I was excited to get my sense installed this weekend. I live in Colorado and the fire code for new homes has the panel outside. I contacted sense about this because I was concerned of the high and low temperatures outside. They recommended installing outside of the panel in a water proof box. I just wanted to post for anyone else how I got this done. My father is a master electrician and I worked for his company in my younger years, so I have electrical experience. PLEASE consult an electrician as working in a panel can be very dangerous.
I found an outdoor electrical junction box at home depot. I had to create my own holes for connectors and the antenna using 1/2" drill bit. I used 1/2" flexible wire tubing and water proof connectors to connect from the junction box to the panel. I was a little worried that 1/2" would be too small for the connectors sense uses but I was able to barely fish in all connectors. I first fished the connector that as the ‘claws’ to sense power from the main panel back to sense’s box. I then fished the actually power connection end from sense’s box to the panel. This way I did not have to fish the power connection connector through the 1/2" line (as the other side only had wires). This worked well and made it easier.
The sense box sits under my sub panel. There was no room to easily put it under my main panel. Luckily I had enough slack for each cable to reach my panel. No picture of the inside of my panel because I am embarrassed at the sloppy mess the original electrician did!
When you say behind your panel? Does that mean it’s in the room behind the panel?
That room would be my garage in my case. Right now it would not be that much better to put it there and I was concerned about the length of cable not being able to reach. Plus this was easier setup
I think I might get some kind of material to shade and deflect sun. That side of my house does not get as much sun but still gets some. I might put a temperature sensor in that box since sense does not have one.
It’s in the panel, but behind the panel along with the guts, probably same as yours I’d expect it to have seen 120* several times this summer with mean daily temp over 90* for close to a hundred days straight? My garage is a little better - I think it only topped out at 105* this summer
Careful what sort of sensor you put in there (at least post up if it works!), a zigbee one might interfere with Sense transmission
haha, good question! I just went in the garage to confirm what I thought. There is ground rod just inside the garage that goes through the concrete foundation. There is another ground wire running up through the garage ceiling into drywall, so I can’t see where it is going. That is kind of surprising as I would have thought it went to the basement. Maybe it still does but I can’t see past the drywall.
Typically when I worked for my father company (this was in Maryland), you would install a ground rod and then clamp another ground to the main water pipe.
