+1 to pig pappa's post on IP. It is very informative

Managing the knot... Chapter 1.

Unless you are going to bring each type of wire to a wall can and run patch cables to the rack...there will be a "knot" (big ol ton of random cables coming from different areas running allover the other wires)...somewhere.

So... Manage the knot.

I build a drop ceiling or false wall cavity to hide the knot and sort the cables. Break up the bundles, separate the types of cable, bundle them and bring them to your racks.

The photo below is from the project im at right now. Its from last week when we began routing cables so not much cable is organized/routed but you get the idea. All wires are all pulled thru a 10X10" area in the right back corner. Thats the knot. There isnt anything you can do about the knot. You can try using cable specific pipes or wall enclosures but you will always end up pulling extra wires or re-purposing wires etc. Dont waste your time. Learn to tame the knot by hiding it. If you brought all your wire out of the wall behind the rack the knot would be in your way. In a ceiling or crawlspace its hidden.

You can see we have already pulled out data and phone and started routing it towards the opening in the wall. This area gives you plenty of room to create a service loop, store unused cable and get your bundles neat before bringing them out into the room.



Here you can see the control room. All you see is the neat bundles coming thru. You dont need a 3 foot slot in the wall with cable ladders or a hidden room to hide wire. I have done this with a small drop ceiling above the racks, crawlspace under the racks etc.

Wow. I swear it feels like i posted that a few months ago. This is the second post like this (from years ago that felt like weeks ago) ive seen this week. I really need to reevaluate my priorities. Maybe this is a sign. Career change in order?

Nope, it just means that you're getting old.
Oh, wait, we share a birthday. In that case it must be environmental factor :-)

White cat5 = pots
Blue cat = network
White rg6 = catv
Black rg6 = incoming catv
Grey rg6 = sat and fm antennas
Yellow cat = incoming pots
Other colors for tps, video feeds, etc

This Coloring scheme helps in bundling like colors together and really helps in routing IMHO.

Ymmv
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+1 on color coding.

I went to a job where I was only the electrician. The AV firm had a $600K contract that swelled to near a million bucks.

All was done in blue cat5: network, phone, touchscreens, keypads, everything- there must have been 300 of them, maybe more. I saw that a laughed thinking about the poor bastard that had to deal with that cluster.

How do you label pre-wire for a home......IF the client is so cheap and waffling that you're not sure if you'll be their integrator for the next phase of the custom home construction project?

I was recently faced with this predicament.  I've had to baby step the client thru each phase of the project.  Due to low voltage permit challenges in MD, I had the electrician pull the cables for me.  He's also good friends with another local A/V competitor who lost the design and pre-wire job (to me !). Electrician said "Hey, you want us to label these wires?" I said "NOPE !"

I'm sure at this point you're saying, "You're a lunatic !" Why would you not label the wires?  Well, in this economy, there's probably a 50:50 or 75:25 percent chance the client might "get smart" on me and try to connect up all the nice in-ceiling speakers himself.  And if the wires aren't labeled, don't you think he's going to struggle a bit? He'll likely say "Crap !  I guess I have to pay the installer to come out here and do it right for me !"

I'm all about making it easy for me and my installers, but I also have to protect the company and try and ensure the call backs keep coming.


In hind sight, I would have numbered only one end of the wire and then written down the numbering sequence on the pre-wire plan/dwg for future reference.  And of course, I would have never given that information to the home owner.

I was shaking my head until the last part. I would probably not leave a job "incomplete" with unlabeled wires regardless of whether I expected to trim or final the project. But your idea of a wire schedule with a numbering system that YOU can refer too is smart. You could always try and sell the info to the client if he decided to use someone else or try and DIY after you roughed it in.

I can understand the frustration of spending the time designing and roughing in a house that you never get to go back and finish. But if you did it right, you got paid for the design work and made a profit on the rough-in. I really think a rough-in should be treated as a complete project. You finish it like you would any other project. If you played your cards right, you will get the call back....and if you do not, move on.

We sell the client stages. They pay for the wiring plan and cable and the labor to install the cable. After wiring they always use us for the rest of the project but they dont have to.

As far as labeling... when someone else wires for me i prefer no labels vs half labeled or labeled wrong. The best thing to do when letting someone else pull cable is to use bundled cable to each location. Its much harder for them to screw up 1 bundled cable vs 5 individual cables. Plus you only need to tone out one of the cables in the bundle and you locate all of them.

If you are not selling the wiring plan you could always label them 1 thru whatever and have your document that explains what each wire is for. The client would be able to find each end of the wire but they wont know what each is for.

Stamp, how is that 10"x10" area finished off? I need to pull wires through the ceiling of an A/V closet and by default would probably ask for something like three 6" grommets. What might be a better solution? Thanks.

The other side of that wall is plywood with spray foam. The visible side is 2X4's and standard pink insulation. The 10"X10" opening is just a square cut in the plywood. There isn't anything else because this isn't the actual control room. Its a little room next to the control room with a door/hatch that seals tight. All of the wire you see routes thru a finished horizontal slot. Once the wiring is done we are going to install brush strips at the slot so that you cant see into the "dead space".

If i were bringing the cable into the ceiling above the av closet i would take a piece of half inch plywood and attach it to the ceiling (where you would normally attach sheetrock) cut a 10" circle or square and route all of the cable thru the ceiling joists and out of that 10" hole. It would/work look similar to a speaker bracket but instead of just the speaker cable you have all cables in the house coming thru it. This is purely a way to keep all cables coming to a specific point so that they are not hanging in different corners of the room (based on how they were routed into the control room.

Then i would have them build the finished ceiling so that its dropped 8 or 10 inches lower than actual ceiling height. This creates a dead space where all of the wire can hide until its needed. You could also do this just above the racks like a soffit.

Have them put in a 2'X2' ceiling panel/hatch (like attic access) in the finished ceiling. Or you can wait and do it yourself. It should fall behind the racks not directly above them. The idea is you use the hatch to climb half way in on a ladder so that you can route your cables thru a slot or pipes cut into the ceiling directly into your rack.

Using the dead space and cutting your pipes/grommets/slots in after sheet rock allows you to get the room finished and then decide on exact placement of racks and where you want to route cable. You can only plan so far/much with blue prints because you cant see the 4" molding or the 8" deep box on the back wall from the elevator equipment until the house is done.

The dead space lets you store unused cable, create nice bundles that route thru to the racks by hiding the "knot" created by cables coming from all directions in the house and it lets you precisely pinpoint the location where they come out of the ceiling into the rack.

Thanks. What I didn't mention - and I know this is a pet peeve of yours - is that the closet is only 31" deep and the racks are on casters. Still, I will survey the site and see how I can apply what you describe.

What's your preference? Bringing the cabling in through the top of the rack or from the bottom up?

In my case, because the rack is on casters, I'd like the wires to come from, say, the top left, drape down to the floor in a U shape, and then come up and attach to the rack at the top right. That way when I roll the rack back into the closet, the wire bundle can neatly fold against the back wall.

Get or make a nylon sleeve with a zipper. It should be long/wide enough to wrap around your finished bundle. This will hide your bundle so you don't have to be über perfect and it will protect the cables. It also gives you something to attach ( zip tie and/or Velcro) the bundle to the rack with. The sleeve gets the zip tie crease instead of your cat5.

To answer your original question...I did a slide out rack in 2007 where the rack was the control room. I had no other space. This was a 10 year old install that got upgraded and the rack stayed in place because it was framed/bolted into the clients closet.

I cut the drywall out of the back wall between two studs so I had a 16" wide by 8' opening. The back was the drywall for the other side of the wall. I bought an 8x4' sheet of melamine with one side that had the white glossy finish. I cut it to fit the wall. I piloted holes in each corner and down the sides. This became my cover plate.

I used a 2" hole saw to cut 2 holes 6" apart at the bottom. Then I used a jig saw to go between the holes and make a 6"x2" slot. The slot is better than a hole because you can remove the cover if you need to.

The wall cavity became my dead space where I separated cables and created bundles of the different types. I then brought them out of the bottom and put my cover plate in place. Nice neat bundles that came out the perfect height to hit the cable tray that attached to the racks.

Sorry no pics. I started updating a DM switch over USB and an hour later it was barely half way. I decided to just leave my laptop at the clients house until tomorrow.

You could do this with the slot at the top. You could also just use a huge empty wall enclosure at the back of the closet if you have space.