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roy_gregorio

Help with Electrical Outlets in Cabinet

6 years ago
last modified: 6 years ago

Hello. I need some help in getting some electrical outlets in a cabinet in the wall I'm building. Any suggestions on how to go about doing this? I'd like to have at least 4 outlets inside the cabinet, drawn in red in my diagram. There is a light switch to the right, and an electrical outlet to the left of the cabinet separated by two studs. Wall is not load bearing. I have very basic electrical knowledge (i.e. installing a new electrical outlet from an existing outlet). Any ideas? Thanks!











Ideally, something like this.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B072FRLY77/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_2?smid=A2CUKWIFN3E002&psc=1



Comments (12)

  • 6 years ago

    I think there are two problems: the cable to the strip you illustrate cannot be behind walls, etc. And, I don't know if you can put any receptacles inside an enclosed cabinet. Other people on this forum can better advise than I can, but I thought would give a quick answer.

  • 6 years ago

    There's no problem with mounting receptacles inside cabinets as far as the code goes. What you need to do is wire a proper receptacle inside the cabinet (junction box, proper cabling leading up to it). To this you can plug in the CORD from the thing you saw on Amazon, and mount its body wherever you like. The cord is fine as long as it remains within the cabinet itself.

  • 6 years ago

    Are you talking about a recessed medicine cabinet with the receptacle on the side like this:



    You could place two of them with one above the other so that you have 4 outlets, but as the others said, the power strip that you linked to isn't designed to be installed in the wall and can't be used that way.


    Where is the switch going to go?


  • 6 years ago

    If you look at the reviews for that item, one of them says it is not UL listed. Also, because it comes with a cord, you can't have it mounted in the wall like a conventional receptacle box. You would need to mount it externally to the wall and be able to plug it in to a standard receptacle.

  • 6 years ago

    greg_2015

    That's pretty much what I'm going for. I think having 2 receptacles, one above the other would work. I'm not really sure about what to do with the wall switch. It controls my vanity mirror light, which has a on/off switch right on the mirror already. I may just leave it inside the cabinet if it is not against code. I'm in the US for reference.

  • 6 years ago

    That switch isn't the main light switch for the room? That doorway that we see isn't the entrance to the bathroom?

  • 6 years ago

    The doorway we see is to the bedroom on the other side. From our point of view, when you go through the door, the main bathroom lights are to the right side of that doorway.

  • 6 years ago

    In that case, you can try to move or get rid of the switch altogether.

    Depending on the length of the wires, you might be able to move it to the other side of cabinet.

    Or if you don't want/need the switch, then you could join the cables in a junction box and put a blank cover plate on it. That box/plate could be inside the cabinet at the top if you didn't want it to be very noticeable, but the junction box needs to remain accessible. You can't bury it behind drywall.


  • 6 years ago

    One other point: receptacles in bathrooms are required to be GFCI-protected, and that means anywhere in a room, including inside of cabinets.

  • 6 years ago

    Do all receptacles in the bathroom need to be GFCI protected? Or just one switch in the circuit?


    greg_2015

    Thanks, I'll have to think about this one for a little bit.

  • 6 years ago
    last modified: 6 years ago

    Perhaps you could explain the purpose of the cabinet and why you want to include these outlets in it.