10/17-24/04 I skipped going to the property this week because my pickup was still in the shop.

On Wednesday I built a spreadsheet to keep track of the electrical wiring for the cabin and to calculate the length of wire needed. Once I decide where all the fixtures, switches, and outlets are going to be, I can decide on the wire runs. Then, by entering all the x,y,z coordinates of the fixtures, switches, outlets, junction boxes, and bends in the wire runs, the spreadsheet will calculate the lengths.

On Friday I spent an hour ($60 worth) with a lighting consultant at Harold's Lighting in Wallingford. I now have a fairly good idea on how to proceed with the design of the lighting and the placement of fixtures. I have already prepared a worksheet floorplan diagram with a coordinate system in feet printed around the perimeter. So once the fixtures are located on the diagram, and the wire runs are drawn in, the x,y,z coordinates should be easy to read off the diagram and enter on the spreadsheet.

On Saturday I decided to see if building an Access database wouldn't work better than the spreadsheets for keeping track of the wiring. I beat my head against the tutorial for Access for a couple hours, but I didn't come to a conclusion as to whether or not to use it. I'll need more help before I do.