All in the same ditch/trench

[LBrown59]

Should an electric and phone line running in the same ditch be ran through a separate conduit for each or would running then both in one larger diameter conduit be OK?
How about a gas line in the same trench with them?

 

[mjarrels]

Building code here will not allow it.

mark

 

[LBrown59]

Building code here will not allow it.

mark

It What?

 

[Sully2]

Should an electric and phone line running in the same ditch be ran through a separate conduit for each or would running then both in one larger diameter conduit be OK?
How about a gas line in the same trench with them?

NO WAY in a SINGLE conduit!! NO GAS in the same trench AT ALL.
Here main entrance can be buried direct ( no conduit) AND telephone can go in the same trench ( no conduit) but there must be at least 1 foot of fill between them. Same theory applies underground as to above ground on poles. Telephone men arent suppose to HAVE TO go over electric wires to get to the telephone servic. One of the reasons why anymore..around here..telephone men work from bucket trucks ( plus they are getting too old to be sanding on hooks all day ong)

 

[wroughtn_harv]

NO WAY in a SINGLE conduit!! NO GAS in the same trench AT ALL.
Here main entrance can be buried direct ( no conduit) AND telephone can go in the same trench ( no conduit) but there must be at least 1 foot of fill between them. Same theory applies underground as to above ground on poles. Telephone men arent suppose to HAVE TO go over electric wires to get to the telephone servic. One of the reasons why anymore..around here..telephone men work from bucket trucks ( plus they are getting too old to be sanding on hooks all day ong)

I taught my father to climb poles when he was in his mid fifties. He did fine.

As for the same trench, think of the potential. Can you imagine the fun power would have playing on all the equipment attached to your phone lines? If you had them in the same vicinity and an auger or digging attachment was able to contact both entities at the same time you would have power playing with your puter, your telly, and your phones.

If gas was in there, hmmm, sparks and fuel, sounds like a real party.

This is along the line of the logic of running your waste and water supply lines in the same trench............

 

[montejw]

Should an electric and phone line running in the same ditch be ran through a separate conduit for each or would running then both in one larger diameter conduit be OK?
How about a gas line in the same trench with them?

As others have said, don't put them in the same conduit, you'll get the electromagnetic field feeding into the phone line.

I've seen gas and electric in the same trench, it's just 2 feet wide and they're at the opposite sides. Same with water and waste lines. Neither of them are supposed to leak anyway. Keeping the water higher than the waste helps too.

Monte

 

[flusher]

Should an electric and phone line running in the same ditch be ran through a separate conduit for each or would running then both in one larger diameter conduit be OK?
How about a gas line in the same trench with them?

My 200-amp electric service cables run in 3" dia conduit buried about 24" deep. The building inspector said to drop the direct-burial phone cable in the same trench and backfill. No minimum separation required. Phone works OK.

Don't know about the gas line. Seems to me that it would be safer to run it in a separate trench, especially if you plan to use plastic gas line. My gas line is the black steel type that runs in a separate trench.

 

[Syncro]

12 Inch seperation, thats all on service drops (from the street to the house). Gas lines depend on localities, here its OK, just that 12" rule. We load up trenches with as much as possible, the local gas co loves it when we call them with an open trench so they can drop in their lines. Most utility co's these days require pipe, and no sharing the same conduit.

The only exception to the same trench rule is potable water and sewer lines must be in seperate trenches, sewer generally by itself.

 

[sandman2234]

I have dug up two water lines that were laid right on top of sewer lines. I guess this is a new generation rule, cause it sure didn't apply here, back in the early sixties.
David from jax

 

[LBrown59]

Should an electric and phone line running in the same ditch be ran through a separate conduit for each or would running then both in one larger diameter conduit be OK?
How about a gas line in the same trench with them?

PS
The electric lines would be for branch circuits from the entrance panel not for main 200 amp service line(s) coming in from the pole.
I'm talking about a 15 Amp and a 20 Amp run.
__________________
59

 

[bdeboer]

If you ever have to dig the lines back up, the phone line will always seems to be in the way. The underground to my barn has electric in conduit, a water line, and a direct burial phone line. The phone line is above the water & electric.

 

[woodlot]

If its not to far of a run to be cost prohibitive I'd put the phone and cable TV lines in conduit, separate conduit. You never know when that cat5e is going to be obsolete. Technology changes so fast, you may as well be prepared when it needs replacing.

 

[LBrown59]

If its not to far of a run to be cost prohibitive I'd put the phone and cable TV lines in conduit, separate conduit. You never know when that cat5e is going to be obsolete. Technology changes so fast, you may as well be prepared when it needs replacing.

I've decided to go with one trench about 12 to 15 feet long for
2 elect lines 20 amp breaker: feeds from garage breaker box.
1 elect line 15 amp breaker-from house breaker box.
1 phone line .
What i'm undecided on is Should I go with a seperate conduit for each of the 4 lines, or can I just run the phone line on one small conduit and run the 3 electric lines in one larger Conduit?

 

[VABlue]

Put the electric together but the phone line separate. Also, use larger conduit than necessary and leave fishtape in them. If a future need dictates more wires, you can easily pull them through with the fishtape and not have to dig it all up again.

 

[LBrown59]

Put the electric together but the phone line separate. Also, use larger conduit than necessary and leave fishtape in them. If a future need dictates more wires, you can easily pull them through with the fishtape and not have to dig it all up again.

What is fishtape and where do I get it?

 

[VABlue]

The fancy stuff is a metal line that you push through conduit. You can get it at any Lowes or HD, either on a reel or coiled up on its own. You just tape (or tie) the end of a wire to it and push it through. The non-fancy version is a string pulled through the conduit along with a stiff wire. You can then use the string to pull anything else through. If you always attach more string to anything you pull, you'll always have an easy way to get more wire pulled.

 

[jeffinsgf]

I've decided to go with one trench about 12 to 15 feet long for
2 elect lines 20 amp breaker: feeds from garage breaker box.
1 elect line 15 amp breaker-from house breaker box.
1 phone line .
What i'm undecided on is Should I go with a seperate conduit for each of the 4 lines, or can I just run the phone line on one small conduit and run the 3 electric lines in one larger Conduit?

12 to 15 feet? Why run the phone line? Just get a 2Gb wireless phone. I use mine almost a hundred feet away with a steel building and a brick house between the base and the remote.

 

[lola13]

I taught my father to climb poles when he was in his mid fifties. He did fine.

As for the same trench, think of the potential. Can you imagine the fun power would have playing on all the equipment attached to your phone lines? If you had them in the same vicinity and an auger or digging attachment was able to contact both entities at the same time you would have power playing with your puter, your telly, and your phones.

If gas was in there, hmmm, sparks and fuel, sounds like a real party.

This is along the line of the logic of running your waste and water supply lines in the same trench............

just wish to know why does gas and water lie need to be in seperate trench?

 

[WarrenF]

I've decided to go with one trench about 12 to 15 feet long for
2 elect lines 20 amp breaker: feeds from garage breaker box.
1 elect line 15 amp breaker-from house breaker box.
1 phone line .
What i'm undecided on is Should I go with a seperate conduit for each of the 4 lines, or can I just run the phone line on one small conduit and run the 3 electric lines in one larger Conduit?

I would not do that all in one trench. But then I see against all advice you will do what you want. Good luck if you get ground loops through your phone line. Best of luck when you have to upgrade your phone system when fiber takes over. What I would recommend is that you make sure that you run a large conduit for your phone line....make sure you have a fish tape in the conduit so you can pull upgraded phone lines if you ever need. OOPPSS I see you don't know what a fish tape is. Hmmm, go to Home Depot or Lowes and ask.

 

[Lineman North Florida]

I guess I am missing something with this fishtape advice, if you needed to upgrade your phone line would'nt you just tie a string to one end and pull it out the other end when the last of the phone comes out so does the string and it is then in the conduit ready to pull in new phone line,or make a rat out of a plastic bag with your string tied to it and take your shopvac to the other end of your conduit and suck the rat with the string tied to it in. either way it's no problem to get something old out of conduit and get something new in provided the conduit is large enough.