Where to run the wire....

I would drill through the double plate in the attic, and snake down to a new outlet location. Don't try to refeed an existing outlet. Unless the wall of the room in question is over 8 feet, there is probably no obstruction in it except insulation. A wire fish tape (snake) should go through it easily

Aye, they are indeed eight foot walls, but there is a firebreak at the midpoint at about four feet up.

Jon

I think it's code here, my house also has them for eight foot walls.

Jon

It's a window AC. It is ugly anyway, and the pigtail is ugly, too. Run the new string through the crawlspace, and come up through the baseboard. Put the dedicated single-hole outlet in one of those surface-mount boxes that are designed to use in a big living room under the long skinny table that goes behind the couch sitting in the middle. If you buy a pretty box, and notch the baseboard so it backs up against the wall surface, nobody will look twice at it.

If you have the working space, a long flex drill could get you through the firestop, or a shorter one might be angledfrom the box hole to the outside of the wall and back to the inside wall at the bottom so as to angle through the bottom footer.

Fiberglass rods go through insulated walls better than a fishtape. However you will need to cut a hole and drill through that fire block so a fishtape might suffice.

Use 12/2 for the A/C line. I would cut in a separate box for the A/C and leave the existing boxes and wiring alone.

Difficult to suggest without seeing. There's no way you drill from the crawl at an angle so that you come out inside the wall space? I have successfully done that in other situations when coming up from the crawl to an exterior wall.

Interesting, I hadn't thought of going through to the outside. Thanks.

Jon

Thanks A, I appreciate it.

Jon

You know, I've done the drill access at the footer before, but somehow I didn't carry the idea over to the header. Thanks!

Jon

I'd just plug it into the existing outlet and be done. You stated in the original message it was only 8a. Even on a 15a circuit, this still leaves plenty for the 'couple o' lights' and the other outlets. Unless it's a microwave plugged into the other outlets, you will never know the difference.

To avoid confusion, I wasn't saying to go through the outside, but to flex the shaft of the drill from the box hole, out against the outside and back to the inside in an arc so that it angles back towards the inside where it drills through the bottom plate right against the insode wall. You would need a helper tool of some sort to get the flex right probably.

The vacuum could be a problem.

That can be a very tricky task in a wall filled with fiberglass insulation

Not if you plug it in a different circuit. Or turn the air off whilst doing such things.

Depends on how close you are to this "relative." For a distant in-law, consider running the wire in a conduit attached to the outside of the house, then through the wall at the desired location.

Should take about an hour and you won't have to muck around in the attic or crawl space (where there might be spiders and other icky things).

Thanks for all of the responses, they were appreciated.

I ended up running the wire in the crawl space, but I did follow the advice of several and installed it into a new outlet (left the existing outlet alone). Also, I picked up one of the long flexible bits, which kept from having to cut big access panels into the wall. Always wanted one of those, and when the local hardware store (Ace) agreed to price match an internet price, it was too good of a deal to pass up.

Took a little longer than I would have liked to, but it's done, and that's what counts.

Jon