Background Story:
About two weeks ago, my wife, son, and myself moved in to a new 2 bedroom house. One of the bedrooms on the main floor is being used as an office while the other is my son's room. You may now be asking yourself, "where do you sleep?". Sometime ago, the attic was converted in to a loft. Its a fairly neat room (though not a bedroom as it lacks a closet) and is awesome to live in.... except for one small detail. there is no heater register and no duct work to add on. This should not be a problem during the summer, but it has been -20F a few times during this winter.
A Temp Fix:
As a temporary fix, we have been using a small space heater in the loft, while this does get the place to heat up, it takes a few hours to get warm and we have to remember to get the heater going about 3 hours before bedtime.
A Better Fix:
Since the space heater is a really small unit, I decided to make a thermostat controlled outlet box to regulate the temperature in the loft. Things are a bit tight, but everything fits inside the gang box.
Things needed:
  • Honeywell Baseboard Thermostat
  • Duplex Outlet (Home Depot was out of the regular ones, so I grabbed a tamper resistant one)
  • Metal 2-Gang Box - 4"
  • Metal 2-Gang GFCI and Duplex Outlet Cover - 4"
  • Heavy-Duty power cord (i re-used an old, lighter duty PC power cord since my heater is small... but 12 gauge wire is recommended)
  • Y-shaped crimp on terminal connectors.
  • Soldering Iron with Solder.
  • Flux soldering paste
  • Electric tape
A few things to note:
  • Outlets/Plugs: When it comes to outlets, it is important to have the correct polarity. Typically, one contact on a plug will be slightly bigger than the other, This is the Neutral line. The smaller of the two contacts will be the Hot line. DO NOT GET THESE TWO SWAPPED!
  • Baseboard Thermostat Wiring: Most baseboard thermostats have four wires sticking out from the back. In my case, Two red (Neutral) and two black (Hot). One black and one Red will be labeled as "L1/L2" and the other a "T1/T2". Both the "L"'s are connected to the power cord and both the "T"'s will be connected to the duplex outlet.
  • More Baseboard Thermostat Wiring: On most baseboard thermostats, the two red wires will always be connected inside the thermostat, ONLY the two black wires are switched on or off. MAKE SURE THE BLACK WIRES ARE CONNECTED TO "HOT".
Lets Get started:
  1. Lets start out by stripping the outer insulation off the end of the power cord. The power cord that I used had one Green wire (Ground), one Brown (Hot), and one Blue (Neutral). Wire colors and connections in power cords will vary, be sure to check the pinouts using an Ohm meter.
  2. Remove one of the round punch-outs on the bottom of the metal gang box. I choose the center hole. After removing this hole, feed the end of the power cord thru the hole and tie a knot in the cord. This will keep the cord from being ripped out or having other problems in the future
  3. Locate and identify the two "T" wires coming out of the back of the thermostat. Crimp one terminal connector on each of the two "T" wires.
  4. Slip the four wires from the thermostat thru the front of the GFCI hole on the gang box cover, mount the thermostat to the front of the gang cover using the two screws provided with the thermostat.
  5. Connect the black "T" wire from the thermostat to the Hot terminal on the side of the duplex outlet. Next connect the red "T" wire from the thermostat to the "Neutral/Blanc" terminal on the other side of the duplex outlet. You may now mount the duplex outlet to the gang cover. You may want to remove the four break off tabs on the duplex outlet mounting brackets for a nicer fit.
  6. Strip around 2" off the Hot and Neutral wires from the power cord, and from the two "L" terminals on the thermostat. Cross the two Hot wires (Black on thermostat, Brown on power cord) in the center. make two big twists in the center and then three or four tight small twists using the two ends. Do the same with the Neutral wires (Blue on power cord, Red on thermostat).
  7. Plug in and heat up your soldering iron. After your soldering iron is nice a hot, apply flux soldering paste to the two wire splices you created in step 6. Heat each connection with the iron and flow the solder on to the two splices. Wrap the two splices with electrical tape
  8. Crimp one terminal connector to the ground wire (Green) on the power cord. Slip all the wiring inside the gang box and secure the gang cover to the gang box. Make sure you connect the ground terminal to one of the gang cover mounting screws.
The End Result:
The end result to this project came out quite nice. The loft in my house has been staying at a fairly constant temperature during the day and I no longer have to worry about turning on the heater before going to bed.