Wired Home Networking Question

[haunter]

What are you a gay fish?
Sorry, could not resist the south park reference.

lulz.

see dash's post

mine are labeled 'fish stix', got them at menards I think

 

[RocketTech]

I have fish tape and don't even bother bringing it on jobs- fiberglass rods are where it is at. For tips, I recommend a screw tip (screw tip into end of cable jacket and pull, tape additional cables to first), a J-hook tip, and a wisp head. I have a 20-odd piece set of heads and use the screw and J-hook 99% of the time. Everything else is a gimick IMO, until you have the experience to know what you need. For old work, make sure your new boxes line-up with existing boxes, and try to color-match existing plates. If you are at the store and forgot color, get Almond or off-white. White will catch your eye in the store, but 95% of plates are Almond.
You can usually find walls from the attic- you'll see the top 2x4 on the attic floor. Going into the basement, I would cut the wall plate hole first, then use a flex auger bit to drill into the basement. Be aware of any obstructions that may be near the exit hole.
Stay away from gimicks, or at least ask in here- most labor saving devices only save the inventor from labor by taking your cash.

 

[Xonim]

Nice setup. Ive been thinking about doing the same for a house I am buying. Though I plan on only making 4 drops in the ML, maybe 2 in each bed room. What did you use to fish the wires through? any tips or suggestions?

Truthfully, the drops I did weren't difficult at all - no fishing necessary. It just took so long because I'm a novice, and this was my first time doing such a thing. I only did 4x runs terminated to a single jack in each room, 3 rooms total. I didn't bother running drops to the bedrooms because we don't plan on having TVs in there, and those would've been significantly more difficult.

For room #1, I had open access to the wall (shared with the utility room where I terminated everything). To get to the others, I had to get over the hallway, so we drilled through a 2x10 (well, it was 3 thick, so 3 I guess) using a 1" flat bit. Made 2 holes, 4 cables in each hole.

Once over the hallway I had access to rooms 2 and 3 from the crawl space. I could see the bottom of our coax jack in room #2 from the very back corner, so we just cut the plate in midway between the coax jack and the floor, then dropped the wire down. For room #3, we had some ductwork that ran up between false walls. We measured out the wall, cut the plate in, and fed the cables through through about 6-8" under one of the ducts.

 

[/usr/home]

Have you guys ever used the fiberglass fish tape? I'm curious on it. It looks like it could stay straight, but yet be a lot more flexible than the rods.

 

[RocketTech]

I have a 25' FiberFish, a 3/16 fiberglass rod in a coil. I mostly use it in tight locations, such as under desks or in closets where a longer rod isn't convenient. I don't see it as a necessity, just handy at times. Where a longer fiberglass fish tape would beat rods is for use in conduit with bends- I find the bends puts too much strain on the joints. It is not common to run data cabling in conduits, so I guess it comes down to circumstances.

 

[BoogerBomb]

I ran two Cat 6 cables from the master bedroom (where the Uverse gateway is) to the other bedrooms. We had just removed all the insulation in preparation for some new blown in so while it was easy to locate the walls, it was hot as hell up there. But wouldnt you know it the 50 foot cable I bought to run to the living room was about 10 feet too damned short. I was fucking pissed because I wasnt about to get raped for a 75 footer from local retail places. The next day the blown in was put in so I may run it outside the house cause I ain't fucking around with moving the blown in, plus three of the walls are outside walls so they all have insulation in them.

The cables I bought where longer than I needed for the other rooms so I shoved all of it down the walls so that it had more than enough at the bottom for me to cut a hole in the wall and snag it with my fingers.

 

[dashpuppy]

I have a 25' FiberFish, a 3/16 fiberglass rod in a coil. I mostly use it in tight locations, such as under desks or in closets where a longer rod isn't convenient. I don't see it as a necessity, just handy at times. Where a longer fiberglass fish tape would beat rods is for use in conduit with bends- I find the bends puts too much strain on the joints. It is not common to run data cabling in conduits, so I guess it comes down to circumstances.

That's the hard way still.

Using light string, and toilet paper. Make a ball a fluffly big one, then tie string in the center. Put it in one end of the pipe. Go to the other end with your vaccuume, and turn it on. POOF it should suck the tp and string right to ya I do it all the time..

 

[/usr/home]

That's the hard way still.

Using light string, and toilet paper. Make a ball a fluffly big one, then tie string in the center. Put it in one end of the pipe. Go to the other end with your vaccuume, and turn it on. POOF it should suck the tp and string right to ya I do it all the time..

Lmao. That's the craziest thing I've heard all day. I'm assuming your talking about running through the wall space?

 

[RocketTech]

That's the hard way still.

Using light string, and toilet paper. Make a ball a fluffly big one, then tie string in the center. Put it in one end of the pipe. Go to the other end with your vaccuume, and turn it on. POOF it should suck the tp and string right to ya I do it all the time..

Sounds great for empty conduit, but partially filled conduit might be another matter... You'd just wind up with a mess. Not to mention if I showed up to the job with a roll of toilet paper and string, I might not be coming back.

 

[jeffmoss26]

A lot of people do that with string and a sandwich bag to fish empty conduits.
Depending on what I am doing, I will use glow rods or a fish tape. Going over drop ceilings, glow rods all the way. Fishing an insulated wall or a conduit, fish tape.

 

[dashpuppy]

Sounds great for empty conduit, but partially filled conduit might be another matter... You'd just wind up with a mess. Not to mention if I showed up to the job with a roll of toilet paper and string, I might not be coming back.

it's called being innovative, one of the main electrical guys gave me a thumbs up for that idea, all "HIS" time he was using fish tapes and stuff to fish stuff through them. And when your pulling a strink that's more than 300 feet, well the toilet paper and stuff works WICKED!

 

[valve1138]

Dash is right, that idea works great for empty conduit. You can also use ping pong balls.