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Electric baseboard heat in a new living area is convenient and doesn’t require tapping into the house’s main heating system. Some units come with plugs, but most are meant to be wired directly into the house’s electrical supply. For maximum comfort, place heaters on exterior walls. A New Circuit: Whether a plug-in or hard-wired mod el, the heating element in a baseboard unit large enough to heat a room consumes a substantial amount of electricity For example, baseboard heaters for ordinary 120-volt household circuits come in units drawing up to 1,500 watts of power—about 12.5 amps. More powerful models drawing 2,000 watts or more may require a 240-volt circuit. To meet such demands, plan to run a new circuit from the service panel to the room you intend to heat. Unless you are familiar with connecting a new circuit to the service panel, leave that part of the job to a professional. In rare instances, the electrician may recommend an increase in the amount of power coming into the house and a new service panel. Buying the Right Size: As a rule of thumb, plan to in stall about 10 watts of heat for every square foot of floor area. A heating supplier can fine-tune this estimate if you provide the room’s dimensions and the number of windows in it. If possible, furnish the amount of insulation in the walls, floor, and ceiling, as well as the aver age hours of daily winter sunlight. CAUTION Do not connect the new circuit to the service panel until you have finished installing the heater. TOOLS
MATERIALS
INSTALLING A BASEBOARD HEATER 109 1. Running a new circuit. • Baseboard heaters have a knock out toward one end, usually in the back, to accommodate electrical cable. Bore a 3/4” hole in the wall about 2” above the floor where this end of the heater will be located. • Route electrical cable from the service panel to the hole drilled in the wall of the new living space. Possible paths for the cable include a basement, crawlspace, or attic. Leave about 2’ of extra cable at the service panel and at least 8” of cable protruding from the hole. 110a 2. Mounting the brackets. Lay the unit on the floor next to its planned location, remove the base board from the wall, and mark positions for mounting clips or screws. In one system , clips that are screwed to the wall fit into slots in the heater back. 110b 3. Connecting the heater. • Unscrew the wiring box cover plate from the front of the heater and remove the knockout in the back of the unit. • Fit the knockout hole with a cable clamp and install the cable. • Step about 0.75” of insulation from the black and white cable wires and , using wire caps, connect these wires to the black or blue wires of the heater. When in stalling a 240-volt unit, mark the end of the white cable wire black, to indicate it carries current. • Connect the bare ground wire in the cable to the green screw terminal in the wiring box. • Replace the cover plate and complete the installation by slipping the heater onto the wall clips. If the unit has a wire for a remote thermostat, be sure that this wire remains accessible. 111a 4. Mounting a remote thermostat. Some baseboard heaters allow for a thermostat to be in stalled in one end of the unit. In such a case, connect the heater wires to the thermostat according to the manufacturer’s directions. A heater that uses a separate low-voltage thermostat usually includes enough wire to install it. The manufacturer will connect this wire at the heater, but you must make the connections at the thermostat. Place the thermostat where it will not be affected by direct sunlight, drafts, or the heater itself; if possible, put it near a door so that the doorframe will partially conceal the wiring. • From the heater, run the thermostat wires along baseboards, doorframes, and walls to the thermostat location, then staple them in place. If the wire is too short, replace it entirely with three-strand thermostat wire; do not use door bell wire. • Attach the thermostat backplate to the wall, then connect the color-coded thermostat wires to the backplate terminals marked R for red, B for blue and w for white . • Screw the thermostat and its cover to the backplate. A PLUG FOR PORTABILITY 111b Installing a receptacle. Plug-in heaters come equipped with several’ of power cord; if the cord is too short to reach the nearest outlet box replace it with a longer heavy- duty cord containing No. 14-gauge wire. Then, instead of running the new circuit into the heater, install an outlet box to hold a receptacle for it. • Cut an opening for an outlet box designed to clip securely to wall board. Clamp the cable to the box and mount it in the wall. • Connect the black cable wire to a brass screw terminal on a grounded receptacle and the white wire to a silver terminal. • Using a wire cap and two short jumper wires, connect the bare cop per cable wire to the green screw terminal of the receptacle and to a grounding screw in the back of the box. • Fasten the receptacle to the outlet box and screw a cover plate over the entire assembly. |
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