Toning for Elevator Wires

[Up And Down]

Hi,
I am wondering if anyone can recommend a good toner for IDing elevator wiring? If you’re not familiar, elevator wiring is often bundles of insulated individual 18 awg copper wires that are grouped in certain numbers (often 19,24 and 37). A lot of times the older wires, which sometimes have to be reused, have lost their printing which once had numbers on them to identify them. A lot if times they are still wired on 1 end (they will not be energized when toning them out) and unwiring all of the connections to ID via other methods like grounding them is not practical. The wires are colored also but that is in groups of 10 and I need to positively ID individual wires. I tried a Fluke Pro 3000, with one clamp grounded and the other on a single wire, but it sounded off on the other end of the cable on pretty much every wire. I’m sure EMI has a lot to do with this. I am looking for something to help me to ID down to 1 specific wire out of the bundle at a time. It seems that most timers are designed for wire pairs and not individual conductors. I appreciate and welcome all replies and comments. Take care

 

[LXCam]

I have an older amprobe unit that uses a CT to induce the signal. But fishing the clamp thru your bundles might be an issue.

Basically this kit:

Pasar Amprobe A2201CE Advanced Wire Tracer Kit Transducer S2600 T2200 R2000 44BDefault Title

Pasar Amprobe A2201CE Advanced Wire Tracer Kit Transducer S2600 T2200 R2000 44B

buysgalore.com

 

[danski0224]

Haven't done elevator wiring work, but this kit has come in handy:

Advanced Electrical Circuit Breaker Finder and Wire Tracer Kit and Case - ET450 | Klein Tools

The Klein Tools ET450 Advanced Circuit Tracer Kit is a professional tracer for energized and non-energized breakers, fuses, and wires. When the Transmitter is connected to a circuit, the Receiver's sensitivity can easily be adjusted to detect the transmitted signal on breakers, fuses, and wire...

www.kleintools.com

 

[cvairwerks]

Clip lead and short one pair together. Clip one lead of the ohm meter to one of the two colors and ring the other color wires til you get a low reading.

 

[Up And Down]

Thanks for the replies so far. There are no pairs. These are multi cables of 18 awg insulated wires. Like I said I’m hoping for a solution that I can leave the other end connected at its destination where it already is, sometimes a switch or button etc.

 

[cvairwerks]

By pairs, I mean clip any two in a cable together and ohm out.

 

[Up And Down]

Understood. The problem is that these wires usually go to an array of different places all over the place not 1 central spot and I was hoping to be able to get a tool to ID them individually without having to disassemble things to get to the wire ends. Thanks

 

[cvairwerks]

Do the clip lead at the end where it's just the one location and ring from the control stack end....

 

[Beerhippie]

I used to use a Sony Walkman for this. An 8 Ohm isolation transformer, the cord and plug from a set of earphones and a couple of alligator clips at the Walkman end. Alligator clips/probe on the headphone end.

Because it's low power and audio frequencies, there is no interference between wires, even in a twisted pair.

I find that the Rolling Stones make for the best wire traces. Heavy Metal tends to summon gremlins, so avoid.