Is There Any Way To Run Wire In The Roof Of A Thai House With Those Flimsy Steel Ceiling Supports?

[thaibeachlovers]

There is NO WAY I can get across the ceiling in our house to run new wire. I'd crash through.

How do the locals do it?

[Crossy]

Use a lightweight local

Or a bamboo pole.

Actually, if you spread the load with a long plank those supports are amazingly strong. No, I would not risk them supporting my 100kg mass, that's what to 50kg local chaps are for

[Daffy D]

As Crossy suggests use a bamboo pole. If a long pole is difficult to get up into the roof space use several lengths of small plastic water pipe joined together as you feed it across.

If you have a cat tie a string to it put it on ceiling and call it across.

[GooEng]

Weighted projectile with wire attached?? Catapult involved contraption??

[Forkinhades]

If you have some ceiling lights, you can take them down, and 'fish' the cable across

[Hssl]

pvc pipe, pvc tape............. go fishing

[longball53098]

slingshot, a weight tied to nylon line will do and fire away

[watcharacters]

Weighted projectile with wire attached?? Catapult involved contraption??

.

This is a possibility. Another is to use a child's' toy type bow and arrow. Just shoot a string across the needed space you want to cross with your cable. Either system implies you have two access points.

A final and occasionally used method is a trained monkey.

Good luck.

[johnopolo]

All I can suggest is that the OP makes sure his installation has an Earth Leakage Protection unit (aka Residual Current Device). Certainly sounds like he needs one ....

[retell]

myself have a few lengths of wood laying on top of the ceiling and that is strong enough to hold me

[selavy59]

This is an easy one. Get the missus to do it. Tell her she needs to be as light as possible so she will have to remove her clothes. Oh, and send us the pics pls.

[USNret]

RC car, if there are no obstructions.

[gerry123]

why hide the wire do it ISSAN style couple of nails and sling it just about neck high and da s your uncle

[tragickingdom]

A local boy will work miracles for a few hundred baht. Try to do as little as possible yourself.

[dannyol]

Do they not sell "fish tape" in Thailand? That's only if you need to accumulate more tools!

[thaibeachlovers]

As Crossy suggests use a bamboo pole. If a long pole is difficult to get up into the roof space use several lengths of small plastic water pipe joined together as you feed it across.

If you have a cat tie a string to it put it on ceiling and call it across.

Excellent suggestion about the lengths of water pipe, thanks.

To Crossy and the others suggesting long poles/ boards etc, good idea, but impossible for me unless I break the ceiling. Unfortunately, the builder put the access panel in the most inconvenient place possible ( of course he did! ).

[thaibeachlovers]

All I can suggest is that the OP makes sure his installation has an Earth Leakage Protection unit (aka Residual Current Device). Certainly sounds like he needs one ....

That was the first thing I put in after we moved to this house. Comes in useful when trying to run new wire through a hole alongside old wire and the bare wire on the old wire joins touch the steel- arrrrggggghhhhhhh. It's so bad up there!

[thaibeachlovers]

This is an easy one. Get the missus to do it. Tell her she needs to be as light as possible so she will have to remove her clothes. Oh, and send us the pics pls.

Ooh, you are naughty!

Already tried getting her up there, and she's not playing that game.

Edited April 30, 2013 by thaibeachlovers

[thaibeachlovers]

RC car, if there are no obstructions.

Obstructions galore, but interesting idea.

[thaibeachlovers]

why hide the wire do it ISSAN style couple of nails and sling it just about neck high and da s your uncle

I was originally going to duct it all the way, but the thought of drilling a hundred + holes all over the house with the dirt etc put me off in the end. Even so, there are places I just can't reach safely, so I'll have to duct them anyway. So I opted for the dirt, cobwebs and sheer terror of balancing on a 4" ridge of very rough brichwork, knowing that an overbalance will send me crashing through the ceiling.

Anyway, doubles as a sauna. Can't go up in the day time, as the roof steel is too hot to touch, and I'd broil in there.

[thaibeachlovers]

Thanks for all the ideas.

In the end, I opted for my wife pushing a long length of wire through the hole over the consumer unit. After much shouting and back and forth with the wire, I was able to tape the cable to the wire and she pulled it across the ceiling and through the hole.

As for doing it properly and putting it in tubing, .

[vijer]

Do they not sell "fish tape" in Thailand? That's only if you need to accumulate more tools!

It is very difficult to find proper tools in Thailand. I know there are going to be all kinds of TV members who will dispute this but they are full of bullox. Specialty tools like fish tape would be impossible, I know I looked and never found one, not to mention the PVC insulation used on ALL wire in LOS is very soft and does not fish through PVC pipe at all and metal pipe is only used in rare situations. Also, Thai construction is typically the little red bricks and the walls are not hollow so Thai's don't need to fish wire. Then again as another poster mentioned, Thai's just tack the wire to the wall for everyone to admire its beauty.

[longball53098]

"Fish tapes" are available at Global House for sure. At least 2 size lengths in plastic reels. These are the steel type. I have also seen nylon fish tapes in at least one other tool shop in Chonburi/Siracha area at Hardware House

[Keesters]

What exactly is Flimsy Steel Ceiling Supports.

My Thai house has flimsy aluminum ceiling supports on a 600mm x 600mm grid. Climb a ladder, remove one tile and throw the wire over to near where you want it. Open tile at that point and continue. Easy.

You could also try casting a line with a fishing rod. Tie the wire to the cast end and reel in.

Edited May 1, 2013 by Keesters

[Mrjlh]

I may have had the same problem. I needed to go 30 meters with only a small opening in the middle from one room to another all the way across the house. Punched a small hole about 2" in diameter at both ends where I needed the wire to enter into the room. Took a 50 foot tape measure fed it out to the first hole from the center access. Using a coat hanger hooked the end of the tape and pulled it down into the room, Secured the wire (6mm X 2) to the tape measure with electrical tape and simply released the tape measure lock retracting the tape along with the wire, puling the wire to the center opening. Half way there. Disconnected the wire. Now the tricky part! Fed the tape measure up through the other small hole toward the center opening. With a little help from my GF she grabbed the end of the tape. I re-secured the wire to the tape and retracted the tape measure slowly pulling while at the same time feeding the wire. Sounds like a lot of work but really wasn't took about 30 minutes to complete.

The tape measure is flexible steel and can easily fed out of your take your time. Worked for me

[Secondmouse]

When I was a child I remember my dad re-wiring many of the sockets around the skirting boards (baseboard), in our house using our cat....

He would lift up a section of floorboard at each end of the room and put the cat, (Tibby, if I recall...) into one of the openings with string attached to his collar..(the cat's collar.. ) and then replaced the floorboard whilst my mum would call the cat from the other open floorboard section......once the cat emerged from the other end he was rewarded with a treat and the string was removed and then used to pull through the new wires......

The same principal could be used or even string tied around a nut..(of the 'Bolt' variety) and thrown across the ceiling structure......

Disclaimer...No animal was harmed or suffered during this process although being 50 years on, the cat is no longer available for this type of work...

Edited May 8, 2013 by metisdead
Bold font removed.

[mrbojangles]

My Thai house has flimsy aluminum ceiling supports on a 600mm x 600mm grid. Climb a ladder, remove one tile and throw the wire over to near where you want it. Open tile at that point and continue. Easy.

The op obviously doesn't have that type of ceiling design but I too am confused as to what he does have. Mine is an alluminium grid system but without removable tiles but with plasterboard sheets and all the joints are taped and smoothed to it's a continuous ceiling. There is however an access trap and through there you can walk along the top of the internal walls or walk on the "C" section steel that spans the house and is welded to the roof "C" section steel. I was up in the loft last month putting cables in for extra outside lights and it was a doddle.

[mrbojangles]

When I was a child I remember my dad re-wiring many of the sockets around the skirting boards (baseboard), in our house using our cat....

He would lift up a section of floorboard at each end of the room and put the cat, (Tibby, if I recall...) into one of the openings with string attached to his collar..(the cat's collar.. ) and then replaced the floorboard whilst my mum would call the cat from the other open floorboard section......once the cat emerged from the other end he was rewarded with a treat and the string was removed and then used to pull through the new wires......

The same principal could be used or even string tied around a nut..(of the 'Bolt' variety) and thrown across the ceiling structure......

Disclaimer...No animal was harmed or suffered during this process although being 50 years on, the cat is no longer available for this type of work...

Pity we can't train Gecko's, eh

[thaibeachlovers]

What exactly is Flimsy Steel Ceiling Supports.

My Thai house has flimsy aluminum ceiling supports on a 600mm x 600mm grid. Climb a ladder, remove one tile and throw the wire over to near where you want it. Open tile at that point and continue. Easy.

You could also try casting a line with a fishing rod. Tie the wire to the cast end and reel in.

Flimsy steel ceiling supports are lengths of thin steel attached to the roof beams by lengths of wire with the ceiling riveted to them. My ceiling isn't removable. If it was, I wouldn't have made this thread, as I could have done what you said. I am familiar with removable ceiling panels.

[thaibeachlovers]

I may have had the same problem. I needed to go 30 meters with only a small opening in the middle from one room to another all the way across the house. Punched a small hole about 2" in diameter at both ends where I needed the wire to enter into the room. Took a 50 foot tape measure fed it out to the first hole from the center access. Using a coat hanger hooked the end of the tape and pulled it down into the room, Secured the wire (6mm X 2) to the tape measure with electrical tape and simply released the tape measure lock retracting the tape along with the wire, puling the wire to the center opening. Half way there. Disconnected the wire. Now the tricky part! Fed the tape measure up through the other small hole toward the center opening. With a little help from my GF she grabbed the end of the tape. I re-secured the wire to the tape and retracted the tape measure slowly pulling while at the same time feeding the wire. Sounds like a lot of work but really wasn't took about 30 minutes to complete.

The tape measure is flexible steel and can easily fed out of your take your time. Worked for me

You are lucky to have the access panel in the middle. Mine is far from the middle and it makes it excruciatingly difficult to get up to and down from the roof space. If I owned the house, I'd rip it out and put in removable ceiling panels.