Outdoor Grill Island Build w/ Custom Concrete Counters inset lights ???

[noah1982]

Hello all, I am an experienced stone mason doing a little side work for a family of a friend of mine. The job is to construct out of 18 gauge steel frame a 12' long grill island with refrigerator, 40" SS grill,
SS double doors below, and a SS three drawer pullout finishing out the end. I have constructed the steel frame, attached 1/2" Hardie under that and installed Veranda decking boards along the bottom. I have trenched in Gas/Ele into the island and have wired in a 4 way GFI outlet near the grill and refrigerator modules. My plan is to pour a 2 1/4" thick concrete counter on top having a 14" overhang on the left end of the island supported by two wrought iron corbels as a seating area. I'm also putting a 6" back splash all along the front and pouring another matching concrete counter as a bar top.

Now at this point I need to finish cement boarding the entire thing, including my top pieces of Hardie for the counter top, keeping in mind the overhang needed for the stone and the lighting that I will be insetting into the concrete slab. This is where I'm drawing a blank. I will be insetting 6, 1.5" puck lights into the top bar counter (2 on the sides and 4 facing the prep/cook side) down facing in the actual slab...i was originally going to core drill the Hardie board and silicon in the fixtures...running short 90's of conduit through the Hardie board to go from the back of the fixture to the dead space under the slab so i can wire them all together and pour the fixtures into the slab. But then I wanted the ability to remove the fixture from the slab if it burnt out being that it is LED I'd hate to have it installed then fail and have no way to change it out.

My question is this...i want to be able to unscrew the fixture from the slab and pull it out if i ever need to change it. Im thinking right now about a 1 1/2" pvc cap that i could drill a conduit 90 into and have that running down through the hardie placed before i pour the slab...then once cured i would have perfect circular pvc lined holes with a conduit running from the back down through the slab? I really hope this is making sense. Basically im trying to flush mount circular LED puck lights into a pour in place slab counter with the ability to change them out?

Any ideas would be greatly appreciated

Thanks

 

[gwegan]

Lets start from the code. Generally you cannot do this. The lights you are describing are generally not listed for outdoor applications. You might be able to find some but that will be tough.

Generally most of these are designed for surface mount. If you want to run conduit through concrete coutertop I think you are a bit nuts. I would just run the wiring under the surface of the coutertop. Because its low voltage arguably it does not need to be in conventional conduit. But remember its probably not listed for this use so you are on your own there. If you want conduit try ENT Carlon 1 in. x 25 ft. ENT Coil - Blue-12008-025 - The Home Depot

Its listed for use in slabs. You might try some 2 1/2 inch PVC to make a recess and run the ENT from that. If you were indoors all legal outside ????


A drawing of your plan would be good.

 

[txnole]

Attach your plan drawing. There has to be a second way to achieve this result.