Ok. Got it sorted out. Replaced the white 6ga with one piece off the spool at Lowes. All wires through conduit are marked and no splices in the LB. Sub Panel is done for now. Previous owner had 5 shop lights up. Really ratty looking. I replaced those and added more. 11 total lights. 80w each light. 880w total. Two are on one circuit. Nine on another. None of those are GFCI receptacles for the shop lights. Unless you have 103" reach, or are on a ladder, can't get to them. Temporarily running power to the sub panel as it was before with the 12 gauge romex. Will swap that over to the 6ga feed wires when I get the new larger panel installed inside the house. But it is full up now and I can't add a 60amp feeder in it without putting more tandems in. Everything works in the garage. The shop lights, save for one, all have pull string switches, but are also on wall switches. One switch by the back garage door controls two shop lights in the side bump out work area. The other switch by the entry door, inside the house, controls the bulk of the shop lights. Prior sub panel was all 20 amp breakers. I only have one 20 amp connected on the new panel where I knew the entire wire run was 12 awg. The rest are 15 amp. I found a mish mash of 12 awg and 14 awg cables mixed on some of the same circuits. So just put all those on 15a breakers. It seems some of the older 12 awg copper is definitely larger diameter than the newer 12 awg wires. Not sure if the smaller wire is imported or not. Added GFCIs to the lower receptacles. Though when I opened the Cooper boxes and took them out, I notice a new sticker is on the side of them now. It says that they are not suitable for wet or damp locations. I presume the garage would be considered damp. Is this mainly for nuisance tripping? I know I need some more cable staples above the sub panel. On the list. The small plastic bushings for the 1/2" metal connectors do not stay on. There is not enough thread on the romex clamps to keep them in place.

You might try pulling the top two breakers on the right and left side to see if there is a tapped hole in the back of the box. Or look at the labels in the box to see if a pair of spaces is designated for a field installed main breaker. Some older boxes were made for field installed back-fed mains. If the hole is there, you could purchase a 2 pole breaker to install in that spot & backfeed it so you would now have a main breaker. One additional step would be required and that would be installing a machine screw through the breaker and into the threaded hole. This is done so that the breaker cannot be unplugged just by pulling it out with your hand. Sylvania may have some other means of installing a main breaker such as a hold down clip.

It's best practice to use perforated PVC (NOT PE black slinky) around the outside of footings/bottom of basement and retaining walls. This pipe is wrapped in a filter sock, clean gravel and protected by thicker geotextile fabric like a burrito. It's best to backfill with clean gravel on top of burrito and against buried walls. This gravel is also protected by fabric. A cap layer of less pervious soil and good slope away from the house redirects surface water, the drainage stuff below is for times of heavy rain and increased groundwater. The perforated pipe transitions to solid pipe as it leaves the gravel burrito at house. It's pitched to drain by gravity, just like downspout drains. Some sites may need to trench 100' or more to drain to daylight. Cleanouts should be provided as needed, same as with waste plumbing. It's also best practice to have a drainage pipe in the slab gravel layer that maintains a consistent slope to daylight, usually requiring a penetration of the stem wall on the downhill side. Very few residential monolithic slabs in our area, but those might need the pipe to go through or under footing. A dry, monolithic slab site may not need a drain if built up well. If basement is a top design priority, and gravity drainage is not possible, then I would specify an airtight sump cover and look into battery backup if in an area of frequent power outages. The wetter and more remote the site, the more nervous I would be without gravity assist. Power failures often coincide with the big weather events that require drainage.

nidnay - at our current facility we have an 8 stall barn with a bathroom, 12' X 18' office, and 12' X 24' tackroom, with the barn being about 125' away from the back of our house (facing it actually). I've lived here for 18 years now and we RARELY EVER use the stalls, so we don't plan on building a 'stable' (or a barn with stalls). The horses are going to live out with shelters in each pasture. Our current barn had to have it's own it's own septic system. $$$ The current land we are looking at only had one perc site for 4 bedrooms. I don't want to pay for the test for a second perc ($250) plus the cost of having another septic system (about $4K), as well as creating a climate controlled office and bathroom in the barn (a mini split system is about $3K and a 2 piece bathroom probably around $2K). That is about $10K right there in a separate septic, a 2 piece bathroom, and office and climate control for both (as well as permitting, creating plans, etc.). All things that would have already been in the house at the square footage we had to build. Plus grading for a large barn was going to be expensive. We found a place next to the house to put in a modest shed row 'barn' for a tack room, feed room and grooming, that will work with the topography of the land for minimal grading work. We did this to keep things cost effective. It's just my husband and I living in this house, it's not like we have kids to keep separated from my business. We're both fine with this situation. The door up the stairs to the main floor will have a lock on it. And I don't have a lesson mill program, I focus on quality not quantity. I've been teaching for over 20 years now. I keep about 8 weekly students at any given time. I get to know my students and my parents well... my students tend to stick around for years. Same for my boarders. We'll have 2 or 3 boarders at the new location. At our current facility 3 of our customers have been with us for 5+ years. At one point or another I end up paying most of my students and all of my boarders to house sit / dog sit / farm sit for us when we go on vacation. I'm pretty confident they are not going to bust the door down to access the main floor of my home. And they won't be there at inappropriate hours of the day / night anyhow. Vigil Carter - I guess you didn't read my last post. We priced out a 1 story 'ranch' with the same builder. 2200 sq ft was going to cost $209,000 THEN another $15K because of the sloped ground to add more courses to the crawl space foundation. This 1700 sq ft two story house, without walkout basement, came in at $178K pre-basement. The cost of the completely finished 840 sq ft basement, with a grand total heated sq ft of 2540, came to a total less than the single story 2200 sq ft ranch. Though we could have gotten a separate entrance in-law space, the in-law space would have been way smaller (by over 150 sq ft) and I would not have had an office that was separate from my main living space. I lift 50 pound bags of feed and hay nearly daily and my husband is military / infantry, we are active horse riders and hikers. I think we can handle interior stairs for another 12+ years. :) At that point if it starts to bother us then we can add a master suit to the side of the house (which we had already spec'd out anyhow but we just do not need at this time).