Simple Tool/Method for sorting runs of CAT5, Speaker and Phone wire
Ok.
I was smart enough to run all the speaker wire, CAT5 and phone wire I need for this house when the walls were open and labeled them well. I didn’t count on the kids pulling off all my colored tabs one rainy Saturday. Looking for basic way I might be able sort which wires are running from the home base location throughout the house. I’ve seen these $400.00 tools online… but need a some what a more cost effect method to sort this mess out? I’m thinking a battery might give me a basic load…but just reaching out to you all to see if anyone can solve this before I pull out what remains of my hair. The kids might live a little longer too.
Ted
Replies
I once had a Cat-5 tool that tested by applying voltage to the 8 wires in sequence. You plugged in a device on the other end that then had LEDs that lit in sequence, and a missing or out-of-sequence flash meant a wiring error. But I lent it to someone several years back and never got it back. I believe it cost under $100, and I may have gotten it from CiberGuys.
Certainly you can do it with a battery and meter, but it's tedious. Another trick is to gather up all the CD and MP3 players in the house and put rock on one cable, easy listening on the next, orchestra music on the next, etc, and listen to see which you get on which cable.
An Ohm meter will do it or even a crude test light. Short the cables at the far end, one at a time and look for the shorted wire at the home run location.
You really only need to short one pair to find the cable. That doesn't really test them but it will tell you where they go.
Easy way to do a bunch of wires at once:
Get a bunch of different kinds of batteries, 1.5v, 3v, 6v, 9v 12v - you can just buy battery holders at Radio Shack and make some different permutations so just using AA bateries you could have 1.5, 3, 4.5, 6, 7.5... etc. Each voltage coresponds to a different wire type.
First, you attach each voltage to a different rooms layout and go back to the homerun. Now you can label which room coresponds to which bundle.
Then, you gather the battery packs and attach them on one rooms different wire bundles, this will allow you to find out which wire does what. 1.5v is Ethernet, 3v is phone, 6v is speaker, etc.
Simple Tool/Method for sorting runs of CAT5, Speaker and Phone w
A "Toner" and inductive probe are what the "pros" use. The toner hooks up to a pair in the cable and you run the toner through the bundle at the remote location until you hear the tone. You can pick ths pair of equipment for a hundred bucks or sometimes a little less.
Steve
http://www.altex.com/Progressive-Classic-Tone-Probe-Kit-701K-P139898.aspx
I can understand why you need to identify which speaker wires go where -- you want to make sure that you know which room is which and that left/right pairs are matched. But you don't really need to know which phone or data cables go where. Connect the data cables to a patch panel in your wiring closet (or whereever they all come together) and then use modular jacks at each drop so they can be connected. Your router/switch will take care of figuring out the connections. Similarly, just connect all the phone drops at a punch down block. You went to the trouble of running all these cables, go ahead and connect them all
Monoprice is a great cheap source for everything you need to make these connections.