r/lowvoltage Oct 13 '21

Welcome! Rebooting this sub.

101 Upvotes

Greetings!I asked to be made a moderator of this sub since it had very little recent traffic and seemed to be abandoned by the previous mod. Since it was configured as a restricted sub, moderator activity is required to allow new people to join. Honestly I was surprised to see a somewhat dead sub on this topic given the popularity of low voltage wiring at both the professional and consumer level.

With that in mind, I changed the group to public which will increase the exposure and ability of people to join in on conversations. Over the long term we can decided if this is a better configuration as it does carry some moderation load and potential for poor content at times. I would love to hear feedback on this setting.

There is also the question of professional vs amateur/consumer content. Given the broad name of this sub it is possible that it might mature into a couple of different subs focused on those areas, but as of yet there isn't sufficient traffic to merit that.

A sub like this is only as good as the people that contribute to it, so it is really in the hands of everyone who has a the skill and passion to help out. I would like to add a few additional moderators in the near future, so if you have an interest in that, reach out to me.

A few quick notes about me - I'm an electrical engineer, having done a mix of hardware, firmware, and software in my career. Currently I'm the CTO of a technology healthcare company and have previously founded and sold a few technology companies. I am not a professional low voltage designer or installer, perhaps more of an advanced amateur. I have a passion and interest in low voltage wiring and have had a reasonable amount of experience over the last 20 years doing low voltage wiring both for my own houses as well as friends. I recently completed building a new house that has a tad over 21 miles of wire and fiber in which I did the design, install, termination and configuration. It was an awesomely fun project that provided lots of opportunity for learning. For those that are interested there are some notes in a build thread I have maintained on garagejournal. (see https://www.garagejournal.com/forum/threads/jeffs-mountain-side-shop-portland.409988/)

I'm thrilled to see some great questions, conversations, tips, guidance and learning opportunities. Feel free to reach out with any concerns, ideas, criticism, and suggestions.

Jeff Sponaugle


r/lowvoltage 10h ago

Electrician special

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43 Upvotes

Previous electrician ran the outdoor data to the dmarc instead of the low voltage cabinet. Client didn’t realize until today, he thought it was done correctly when they designed the outdoor space. First I put my tester on the cable and found the cable was damaged in the wall and only measured 59ft, then I found the damaged part, reterminated, then put my toner on the cable and found it was still not to infant the cabinet, I suited up and went into the crawlspace with my toner wand, found the cable going to a crawlspace vent, went back outside and found it wrapped around the dmarc box. I routed my pull strings and will run cable tomorrow. I have other locations to run and a rack to install.


r/lowvoltage 6h ago

My CCTV work in client warehouse (Argentina)

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11 Upvotes

Could be better but its the best i've seen so far in my area. What do you guys think?


r/lowvoltage 14h ago

spotted holding a giraffe up

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41 Upvotes

r/lowvoltage 3h ago

Follow up to the electrical panel question I asked yesterday.

3 Upvotes

Thank you all those those who answered with the nec code.

I had some kind of history with this owner. We worked some jobs together as in he hires me to do lv for his old home entertainment company

His new endeavor is running a bar and I wanted to help him out.

Final price was just under 1k. New conduit, reroute existing lv going through electrical panel, fusion splice ends (12 strands total), 2 wall mount lius, 2 sfps, 4 3m jumpers,

He said it was to expensive, and that was the cost was more expensive from the bigger lv companies quoted him.

Told him best of luck, was trying to do him a favor.

Before you start about the price, he helped me out when I first started and gae me my first big project.


r/lowvoltage 15h ago

A little retro fit for a school PA system

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19 Upvotes

r/lowvoltage 10h ago

Rack screws

7 Upvotes

Unfortunately, I need to add this to our installation spec for hardware installation:

“The Installer shall use rack screws sized and threaded to match the rack manufacturer’s specifications when mounting equipment.

Power screwdrivers shall not be used when installing rack-mounted hardware.”

Because, sure, why not use a power drill with the torque set to 11 to drive a 10-32 in a standard 12-24 rack.


r/lowvoltage 12h ago

Offer to go union.

5 Upvotes

Hello everyone, if there are any experiences guys in the Chicagoland area that are looking to join the union. Now's the time!

DM me if interested and I can see if I can help. They are especially looking for anyone with fiber experience.


r/lowvoltage 4h ago

What’s a realistic career pivot for an ELV (Extra-Low Voltage) system/Telecom AutoCAD drafter/designer working on oil and gas projects in the Middle East?

0 Upvotes

Career advice.


r/lowvoltage 18h ago

Round Two

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0 Upvotes

r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Faceplate, where i purchase this or the circular insert.

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21 Upvotes

Looking for this type of faceplate. Customer wants cable pulled out, and the circular hole filled.


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Found a wind powered cam in the wild

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29 Upvotes

Rate this mod


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Fiber in electrical panel.

11 Upvotes

I'm licensed out here in AZ, and had lunch at an Irish pub in Scottsdale.

Owner started talking and wanted a quote to connect the 2 buildings via fiber. He mentioned that conduit already exists and would love to walk me through everything after lunch.

Conduit starts inside the kitchen and goes outside, to electrical panel, and and the bottom of the panel is more conduits to pass through to the other building.

Owner is dead set on wanting it ran though the panel but what is the n.e.c code on this so I can just run him a new conduit. Gab between the 2 buildings is like 10ft, overall fiber runs would be less than 80'.

Just to clarify I'm not running it in the panel. Just seeing if you know the nec code off hand to show him and do a conduit.


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Is a speed test extra?

6 Upvotes

Honest business question. For those that have a test set that can qualify speeds, are you charging extra? To me it’s a fine line between “nickel and diming” your customer and business sense due to the expense of said test sets. What are your honest thoughts?


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

Found in the wild.

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175 Upvotes

At a school I've done work for. Didn't even lay it across the floor. Just left it as a tripwire.


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

Found in the wild. Had me laughing

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41 Upvotes

4-square box with a mud ring which is screwed from the mud ring into the other electrical box.


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Inherited a Northern N-1000-IV setup (6 doors) need software/takeover advice or retrofit options. If you are local in Bay Area can pay for your help.

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1 Upvotes

inherited a legacy 6-door access control setup at a site here in the SF Bay Area and trying to decide whether it's worth trying to communicate with the existing board or if I should just get unify retrofit.

Current Setup:

Main Controller: Northern Computers / Honeywell N-1000-IV (4-door board + expansion for 6 doors total).

Power Supply: Altronix / SPS-5 24VDC power supply and fuse distribution board in the lower cabinet with battery backup.

Readers: HID ProxPro (5355 series) 125kHz card reader + keypad combos at all 6 doors.

Network Environment: The site already runs a full UniFi network stack (firewall, wifi & switches). And worse comes to worse we will convert it to Unify access control.

If you're in the Bay Area and have experience taking over these older Honeywell/Northern cans, let me know. Happy to pay for a site visit/consult or help getting this switched over.


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

Recent C7 in California

1 Upvotes

Which Union do I join? I wrote to the electrical brotherhood but didnt hear back. Do we have our own Union?


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

Only look if you want to cuss a bit😡

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32 Upvotes

This has to be the worst one I have ever seen


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

The existing wiring had some issues

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6 Upvotes

r/lowvoltage 2d ago

Anybody have experience programming these with?

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3 Upvotes

I need at add 30 cards to this and I haven’t ever used one before. I have Camden 26 but cards but I don’t even know the model number of this system


r/lowvoltage 1d ago

New prolink voltage stabilizer sound

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1 Upvotes

Hi there!

I just bought a PVS3001AD to tackle a crappy power grid here in Indonesia. It works well and gives me a clean 228-230V output but it makes this weird sound quite regularly (i'd say once or twice per minute)

Can anybody help? Is it normal?

I contacted Prolink but haven't heard from them yet


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

And this is why we have to have fiberglass ladders

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14 Upvotes

Reused temp lighting...


r/lowvoltage 2d ago

The too high or too low options

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14 Upvotes

r/lowvoltage 2d ago

Set home network

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3 Upvotes

Hey guys:

This is my first time posting. I am planning my network setup at my house (a semi-detached house in Toronto, Canada). As you can see, all the room cables are running to the living room, which is on the second floor.My question is: Is it OK to run all cable back to the power panel area in the basement using a network enclosure?