JD> License or not, it's best to know what you're doing when you tackle 
 JD> electrical stuff. :-) 
Arkansas has no building or electric code; the local utility may want to 
look over an installation, but they ain't too fussy either.  Rural areas 
like mine are totally non hassel. if you want to live in it that is your 
business. 
  
 Some differences with 12vdc power rather than 110: twisted splices are 
often a hassel a few years down the pike because the different alloys in 
different kinds of copper wire set up electrolysis and corrosion, which 
in the case of 12 volts, is enough to make for open circuits. 
 
I went back and soldered all the splices in my cellar where the moisture 
was aggrevating the problem.  I used 12 awg throughout to minimize line 
losses with low voltage DC.  Contrary to popular conception, it is not 
the DC that causes the line losses nearly as much as the low voltage, 
and consequent higher amperage in use.  Of course, I can handle a bare 
12 volt hot wire with my fingers-- til it shorts out and burns them. 
 
I find the small (« inch dia) florescent tubes sold in the RV market 
that run on 12 volts don't seem to last long, but the ballast will run 
a similarly wattage large diameter regular 110 AC florescent.  Whether 
for incandescent or florescent, I found the typical wall switches would 
also burn out after some years... til I started putting 1000 mfd caps 
across the terminals of the switches to abosrb the arcing when the 
light is switched.
--- FLAME v1.1
---------------