Wiring: July 2005 Archives

After my parents left on the 24th I started working on the basement electrical. As part of redoing the basement I was going to have to redo almost all of the electrical. Also most of it was tapped into random circuits on the upper floor. I first started by figuring out what circuit various things were on, so that I could safely disable that circuit and work on it. I first ripped out all the old and decaying outlets. Then I went to work on the existing overhead lighting. I found that in all cases it was curious where stuff was connected. In one case I can't find the beginning or the end of a circuit only the center which drives me nuts. It makes it so I can't clean it up as much as I would like.

After ripping out all the lighting in the basement I went and got some nice lights on a tripod. This is actually better lighting than what I had before. It also makes it so I can work at night.

Over July 15-17 weekend I started working on the upstairs wiring. I continued working on it during the week as well. I started by cleaning up all the extraneous phone wires all over the house. I also removed the really old wiring coming in from one of the two phone NID's. I switched over to newer wiring. On the older wiring I found an interesting tag. The company on the tag is The Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Company. As far as I can tell C&P became Bell Atlantic after the breakup of AT&T on Jan 1, 1984. This tag is at least 20 years old and I am willing to bet it is more than 40.

After cleaning up the phone mess I wasted 2-3 hours trying to figure out how to get wires to the outer wall of the living room above the fireplace. I gave up and at this point on July 29th I still haven't figured out how to get wires there. I am probably going to have to call in reinforcements.

I then decided to work on the three bedrooms. I would measure in the upstairs and then in the basement to try and line up where I wanted to fish the wires. I then drilled up through the ceiling, sub floor and stud wall base. This is about 6" of solid wood which takes a long time to do. Then I drill a small test whole in the upstairs and shine a light in. I check from the basement to ensure I can see the light, this tells me that I have nothing blocking. Then I cut a hole for a low voltage plate mount.

This worked perfectly for the first two rooms. In the third room I miscalculated by about 6" and was on the wrong side of a stud upstairs. I will have to patch my test hole which is about the size of a pen.

I haven't terminated either end yet, but I plan to probably this weekend. I want to make sure to test all the lines prior to sealing everything up.