hairball/clump of wire What goes Where?

[kpierce]

As I untangle and figure out how they have wired my house for sound, I am faced with a large clump of wires coming into the family room. Other than trial and error how can you figure out which wire is going to where? I have 5 rooms wired and each has a cat5 and four-wire cluster wire. Is there some type of inexpensive meter I can put at the end of a wire in one room and test the wires in the family room?

thanks

 

[MDS]

I know exactly what you are going through as I had to trace the wiring in my own house.

If the cat5 wires are all run to a central location (mine's in the master bathroom closet) and plug into a phone patch panel, then you can just disconnect all but one and walk around the house plugging in a phone until you get a dial tone - then go label that wire with the room it goes to.

Tracing other wires and coax cables is not so simple unless you feel like carrying a tv or speakers from room to room. There are tools to trace wires and they are known as 'tone and probe' kits. The better ones can trace longer distances of wires and better identify wires in close proximity to one another.

I bought an inexpensive model at Home Depot. It is called the Lan Tracker by Gardner Bender Instruments ($40). It works well enough. It has rj11, rj45, f connector, and alligator clips for tracing all kinds of wire. If you have mutiple cat5 connected to a phone distribution panel, you should disconnect all of them when tracing as well as disconnect the feed from outside. Then pull the wires away from each other when you use the probe - otherwise the tone will sound on all of them.

It won't tell you if the plugs and wall jacks are terminated properly though. I have one dead jack in a bedroom and I had to take the wall plate off to see that it is wired as a crossover (ie. 568A wiring standard on one end and 568B on the other). There are other testers available that can tell you if things are wired correctly or have split pairs or other problems.

 

[kpierce]

Thanks for the quick response. My problem is there are no connectors on either end of these CAT5 wires, or on the bundled wire that contains 4 wires. They are simply cut.

I will look into the 'tone and probe' item you recommended. But for $40 I might resort to simple trial and error since it is only 4 locations. Wish these guys had labeled the wires, it would have made it much easier.

I do have a full CAT5 tester but that would require putting connectors on each end, etc... etc...

That made a light just gone on... What are these CAT5 runs for anyway? I was assuming they would control the volume but now that I think about it, that does not make sense.

I have a CAT5 (PINK)and another wire that contains 4 wires(YELLOW) within. These each run to junction boxes. From the Junction Box I have two sets of speaker wires(BLUE and PURPLE) running into the room. Wouldn't a volume control hook between the YELLOW and BLUE/PURPLE?

If that is true why is there a CAT5 wire run as well? Perhaps sometype of remote control or something?

I already have CAT5(Network/Telephone) drops elsewhere so I am not confusing this with network or phone wiring. (I know that stuff.... )

Just don't understand the CAT5 now... this is more and more confusing.

thanks.

 

[MDS]

I see. Well it looks like whoever wired your house actually had a little foresight and ran extra cat5, just in case.

As you know the cat5 can be used for phone or network but it can also be used for any number of other purposes such as volume controls, ir keypads, security system, etc. They probably ran the extra one in case you need something like that. For that I give them kudos; for not labeling anything I give them an F (I complained about my situation, which is the same, on another thread).

The 4 conductor (yellow) wire is probably 16/4 wire which can be used for speakers. I have a bunch of that too and it is also not connected to anything. The Lan Tracker can be used to trace that by using the alligator clips and that is my task for the holiday weekend. I wouldn't worry about the colors of the jacket as there are no real standards. It would be nice if they followed a convention like all blue cat5 are data and all green are phone but if your house is anything like mine, that is not the case. Same for the other wires. As long as they are the type you need and you can find the other end, you can use them for whatever you want.

 

[AverageJoe]

: Is there some type of inexpensive meter I can put at the end of a wire in one room and test the wires in the family room?

One simple way to ID bare wires is with a simple Volt/Ohm Meter (VOM) with an audible continuity feature. Just short a pair of wires at one end, and check for an audible beep at the other. If you have several cat5 wires at the source, pick unique pairs to short (for example: blue & orange on one, and green & brown on another) so you don't need to run back and fourth for each cable.