Planning a recharging cabinet

17 years ago

Hi all,

I am remodeling my kitchen and have the electrical work pretty much finished. I have the 7 lines coming into the kitchen, 1 for the garbage disposer, 1 for the dishwasher, 1 for the microwave and gas stove, 1 for the fridge and toekick heater, 1 for the lights and 2 for over the counter outlets. I want to build a series of maybe 6 to 8 outlets inside one of my wall cabinets to manage the growing number of rechargable items we are starting to accumulate. I realize that the 2 lines for over the countertops are supposed to be dedicated but it would seem to be the most convenient place to tap off of. I can't see the chargers drawing that much amperage but then again I am having trouble figuring out the amps on the various devices.

These are the items that would probably be plugged into the over the counter outlets: Cordless telephone, computer, printer and a coffee maker. For the recharging outlets I had planned to use the following items: NiMh battery recharger(12v), 2 cellphone rechargers (5.9v, 5v), Gameboy recharger(5.2v), video camera battery recharger(5.2v). There may or may not be more chargers in our future. Any advise would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Mark

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Comments (4)

pjb999
17 years ago
Mark,

Overseas I've seen special outlets that are like power boards in themselves, or you can get those adapters that plug into a double outlet and give you six outlets, designed for low-drain appliances just like you propose. This would be a way perhaps of avoiding code violations since I doubt you could just hang an extra 8 outlets off what's probably supposed to be a dedicated circuit, or you could just provide an extra, dedicated circuit. I like your idea in principle, anyway.

In order to calculate the load, which will mostly be small except the computer. printer and coffee maker. The first two will probably be small but the printer might draw a bit if it's a laser.

In order to calculate your total load, it's ampsxvolts=watts, but in your case you don't want to use the output voltages you've quoted me, as that doesn't really tell us how much current the adaptors will use. Most will say "120v 150ma" or something similar - a ma is a millampere. I suspect none of the plug packs will add up to very much.

If the outlet's in a cabinet - again, check if this is legal, it may be easier and again more legal, to nicely mount a plug-in power board in the cupboard, plugged into the outlet you put in there - that way you can get 8 or 2x4 outlets, without wiring in all those outlets- when you say 6 to 8 do you mean 3 or 4 doubles, or do you really mean 6 to 8 doubles? That's a lot.

Make sure heat's not going to be a problem, perhaps if there's going to be an airspace over the cupboard, you could cut a nice ventilation hole at the top and cover it with a grille.
Ron Natalie
17 years ago
There's a thing out there now called a Squid. It's like a surge suppressor strip but rather than being rigid it has 6 or so legs to it each with a receptacle. Lets you plug in all the wall warts at once.

I've got a 4" sink front bump out cabinet just stuck on the wall under my wall phone in the kitchen. Keep phone books and larger stuff behind the doors, the tilt-outs are where we dump the keys and charge up the cell phones.
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marklevinson1
Original Author
17 years ago
Thanks guys,

I really like the idea of the power squid. I checked it out online. With a couple of those or something equivalent I would really only need one outlet in the cabinet! Now I will just have to figure out how to handle the maze of wires and whatnot.
pjb999
17 years ago
Plastic hooks on the wall, or cable clips, and cable ties. Avoid coiling up A/C wires, as they overheat, but it's fine to coil up the dc wires, the thin ones that exit the plugpacks.... then tie them off with a cable tie.

If you're happy to rewire plugs on 120v cords, any mains cords that are too long you could shorten and put a new plug on. You'd be surprised how much that improves things.

I'm also a big fan of velcro, you could stick some stuff to the cabinet with it. The other thing you could do to bundle cables is spiral wrap which is this tube with a helical split in, which you can wrap around wires to keep them neat...I love the stuff.

Planning a recharging cabinet

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pjb999

Ron Natalie

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