Wiring the Old Shed for Power

Here are the pictures of the start of my shed wiring project. I am running 40 amp 220v service from the house to the shed. I want the ability to do some welding from the shed so that is the reason for the 40 amp 220v service. There are 4 conductors of 8 gauge copper. For those of you that don't know too much about house wiring you need 4 conductors for 220v service; 2 hots, one common and one ground. In Hanover county you are required by code to bury PVC 18 inches below grade, so that is what I have attempted. Apparently the depth that I have was not quite deep enough because I failed the "rough in" inspection today. Damn! The shallowest section of my pipe is 12 inches deep. I can't go too much deeper because my phone cable from the street junction box to the house runs right across the area where my trench runs. The phone cable is 20 inches deep and the PVC pipe needs to be 18 inches deep. What to do, what to do? Perhaps I could get by with placing a piece of pressure treated lumber or some paver bricks over top of the PVC to provide extra protection that the additional dirt would provide.

Additionally, Hanover requires two 8 foot ground rods driven all the way into the ground (need some exercise, try that!). The two rods need to be at least 6 feet apart from each other and a separate ground wire needs to be run from the electrical box inside the shed to both ground rods.

While I am at it I figured I would run two Cat5 cables out to the shed. Easier to do it now than later. One cable for phone service, and one cable for ?? (perhaps an intercom system).

Not shown in these pictures is a circuit box located on the outside of the shed where I plug in the welder and extension cords for various things (xmas lights..).

Still waiting to get a price on building a garage like this. Dominion did really well this year and they rewarded their employees well so I am taking that $$ to build a nice garage.