We buy electrical wire in Seabrook and Kemah.

Pedestal power and the wire behind it

A pedestal is a small distribution point with a hard life. A 50 amp receptacle, a breaker, sometimes a meter, and a feeder running back to a shore panel through a conduit bank under the dock. The feeder is usually copper, 6 AWG to 2 AWG for a single pedestal, and larger where one run feeds a row of four or six.

When a dock is rebuilt, the pedestals and their feeders come out together. Some of that cable is cut at both ends and short. Some is a continuous run of eighty or a hundred feet pulled intact because the conduit was being replaced anyway, and that piece is the one worth photographing.

Dock lighting and small circuits come out with the feeders, usually in poor condition and often in short pieces. Separate them from the better cable so a good run of feeder is not judged by the worst thing in the pile. Two photographs, one of each group, does that in a minute.

• Pedestal feeders, 6 AWG to 4/0
• Shore panel to dock subpanel runs
• 50 amp and 30 amp receptacle whips
• Dock lighting and bollard circuits
• Travel lift and hoist supply cable

Shore power cord and boatyard lead

Shore power cord is a flexible construction, usually 30 or 50 amp, with moulded ends and a jacket made to take abrasion from a dock edge and a hull. It gets replaced when the jacket splits, when the plug runs hot, or when the cord goes into the water and stays there for a week.

Boatyard lead is heavier: 6 and 4 AWG SOOW, sometimes 2 AWG, run from a yard panel out to a cradle or a shed. It is dragged, driven over and left in the sun. The copper inside is often sound long after the jacket has given up, which is why the ends and the outer surface decide how it grades.

Neither is a reel lot. Both arrive in coils, sometimes in a bin, occasionally still fitted with the plug that failed. That is normal, and it can be reviewed where it lies without untangling anything first. Give the coil count and the conductor sizes, and the answer follows from there.

Storm surge replacement on the bay front

The bay front takes water in a way that inland streets do not. Surge comes up through the marina, lifts docks, and pushes into the shore-side panels and the conduit that serves them. Salt water in a conduit does not drain away; it sits and works on the cable for as long as the pipe stays full.

Replacement after a surge is wholesale rather than selective. A row of pedestals, the subpanel behind them, the walkway lighting, and often the service to the property. That produces a large, mixed, wet lot at a single address, and it is worth describing at length rather than in one line.

The honest version of that description says which reels were under water and which were merely outdoors for a season. A buyer can work with either answer, but not with a guess. If nobody on site is sure, say that too, and let the cut ends settle it when the reel is inspected.

After a surge, photograph each group where it lies. Cable that has been moved twice before it is described is harder to grade.

Moving cable from a dock, a lift or a shed

Waterfront property is awkward for vehicles. Parking is short, the walkway is narrow, and the nearest place a truck can stand may be a hundred feet from the cable. Say where the truck can stop and what the path is like, including steps, ramps, gates, handrails and anything overhead that a lifted reel would foul.

Lifts and hoists complicate it further. If the cable came off a travel lift or a boat hoist, it may be up on the structure rather than at ground level, and getting it down is part of the job. Say how high it sits and whether the equipment can be locked out for the visit.

• Where a truck can stop and how far it is
• Steps, ramps, gates and handrails on the route
• Whether the cable is on a lift, a dock or the ground
• Whether the boatyard is working that day
• Whether the reels are banded and stable

A photograph taken from the street, showing the route to the cable, answers more than a paragraph about access.