Power / LAN / Phone

[sharage71]

Gotta question fellas...

Gonna trench 125 ft by 2' deep for power to the garage. Can I put LAN / Cable / Phone line in the trench also. I don't mind running conduit for all. More worried about bleeding from the electric. Any thoughts?

 

[Gary S]

Yes, just put two runs of conduit into the trench. You need one for AC power lines and a second one for the low voltage stuff like phone and LAN. Push the two conduits apart as far as the trench allows before covering them.

 

[royalton10]

Put in at least one empty conduit line for future use. It does not get any easier than the open trench in front of you. One line for power, one for phone, etc, and one spare.

 

[travisd]

You might think about an air line as well, even if it's just for having easy access to tire air back at the main driveway. There's a whole thread around here about underground air lines.

 

[Milwen]

CAT5 is typically not recommended to be run parallel to AC lines because of interference. You may be able to get some kind of shielded CAT5 that is designed for what you are wanting to do. I would do more research before you installed anything. Check out this thread which addresses as similar situation.
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=45240

 

[babzog]

Keep your data cables about 12" from power cables and you should be fine.

Check out this link and scroll down about halfway for the Do's and Don't table.

I'd ensure that extra pull ropes are pulled through the conduits when pulling your cables.. never know when you'll need to pull more (and pull new ropes through when you do).

Find the biggest conduit you think you will need, then put in one twice as big. I put in a 2" conduit for the tower I built last summer for internet and satellite and an glad I didn't go smaller. 5 RG6 quadshield cables plus pull rope would have been too small for the 1.25" conduit I was originally eyeing. I'd not put in conduit smaller than 1.5" for a couple of CAT5 and RG runs. The bends in the trench plus the bends at the ends all end up meaning drag on your wires (shouldn't have more than 180deg - total - of bend in your conduit run). Use lots of cable lube when pulling your data wires!

I too like the idea of burying an air line plus, why not run a gas line now too? You've got the trench open. Even if it's not used right way, it's in.

 

[brwbier]

Actually you can have up to 360 degree of turns in a pipe run. To get a pull rope through just use string and a shop vac. Only takes a few seconds to **** through.
Brwbier

 

[Jaguar Fan]

Actually you can have up to 360 degree of turns in a pipe run. To get a pull rope through just use string and a shop vac. Only takes a few seconds to **** through.
Brwbier

F*ck. I wish i'd learned that about 10 years ago. I am one dumb SOB.

 

[Gary S]

CAT5 is typically not recommended to be run parallel to AC lines because of interference. You may be able to get some kind of shielded CAT5 that is designed for what you are wanting to do. I would do more research before you installed anything. Check out this thread which addresses as similar situation.
http://www.garagejournal.com/forum/showthread.php?t=45240

Running shielded Cat 5 in a trench is probably wasted money. Remember that the shield is just a grounded jacket on the cable. If you spread your low voltage conduit a few inches apart from the AC voltage conduit in a trench, you have a few inches of "ground" between them shielding them compared to a few thousands of an inch of "ground" with the shield.

 

[kwhitelaw]

Actually you can have up to 360 degree of turns in a pipe run. To get a pull rope through just use string and a shop vac. Only takes a few seconds to **** through.
Brwbier

yep, thats how bike builders feed their wiring thru frames..

 

[babzog]

Actually you can have up to 360 degree of turns in a pipe run. To get a pull rope through just use string and a shop vac. Only takes a few seconds to **** through.
Brwbier

I disagree on the number of bends in conduit. Here's one article on the topic. 4th para from the top. I suppose all that matters in the end is what your pulling force is... for power you could probably get away with using a truck to pull but data cables have higher tolerances on the max pulling force.

Would the vacuum trick work on a 100'+ conduit that's full of cables? My own preference is to put a rope in during assembly and then pull another through with each cable bundle that's pulled.. no screwing around down the road when you want to put something else in there.

 

[Gary S]

I've never been able to get a string or rope to pull anything useful through even a short conduit.
Get a cheap electrician's snake from Harbor Freight and do it the right way.

 

[Mattlt]

I've also used an air compressor blow gun to carefully blow a string through a conduit. It also helps to tie a small piece of plastic bag on the end of the string.