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                   HOW TO RUN WIRES FROM AN ATTIC WITH DRYWALL WALLS!   

This is how we run wires in Florida.

I will assume you have a single story house with an attic that you can crawl around in IT.

If you have a basement modifiy these instructions to fit your needs.

Once you have figured out where you are going to mount the cameras then you will have to determine where you are going to place the DVR. You will have to use interior walls to bring down your wires. The outside walls are very difficult to run wires. It can be done, but leave this to the professionals.

Place the camera mount up against the wall, and use a pencil to mark the holes on the wall. If the holes are too small for a pencil, then use a drill bit to make your mark. Use a drill bit the size of the plastic insert when you drill your holes in the wall. When you put the plastic insert in to the hole smear some caulk around the plastic insert. This will help anchor the insert to the wall, and it will help prevent water intrusion in to your wall. Water intrusion can cause termite problems in Florida, or it can cause problems during severe rain storms during mild hurricanes. Do not worry about category 5 hurricanes. You are going to have water intrusion no matter what you do!

On the outside where you have determined where the cameras will be mounted remove the plastic soffit. We installers use a 6 foot fiberglass rod to stick in to the attic. In the attic we tape our wires to the rod with electrical tape. This saves us from having to crawl to the smallest part of the attic, or having to crawl on our bellys to get to the outer edge. Many years ago children use to put flags on their bicycles. These orange flags were on a 6 foot fiberglass rod. I used to "rescue" these flags from the garbage, as they made good "fishing rods" for attic work. If you are installing multiple cameras then you need a rod for each camera location. In the attic you can go from rod to rod attaching your wires. When you get down out of the attic, you go from rod to rod pulling them out of the attic, and the wire follows behind.


Now that you have determined where you are going to place the DVR you will need to know what is in the wall. Is there a bathroom on the opposite side of the wall, is there a shower head on the other side, is there a water heater on the other side? It is possible to cut in to a water line.

On the other side of the wall are there a bunch of electrical switches on the wall? If there is, this indicates to me that there is a whole bunch of wires in this wall. You may want to avoid this area for two reasons.

One:
You may end up with some interference with all of that electrical wiring.

Two:
It may be to crowed in the wall, and you may have no way to bring down your wires.

Once you have determined that you have no obstacles in the wall then you can cut a hole in the wall. Make a very small hole. You will want to look inside first to see what is there.

In the electrical section at the hardware stores they have a product called a low voltage ring. This is a very handy device. It has two tabs, one on the top, and one on the bottom. A screw tightens these tabs up against the drywall. This will allow you to screw on a wall plate.

Look for a wall plate that has a hole in the center. It will probably be a half inch hole, or about the size that you can stick your pinky finger in to.
In the section where they sell dremel tools they have one that I use. It is a miniture sander on a drum. I stick this in to my dewalt drill, and I use this to widen the hole if I have a large number of wires, or if I am using premade cables. Premade cables have a bnc connector, and they have a power connector. If you are running 4 premade cables then you will have to widen this hole.

Take the low voltage ring, and hold it up to the wall. Using a small level hold it up to the low voltage ring, and make it level. When it is level put the pencil on the inside of the low voltage ring, and draw a line around the inside. Do not cut this rectangle drawing just yet. This square is smaller then the actual part of the ring that is going in to the wall. Look at the ring, and widen this rectangle with the level. Draw a horizontal line above, and below the rectangle, and draw a vertical line to the right, and the left of this rectangle. This new rectangle should be the size of this ring. Do not cut the hole to big. Go towards the small size. You can always make the hole bigger if you need to. If you make the hole to big, then you have a problem! Hopefully the wall plate will hide any imperfections!

Do not put the ring on the wall yet. Wait until after you have ran the wires, and pulled them out of the wall. Note how far this hole is from the 2X4 studs in the wall. You will want to remember this.

Now comes the hard part! Running the wire through the attic, and down the wall. This is very difficult. Do you know where this dvr is located from the attic point of view? In the room where you are mounting the DVR look at your ceiling. Remember where fans are located, they are usually mounted in the center of the room. Look at where your air conditioning ducts are located. How far from the wall are they? Do you have in ceiling lights? Where are they located? How far from the wall are they? Get an imaginary picture in your head of how this ceiling looks. When you get up in to your attic you may become "lost".

Walk only on the trusses, or crawl only on the trusses. If you put your weight on the drywall ceiling you will fall through! You can pull the drywall screws through the drywall! At the worst your knee can put a pressure point in to the drywall ceiling, and cause this area to "pop", or dent in to the living area. Be very careful where two pieces of dry wall line up together.

What kind of insulation do you have? Is it the kind that came in on a roll? Is this the kind that is blown in? If it is blown in, then use your foot as a "broom", and sweep the blown in insulation to the side before you step on the truss. If you step on it you will compress the insulation, and ruin the R value. Sweep, or push the insulation away. When you are done start at the farthest point that you have traveled, and replace the blown in insulation back as you work your way to the attic access.

Insullation on a roll can be stapled back to the trusses.

Lets get started. Once you are in the area that you want to be, then move the insulation out of your way. If you are not sure if this is the right area then use this trick. In the room stand on a ladder with a drill, with a very small bit. The smaller the better. Drill into the drywall near the wall's edge above where the wires will come out of the wall. Not to close to the wall, as you may drill through a 2X4 in the ceiling. In the attic, if there is no insulation then you will see the light coming through the hole that you drilled. If you have blown in insulation, then you can take a small wire, and push it in to the attic. When you are up in the attic just look for this wire sticking up through the insulation. Now you know where "X" marks the spot. Later you can put a very small amount of caulk in to the hole to cover it up.

You will see a 2X4 that is the top or known as the header of your wall. You should be able to tell where the 2X4 are in the wall. You will see the nails on the header where the wall 2X4's are located.

Remember how close, or how far the hole was from the 2X4? Line up the hole that we are going to drill in the same area from the 2X4. Drill a one inch hole down in to the wall. If you have drilled a hole but you have not gone through then you may have two 2X4s to drill through. If you need they do have drill bit extensions at the hardware store. This will allow you to get the drill bit deeper in to the wall.

Look in to this hole. You should see day light coming in from the hole that you cut in to the wall. If you do not see daylight then check even harder. If you do not see light then you may be on the wrong side of a 2X4 in the wall. Move to the left, or the right to realign your new hole.

When you can see daylight coming through the hole that you have drilled in the attic then you are ready to run your wires. First look around in the attic. Make sure you can get the wires to where your cameras are going. If the travel path looks good then you are ready to start. If your travel path is blocked can you find a detour? Once you have determinded your detour then you can start running wire.

Pull the rods out of the attic. Remove the electrical tape, and remove the wire from the rod. Cut a hole in the soffit with a half inch paddle bit. You can run your camera wires through this hole. Use caulk to close up the hole to keep insects, or critters (in Florida we have small lizards), from crawling in to the attic.

When you go to drop your wires in to the wall just place them in to the hole, and let them fall down. You can pull the wires out of the wall, and then insert your trim ring, and tighten it down. Use your level, and make sure it is level. Tighten in down, and place the wires through your wall plate, and place the wall plate up against the trim ring, and insert the screws, and tighten them down. Run the wires to your DVR, or your multiplexor. If there is insulation in your wall then drop the wires down the hole with a 6 foot fiberglass rod, or a suitable substitution. Here is a trick with premade cables. Start with first cable and place it about 2/3rds from the end. Tape the power connector to the rod with electrical tape. Tape the video bnc right behind the power connector. If something goes wrong when pulling the rod, and wires through the wall then the power connector may get damaged. This is easy to fix with butt connectors, and a 6" replacement lead! If you damage a premade BNC connector then you may have to replace the whole cable. you can try putting a crimp on connector, but the premade cable are stranded, and difficult to work with, and you may end up with a bad crimp on connection. Now attach the second cable right behind the first cable, and so forth with each cable. This should look like a train going down the length of the rod. If you put the various cable, at random points around the rod then you may not be able to get it in to the hole. You may have to drill a larger hole to get the cables through. If it is a tight squeeze down the wall then this will get hung up on everything on the way down. If they are in a "train" then you can twist the rod clock wise, or counter clockwise to get them past obstacles. Pull the rod from the wall very gently. Remove each cable from the rod as they come out of the wall. After the last cable has been removed from the rod, and the rod has been set aside then, pull a little more wire than you need to get to your destination. You can always tuck the extra wire back in to the wall.

When you are done running your wires take a can of spray foam, and fill the hole that you drilled in your attic. If you do not you will lose your airconditioning. Hot attic air will intrude in to your living space. This will make the air conditioner work harder, and it will raise your electrical bill. In the winter time your warm air will escape in to the attic space. Do not forget to replace the insulation as you work your way back to the attic access.

For crawling through attics get yourself a headband flashlight. Get the LED kind, rather than the light bulb kind. The LED kind last longer. You have to have replacement lightbulbs with the light bulb style in case these burn out. In the cheap range the LED lights will put out more light then a light bulb style. You can get these in the flashlight area, or in the camping/fishing section of large warehouse style stores.


Do a google search. You may find more information that may be more related to the style of work you are doing. The more information you have, the better informed your decisions will be.

Good luck

Scorpion

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