Due to a recent post, I searched for tips and found scattered comments on drilling holes and using vacuums, etc. So I wondered if any would care to share tips that we have accumulated. I'm not thinking of the specialty tool stuff but simple items like this:

1. When pulling cable down a wall with junk to move, check the other side. It may be clear!

2. Use a short piece of fish tape for fishing open walls. Use it like a needle and simply "thread" the wall.

3. Always make a hole in the top plate and see if you can fish to the floor BEFORE making a hole in the wall!

4. A length of pull light chain or something similar is great for uninsulated walls. Or a pull string with a weight attached.

when fishing from the basement or crawl space drive and counter set a 16 penny finish nail to Mark your plate, don't forget to allow for any molding.

Get some long route/cable marking flags if wiring a double wide or crawl space. Tie all your cables on the wire so you only have to go under the building once.

Use pulleys on long pulls and around corners.

My last one for now, watch your language on that difficult fish, a customer may be listening. Boy I could write a book on this one.

Dave, Bill -

All good advice. I'm also a big believer in Pulleys for going around corners.

Re' watching your language on a tough pull -

I was pulling cable (or trying to) down a plaster wall in an occupied hospital office. The lath was metal and of course when I cut a hole to pull the cable out the ends of the lath were sharp and consistently cut my hand. I was at it a good 10 minutes and was bleeding all over the carpet when one of the secretaries piped up complaining about the mess I was making.

I caught myself cursing under my breath and noticed all the women staring at me. I shut up. I was still at it, (still bleeding!) 5 minutes later when I finally got the nose down out of the hole and my partner pipes up on the walkie-talkie - "OK - that's all there is."

I almost dropped the MF-Bomb, caught myself and let loose with a blast in Yiddish. After all who would understand it?

No one in the office said anything and then the 75 year old lady in the corner walked over to me, leaned down and whispered with a grin:

"My little sister's sweaty what?"

Good thing she grinned, As it was I almost died.

Sam

:rofl: :rofl:

These are the things I tell my helpers. Maybe you already know these tricks.

To add a wire to an existing location, use the wire that's already there as a snake, assuming enough slack.

Use an insulation hanger in a drill to get the location near a wall. (Like the nail trick, above) The sharp end will go right through most wooden floors and subfloors. If it's old petrified oak, use the hammer drill. Drop a finish nail in the hole when you're done. They'll think the carpenter screwed up.

Tape is cheap. Make a good strong splice when hooking the wire to the snake.

The best protection is proaction. When wiring a home or office, if there are back-to-back wall boxes, run a 4-pair jumper between them, leave the ends un-terminated, and make a mental note or a written note in the file for that customer. You never know when a wire in a wall will go bad, or when they will ask for one more jack, and you'll be a hero when you produce a spare wire, already installed.

Always make every hole one size bigger than you intended to. You will always need the extra diameter, either in an hour, or in a year.

Leave a pull string in every pipe.

Use a level.

Paint the backboard.

When drilling a route through multiple floor joists, use a chalk line to establish the row of holes. Then go back and mark where the center of the drill bit goes on each joist. It will make the pulling easier, and make Sparky jealous.

A mushroom screwed into the backboard makes a perfect axle for a spool of cross-connection wire. No more chasing the spool across the closet floor into that pile of used Big Mac wrappers. It makes the cross connections go quicker, and makes Sparky jealous.

Always scope out the various routes in a basement or ceiling. Then put up all the drive rings or hangers, along the route. Once you get going, nothing puts a crimp in your plans like having to stop and re-evaluate the route.

A 2" white PVC waste pipe from the basement to the attic for future wires is cheap insurance that you'll never need it. (And it will make Sparky jealous.)

Always curse in a foreign language. Sam, any easy to pronounce suggestions?

Always make sure you are in the right stud cavity before cutting a hole for your work box/low voltage bracket. Blank plates don't look that nice
I was lucky on one job, I just drilled another hole in the correct header and ran my wire down.
I have used the trick with an old wire to pull the new in, however I've also lost the wire because I did not have enough tape.

Like Arthur said, run pull strings. Not just in pipe but also when doing long runs through a drop ceiling. You never know when you will need to run something else. Also if you use a string someone else left, run a new string for the next guy.
A customer of mine had an alarm put in and luckily there was some extra wire going through the hole on both sides so I was able to use that wire to run several more, and left a pull string for myself. Saved a lot of time because I will be back next week to run more cable for security cameras
I also don't like when people put tie wraps on bridle rings, it is not as easy to run new wires in, because you have to take the time to cut those ties!
(mental note to ask my grandpa some good curse words in Romanian, Hungarian, or Yiddish when I go home for thanksiving )

One I found recently:

~~If you are trying to fish a long length of larger diameter (2+") conduit, and the tape binds and will NOT go any further, and you have room for this, go get a 200' piece of 1/2" ENT from the local supply place (big box store). It is cheaper than a 200' fish tape, flexible enough to wind past sweeps, yet stiff enough to be pushed through where a tape might bind or hang. Drilling a hole large enough for poly line through the side of the nose completes your impromptu tape. $35 worth of smurf pipe saved me from having to order a very expensive tape, and waiting a week to get it.

A few oldies-but-goodies:

~ Pull your longest runs first, so when you are left with shorter pieces on the reels/in the box, you can match them with short runs and not waste a lot of cable.

~ If you do not have room on your stands to put all of your reels, a 1" 10' stick of IMT ($15 or so, give or take a few) and some D-rings make a great wire rack on new-conn projects. Put it up high enough and people can walk under it w/o stepping all over the cable and w/o the reels being in a place where people walk. It's also a theft deterrent: harder to steal something they cant reach, and you get straighter, easier pulls in higher ceilings.

~ Use cable lube on larger bundles of cable, or when pulling cable overtop or beside existing cable. imo, it is MUCH easier to pull offset lengths at the end rather than pre-stagger them, especially when the cable is lubed.

~ If you are installing cable through any fire rated walls, you had better know every spec on them and have sheets handy for the fire marshal when he tries to wrongly fail you for code compliant work. grr...

Jack

Excellent tips Arthur and all, however:

"A 2" white PVC waste pipe from the basement to the attic for future wires is cheap insurance that you'll never need it. (And it will make Sparky jealous.)"

is a code violation, but funny and prudent nonetheless (just use grey instead).

Jack

If it's ok to use it for waste, or vent, why isn't it ok to use it for low voltage? You have a NEC reference for this?

Use coated aluminum screw together push rods when running wires thru ceilings. They keep you from having to open a lot of celing tiles. Also you can attach a mini flashlight to the lead rod and see where you are going. (Music Supply Company has all kinds of great install gadgets)

You can run a metal fish tape down a wall, put a toner on it up in the ceiling (one lead to the tape, another to a metal stud or left hanging) and then find the tape in the wall with a probe.

Fiber glass rods are still the best thing for fishing a wall, especially when it is full of insulation.

Use different colors of cross connect wire.....example: blue/white for analog phones, red/white for digital phones...yellow/blue for co lines etc. Makes it easier to figure out what it all is and where its going especially when you have a big mdf.

When using a pull string to pull a wire, loop the string around the wire three or four times before you tape it. The harder you pull the tighter the loops get. Don't pull so hard you break the string.

^ I thought that I was the only person to carry three colors of cross-connect. Don’t you just love looking at a whole wall of blue & white wires?

The telecom department here uses 5 or 6 different colors for the phones across campus.

yes those screw-together fiberglass push rods are nice, but expensive. Any way to make them at home?

anything that saves me time and makes me money isn't "expensive ". my collection of sticks , pull rods , fish tapes etc dont owe me a cent Ive got stuff I dont use but a couple times a year but when I need them I'm glad they are there ...

"Remember, you can earn more money, but when time is spent it is gone forever."
--Zig Ziglar

08 NEC:

"800.110 Raceways for Communications Wires and Cables.
Where communications wires and cables are installed in a raceway, the raceway shall be either of a type permitted in Chapter 3 and installed in accordance with Chapter 3 or listed plenum communications raceway, listed riser communications raceway, or listed general-purpose communications raceway installed in accordance with 800.154 and installed in accordance with 362.24 through 362.56, where the requirements applicable to electrical nonmetallic tubing apply. The raceway fill tables of Chapter 3 and Chapter 9 shall not apply."

Plumbing PVC is neither listed in Chapter 3 or listed as communications raceway. 352.2 and 352.6 would seem to exclude using plumbing PVC over grey RPVC.

Jack

Thanks, now I can tell the alarm guy who taught me that trick that he needs to change his evil ways.

I'll use SCH 40 from now on.

(tho I suppose it isn't an NEC issue until cables are run through it.)

Jack

And by then the NEC Police are long gone.

Lowe's sells fiberglass chimney cleaning rods that screw together and don't cost much.

drilling asbestos floor tile? a dollop of foamy shaving cream limits the offdust.

Gopher Pole.....a drop ceilings horny sister...makes the cable almost go in by itself

As an alternative to screw together fiberglass rods I use these: https://www.lsdinc.com/content/product_details/51

a bit cheaper and i just overlap a few inches and tape a couple together if I need more than 6ft. The pre drilled hole in one end will take one twisted pair nicely. (one pair through the hole seems to hold better than tape that can slide off) They have saved me a ton of time with wall fishing. (is wall fishing a sport?)

MNDAVE suggested pull chain for a light as a 'fish' helper. Try DoubleJack chain. Like the pull chain, no sharp edges to snag, stronger, more mass, almost impossible to tangle up into a ball, easier to make it swing in a cavity, and easier to tie cable to. Used to be 10 cents a foot, probably 50 cents a foot now! I used to buy 20 foot lengths, so if it did get hung, I still had some left to finish the job with!

Ever read the BSP for that operation? It recommends drilling through a dollop of machinery grease. The grease is then wiped up and disposed of in a special container. Then a special cleaning agent is used to get up the grease residue. Then a special soap is used to get up the cleaner residue.

All of the wiping material is disposed of "in accordance with local company procedures."

Instead use nylon kite string, the wire will break before the string does. To make the pull easier, tie the string to the wire, fold the wire over and tape to itself. Now the leading edge is bullet shaped and it will nose though tight areas easier. when you are at the end, two snips and you are done. it uses maybe 6" of wire and a couple inches of kite string that comes on a few hundred foot spool that also works for rewinding. It works great when fishing cash wraps for equipment upgrades.

Edit: If you are breaking any string you have exceeded the pull limit on the cable. You may want to look at what else you are doing wrong.