Wire guage

[Tango287]

Hi folks I am a newbie. I have installed on my outdoor shed 8, 15 watt panels running into a charge controller then into 6, 6volt golf cart batteries. From there to a pure sine wave inverter (good for 1000 watts). Now I want to run a wire into my house to a new wall plug. This will be used for power outages just for lights. I will use the system on a daily basis to power a lamp or two. Someone told me if I only used during outages I could burn up the batteries but I thought that was what the charge controller was for. Anyway, my question is what gauge wire should I use to go into the house? Can you use too heavy of a wire? I have plenty of 12/2 with a ground outdoor rated. I only need to run about 20 feet of wire total.

Thanks!!

[Mike90250]

A 100W lamp only consumes about 1 amp at 120V, so your 12ga wire is plenty large enough.
Then you need circuit breakers, to prevent a short from starting a fire, proper condouit for the cable and waterproof entry to the house. And beware, when you install an outlet to a house, you are making a modification to the inspected wiring and may be in a "out of compliance" situation, where if there is a fire or accident, your insurance may be invalidated because of the inverter and outlet you installed. And a mod sine inverter cannot be connected to a grounded electrical system, because it is NOT designed to be wired in that method, and will likely fault or fail.

[Tango287]

Thanks!

A 100W lamp only consumes about 1 amp at 120V, so your 12ga wire is plenty large enough.
Then you need circuit breakers, to prevent a short from starting a fire, proper condouit for the cable and waterproof entry to the house. And beware, when you install an outlet to a house, you are making a modification to the inspected wiring and may be in a "out of compliance" situation, where if there is a fire or accident, your insurance may be invalidated because of the inverter and outlet you installed. And a mod sine inverter cannot be connected to a grounded electrical system, because it is NOT designed to be wired in that method, and will likely fault or fail.

Thanks for your reply. I am using a pure sine wave inverter.

[SunEagle]

Thanks for your reply. I am using a pure sine wave inverter.

Based on the questions you are asking I believe you have zero knowledge of electrical circuits and wiring.

Do not install a fixed receptacle in your home. Besides being against the NEC code it can be dangerous.

Just run an extension cord from the inverter close to where you want to plug in your lamp. Make sure you protect the wire from getting damaged or a tripping hazard.

You will also need to add over-current protection (fuse or beaker) for the wire that you are running from the Charge Controller to those 6v batteries and another over-current device between the battery system and your inverter.

Please be careful because the electric current from the inverter can kill you.

[Tango287]

Thanks for your input. I do have a question. On the other end of the line I installed a plug that plugs into the inverter. If I only use the outlet during power outages (instead of on a daily basis) and keep the plug at the inverter end unplugged until needed isn't that the same as an extension cord?

Thanks.