Wall Pass-Through

[Jim Redelfs]

My camping trailer has a nice (if cheap), through-the-wall, capped entry/exit/pass-through for the power cord.

How should I make something like this for my house?

I occasionally run a hose from our grade-level laundry room, out the attached garage entry door, to my RV or power washer. During this time, the door is ajar for quite a while. I am concerned about vulnerability to mouse incursion during this process.

Until now, I have used the doggie door as temporary pass-through for the hose I use to pump-out the RV's holding tanks. This, too, opened our home to potential mouse incursion. Now the dog is gone and the doggie door is probably next.

A nice, easily "cap-able" for security and insulation, pass-through would also work for an extension cord from a portable generator running outside. I believe a cap like that found on the exterior of my RV, on BOTH sides of my unfinished utility room wall, wouldn't be too unsightly.

When Qwest build a huge addition onto the Central Office nearby, they replaced the standby plant with a HUGE generator. It was a total rework. The generator contractor had pass-through, 4-inch diameter tubes built through the brick-facaded structure. Through these elevated, probably 12-inch long tubes, were run the cables that ran from the trailered, dummy load outside, to the new generator installation inside. This, I was told, enabled fine-tuning the new system.

Having such a portal at home would help with a couple of things I do occasionally. One could keep the tube stuffed with old socks as insulation during the lengthy periods of non-use. Ideas? TIA.

[Pete C.]

Install a proper support pedestal for your camper, with power and fresh water connections and an adjacent sewer connection if you can.

As for mouse infiltration, don't worry about that, there are already a dozen other openings they can get in through.

[EXT]

Take a piece of 4" or 3" plumbing drainage pipe add a threaded female fitting on both ends, screw in a clean-out plug into each threaded end. Make it the same length as the wall's thickness so only the plugs show inside and outside and affix into the wall. You can paint the plugs to match your decor, just don't get paint in the threads. To use remove the plugs and pass cables, hoses etc., through the openings. Stuff something the mice don't like around the cables while the plugs are out.

Better, actually wire and plumb a permanent supply pedestal by the trailer as suggested earlier.

[hallerb]

I have outside water, electric, airline, and gas outlet, for outside use. they add value and convenience:)

pass thrus are a low tech cheap looking work around

[HeyBub]

A neighbor I once has was forced to cover the bottom of the gutter downspouts with wire mesh. His wife was convinced that mice could use the downspout as some sort of shaft to reach the roof. (What the mice would do on the roof was never fully explained.)

Mice do not use doors or doggie entrances.

Raccoons, armadillos, badgers, bobcats, wolverines, bats, coyotes, beavers, exploring cats, and very large snakes - a different matter altogether.

[hallerb]

ide quoted text -

mice moved into the attic of my moms old home, thru cracks in the soffit and fascia.

they can climb really well

[HeyBub]

I'll defer to your experience on this subject, but I suggest a mouse can't climb the inside of a downspout gutter worth squat. Somehow I'm reminded of Samuel Johnson's observation: "A woman in the pulpit is like a dog raised up on it's hinder legs. It is not surprising that it does it poorly; what is surprising is that it would want to do so at all."

[Norminn]

I've seen rats climb UP two-story downspouts of our condo. I had heard noises like animals a couple of times, because the downspouts are right next to our patio. Couldn't imagine what it could be in the downspout until one day when I saw a rat run from the hedge to the opening of the downspout and heard him go up. We have palms, with lots of berries, that overhang the roof if not kept trimmed

- yummy food supply.