Garage Construction Project

2026-05-24 - Southwire 4" Octagon Box with Bracket Shelf Tag (HD upgrade)

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Southwire 4” Octagon Box (with Bracket) — HD Shelf Tag

Superseded for ceiling duplex outlets (2026-06-03)

A later bench check found these 4” octagons are over the NEC box-fill limit for the pass-through ceiling duplex positions (a 1-1/2” octagon = 15.5 in³; a pass-through duplex needs 15.75 in³). 5 of the 6 are being returned and replaced with 4” square (1900) boxes, 2-1/8” deep + 1-gang 5/8” mud rings. One octagon is kept for the stairwell light fixture, where it’s the correct box. See the bench-check photo and the Shopping List correction. The bracket-upgrade rationale below still stands for what was bought at the time.

Home Depot shelf for Southwire 4 inch octagon ceiling box with F-bracket

Photo Details

  • Date: May 24, 2026
  • Time: 6:32 PM EDT
  • Phase: Phase 1 — 120V rough-in procurement
  • Location: Home Depot Mt Pleasant, Aisle 45 Bay 007 (Electrical / Boxes)
  • Subject: Shelf tag and box for the Southwire 4” octagon ceiling box with integral F-bracket — pulled in place of the BOM’s plain 4” octagon

Description

Home Depot shelf tag for the Southwire 54151-F-UPC 4” octagon ceiling box, 1-1/2” deep, with 1/2” & 3/4” knockouts and an integral F-bracket (steel mounting bracket pre-attached for nailing to a stud). The BOM listed the plain octagon (Southwire equivalent at HD ★3.58 — about $1 more per box but dramatically faster to install on the ceiling joists for the three garage door openers and three cord reels, no separate bar hanger needed.

This is one of the “not exact match” items photographed for the future-reader: the BOM showed the cheaper plain box, but on the shelf the F-bracket variant was the right call given the open-ceiling installation context (nail straight to a joist, no improvisation).

Visible Elements

  • Model: Southwire 54151-F-UPC
  • Configuration: 4” octagon, 1-1/2” deep, 1/2” & 3/4” KO, wood or metal stud, F-bracket
  • Carton label: “4” OCTAGON BOX · CAJA OCTAGONAL DE 4” (101.6 MM)”
  • HD SKU/Bay: 1009-220-901, Aisle 45 Bay 007
  • Price: $3.58 each
  • Brand: Southwire (the box on the shelf below — also visible — is the same SKU)

Why This Photo

Documents the deliberate upgrade from plain 4” octagon (3.58). Six boxes × 6 extra spend, easily justified by:

  1. Faster install — Bracket pre-aligns the box face to the future ceiling drywall plane; no separate bar hanger required.
  2. Stud/joist mounting — Nail directly through the bracket to the joist; no second-hand support during the strike.
  3. Same internal cubic — Box fill calculations from Electrical Shopping List — 120V are unchanged.

Receipt Cross-Reference

This item appears on the 2026-05-24 HD receipt as SW 4” OCT 1-1/2”D 1/2”-3/4”KO F-BKT — 6 @ 21.48.

Graph View

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