Books on wire fishing techniques and wiremold

[Max Voltaire]

Hi,

Are there any good books that could help me rewire a house? Most books spend all their time talking about new work and only dedicate one page or so to fishing techniques. That's not good enough, and to complicate things further, I don't have an attic to help me fish wires on the second floor (the roof is flat).

Having it done by pros is expensive but I could spend my next vacation time doing it myself. But how do pros pull this off when there is no attic? The second floor is a rental and every circuit must start at a panel in the kitchen, so the cable has to travel from the kitchen to every room. Is cutting a trench in the walls throughout the whole appartment the only way?

I've seen that wiremold could be an interesting way to carry the wires throughout the house, but it seems to be expensive when you need a lot, and it doesn't look nice. But never minding the look, has anyone here had any experience with this?

Thank you

[MSH]

Electricians routinely cut the drywall. Yesterday I was in an electricians house who was doing a remodel and he had cut "trenches" all around the room. I guess he considered drywall work easier than crawling around his attic.

M Hamlin

[Chuck]

This site has some neat tips on running wires inside walls. It is primarily aimed toward low voltage alarm wiring, but you may find the information helpful.

[Joe Bobst]

I've used Wiremold many times in older houses, and as for looks, it is a subjective thing. In older houses, with reasonable placement of the conduit it tends to look OK, I think. Newer houses, though are better served with trenching out the stud crossings and installing guards over the wires before patching the drywall. Check out the Wiremold web site

for more info or call

1-800-621-0049 to request a Buyers Guide. FWIW, the stuff is easy to work with, and is even available at some box stores with a decent selection of bits and pieces. HTH

Joe

[John Grabowski]

Here is a good way to cut holes that makes it easy to patch them again:

John Grabowski

[Max Voltaire]

Well John, thank you very much for that tip, it's a really great idea! I won't forget to apply it next time I have to make an access hole.

Max

[Max Voltaire]

It might be quicker but it's probably messy as hell for people like me who never did it before. But I think trenches will do a better long term job than wiremold.

Thanks for the reply.