Lifting metal carpet-dividing strips in doorways

You can, and I have, disconnect the carpet from it

You could chip out a channel round the frame, lay the cable, and repair with plaster and paint afterwards

I think you just nail it down and it can be levered up. My carpet fitters reused it anyway...because one side was held down with ceramic tiles :-)

Those strips without screws generally have a second strip below that fastens to the floor with the top wedging into it and careful prising with a jemmy usually releases them. Having looked at your photo the type you may have is a one piece threshold which is fastened down to the floor and then the carpet is forced under and held in place by a number of spikes. If the latter you have to pull the carpet edge quite vigorously out to get to the fixings. Replacing is a case of folding the carpet edge under the threshold and using a scraper to tuck it in.

With it being carpet both side have you tried forcing the Cat5 cable under with a wedge. The spikes that grip the carpet are on the underside of the carpet. I have to say running cables under carpets and anywhere they will be stepped on is not advisable for numerous reasons.

It could be like this:

Ah. I think you should study this and see if it is what you have.

I *think* mine was nailed, not screwed down. If so you my be able to lever it up, but the easy availability of new should render it possible to 'muller' the old with impunity

Possibly an angle grinder down the centre would allow the top part to be removed, allowing easy removal of the carpets, and then the remains of te strip.

This is something a carpet fitter might be able to help with as well.

I think this is one of those case where fannying around wastes time and doesn't work, but brute force and total replacement is in fact easier than it seems

NY snipped-for-privacy@privacy.net wrote in news:109h6io$30ltv$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me:

As TD suggests, this is a one piece gripper. The base is wider and has barbs to hold the carpet once it has been punched into the slot created between the lower and the narrower top surface.

Removing the carpet can be problematic as it may rip at the retained edge, best to release a corner (perhaps a broad screwdriver under the carpet to assist releasing from the barbs then repeat with the carpet being pulled inverted at 45deg again with screwdriver underneath.

From memory the barbs don't extend into the slot so potentially placing a cable deep in there could be a safe, protected space for it. Be sure to secure it deep in there with perhaps duct tape pieces or some hot melt glue.

Replace the carpet carefully to avoid crushing the cable. The conventional amateur method is to punch it in with a bolster chisel (gently in your case).

Change of plan! I had another look up in the loft and did some measurement of rooms down below to estimate where the hole in the kitchen ceiling was - I eventually found it. So I've reverted to the original plan of taking the cable up into the loft rather than tucking down the edge of carpets beside skirting boards and under metal strips.

Easy to continue that job tomorrow - loft was getting hot and I was getting tired! I'll leave till another day task of mouse-proofing the cable run in the loft (about four feet of exposed cable) which might need a bit of old hosepipe (unless anyone's got better ideas) as "armour". Needs to be flexible armour to route between rafters.

But thanks for everyone's comments about the carpet-strip solution!

Flexicon but you may have to buy much more than you need to cover four feet.

Richard

Wish you luck. I am stuck in 3D printing plastic bits to enable me to clear an air lock in the AGA fuel line armed only with a boy scout and a garden hose...

I think once you knew what was involved you probably could decide another way was less work so happy we managed to give you an idea...

Sounds like an opportunity for whoever makes those strips to accomodate cables both along the width of a doorway, and through into the adjoining room.

Re-purpose

Everyone uses wireless for everything now, except the old-timers. Even I must admit it's fairly reliable now, though I can certainly remember when it wasn't.

or microbore copper pipe if you have some.

e.g. to leave space for the future fibre optic cable.

Not really - if you live in an old house with 2 foot thick internal walls. My PC and NAS are connected to the router via ethernet cable (and a couple of Homeplug/Powerline adaptors).

The limiting factor is the bore which will accommodate the RJ45 plug on the end of the cable, plus its protective boot that avoids ripping off the latch.

Absolutely

Wifi reaches at best to the next room in this house. Foil backed plasterboard. Fortunately its cat 5 cabled throughout.

Yes did that here years ago, the main limiter on Wi-fi is the small number of 2.4 Ghz channels available round here its chocca with interferer's even 5.8 Ghz can work well much more room up there but not that many devices are 5.8 G capable..

Ah well Tony, the only wifi here is in fact mine...one on the lower part of the spectrum one in the middle and one on the high.

You should see what's available in Addenbrookes.,..about 30 wifis. The public one doies work unless you want to download mail...

Wifi is excellent - when it works. Foil-backed plasterboard or a copper hot-water cylinder full of water is Bad News.

Unfortunately the router at my Mum's house. where I was installing the second wifi access point is sited so the hot water cylinder is between the router and the living room/kitchen/conservatory. The position of the router is determined by the ability to run Ethernet cables to my mum's and my dad's PCs.

There used to be a round Cat 5 Ethernet cable which went through an internal wall from the study (where the router is) into the airing cupboard, up through the ceiling into the loft, across a few joists directly above the hall (it's a bungalow) and then down through another hole in the ceiling into the kitchen. That access point stopped working and I discovered that the cable had been chewed (by mice?) severing it into two pieces. So I wanted to replace the cable. In the intervening years, mum and dad had had a lot more loft insulation laid (making it difficult to find the holes in the plasterboard into the airing cupboard and kitchen. Hence my initial attempt to lay the cable (now a flat rather than round Cat 6) between the carpet and the skirting board which would have avoided going into the loft. That would have worked, but getting it under the metal carpet-divider strips proved far more difficult that I envisaged because those strips could not be removed by unscrewing them (as they can in my house).

Fortunately I was able to revert to the loft solution after I eventually found the holes in the plasterboard.

As an aside, when I lifted the loft insulation, I also discovered a leak in the water pipe that fed the header tank. As I moved the insulation, the pipe moved and started gushing water :-( I was able to repair the bad compression fitting but I wasn't confident that my repair would have been perfect so I advised mum to get a plumber to do a proper permanent job. The day after I returned home to my house (4 hours away) the pipe started leaking again and mum had to spin-dry all the sheets stored in the airing cupboard which were soaked, and then find places to hang them to dry them. Luckily the plumber was able to come out within a few hours. He diagnosed a warped, non-circular piece of copper pipe. I was surprised the the pipe did not have an olive. I thought every pipe that went into a compression fitting had to have an olive.

I cant say I have ever seen one without...

Yes, it does. Compression fittings and their nuts are all shaped to apply inward pressure to the olive, otherwise there can be no compression. Just doing the nut up to the fitting doesn't squeeze the pipe.