My electrical panel is in the garage, which is drywalled. There are some available knock-outs in the side of the panel wall and this is mounted between the supporting studs. I want to pull the metal plug out, drill through the 2×6 and run 4, 6gauge wires to a 50 amp 4-prong plug that will be mounted in an external metal box directly beside the panel.
My questions are this:
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Would this be standard practice, recognizing regional codes vary?
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Are there issues with the wires running "wild" as they leave the knock-out hole which won't have a sleeve of any type?
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The wires will go through the 2×6 bend towards the inside of the garage and enter the back of an external box that will house the 4-prong plug?
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I won't have a stud to mount this box to so can I use molly-type drywall fixers to hold the box?
Best Answer
Can't do that, regional variations are not going to allow that much of a basic violation of standard practices in any region where NEC/CEC applies at all.
You need a chunk of conduit here. If it's steel conduit, you can have 3 wires instead of 4, since the conduit is the grounding conductor in that case.
That covers 1&2&3.
For 4:
You can use an "old work" box in drywall, but I would not advise doing that with a 50A receptacle/plug given the forces involved in plugging/unplugging those monsters. Surface mounting a box on the face of drywall is unusual to say the least, and would still be a problem from the plug-force point of view. You could screw a board into the studs and mount a box on the face of that, but it would be cleaner (given that your panel is flush-mount) to just remove a chunk of drywall, drill your hole, install blocking between studs to mount a box, install your conduit and box, replace and patch the drywall, and have a flush receptacle solidly mounted.
If you were planning to drill through the stud from inside the electrical panel, that's a Very Bad Idea and I suggest you think about why that might be and then not do that.