This was a busy weekend for Adam and I as well as our wonderful neighbor, Mike. We tackled our first DIY project for the house and began running all of our low voltage wiring. We decided to initiate the wiring in the walk in pantry as it is a pretty central location in the home. This is where all of the wiring begins and is where our low voltage box will be located. I guess you could call this our "technology hub." With Mike's knowledge and expertise, we were able to quickly knock out the project of running all coaxial cable as well as cat-5 for our data. We also installed all the receptacles for the wiring (this was my job which only required the guys to bail me out twice hehe). Since the walls and roofing are still open, the process was fairly simple, We drilled holes in some of the 2x4's for the wires to pass through and then ran one coaxial and one cat-5 wire from the hub to each room where we would want data or cable and into the receptacle that we nailed into the wall. Each low voltage receptacle is placed next to one of our already installed outlet receptacles. Now, all that is left to do is run the wiring for the security system including the outside cameras and window and door sensors. Fortunately, our other awesome future neighbor, Brian, has a ton of leftover cable that he is going to drop off for us. That will be a project for another day.
Overall, with a little initial direction and some manual labor assistance, this was a fairly simple project and something that I thing anyone could do as a DIY. It will end up saving us at least $1,500 after we have run the security wiring as well! Here are a couple of shots of us hard at work and breaking a sweat....pay careful attention to the one of me using the power tools. If you ask me, I am a natural!
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A little rebar and bent nails makes for a perfect post to put the coaxial cable spool on
This is that starting point for all of the wiring and the location of the low voltage box |
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| Mike crawled up in the rafters to make the wire pulling process faster |
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| Adam, sawing a hole for the back porch cable box |
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| More wire pulling |
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| Me drilling a hole to run the coaxial cable through for the cable company to attach to. |
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| Height is handy. When you are 6'9" you usually do not need a ladder. |
This weekend, we also resumed our appliance shopping. The cabinet designer needs our appliance dimensions which means that, even though we are not ready to purchase any yet, (thanks to absolutely no where to store them) we need to try and decide what appliances we want and hope that we can get the best price when the time comes. I was really hoping to go with a counter depth fridge but holy smokes those things are pricey! We did find a great deal at Sears Outlet on a standard depth fridge. If only we had somewhere to put it for the next 4-5 months hehe.
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| Shopping around at Sears Outlet |
Stay tuned for more DIY high tech wiring and the progress being made on the outside of the house...
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