I purchased a home that was wired for security. Straight ahead from the front entry is a wire coming through the drywall up in the corner. It comes through just a few inches down from the ceiling.
In the same room but on the opposite wall is another wire. This one is about a foot below the ceiling line and is on a flat expanse of wall (not in the corner).
I want to buy whatever is supposed to be hooked up to the wires. I will not actually hook up an alarm, I just want to cover up the ugly wires.
If you don't want the alarm, and just want to cover up the wires, push the wires into the hole and staple the end of the wire just outside the hole (so it's not lost inside the wall), then simply mount a white or beige plastic electrical plate over the hole. You can buy them anywhere for a quarter or so....
RHC
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Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. To us, a few wires dangling is like fine art. Turns us on. The wire in the corner is most likely for a motion and the one on the flat wall could be a glass break detector.
I choose Polesoft Lockspam to fight spam, and you?
I agree with Alan's post. Find a local dealer willing to sell you a motion sensor (may as well go with a pet-proof one like the Paradox DG-75 and a glass break detector (one of the Intellisense "FG" series would do nicely. They're easy to install. Use red and black for your positive and negative power and the yellow and green for the normally closed switch contacts. If you can't find what you're lookin' for locally (or you figure the prices are just too high), you can go online and look for them. There are several online dealers listed here:
I don't know about that. Had one guy we did a prewire for who just would not be satisfied with anything. I visited him (unpaid) half a dozen times. Gave him a free motion to cover a wire, and finally buried the wires in the wall and spackled over them and repainted the area for him. Then he complained to the general contractor and demanded his money back. What a jackass. He also went aroudn the developement telling other clients to use somebody else. I finally had to stop by and let him know that if he didn't stop his slanderous behavior his next contact from me would be through my attorney. He started to complain about his right to free speech, and I informed him that one of the oldest comments about freedom is that, "My right to swing my arm ends just short of where my fist contacts his nose." I had a long chat afterwards with the supervisor in charge of his house and the developer as well. It turns out he treated every single contractor who worked on his house the same way.
Ultimately, I wopuld have been happier if I had just said one word to him and hung up the first time he called. "Spackle."
Sorry, Frank, But RLB was right on the money that time.
Really?? It seems to me the OP was pretty clear about what he wanted. He may have reasons for not wanting the whole system, but to make it look like he has one... You have heard about "budgeting", haven't you?? :-)
You can build a system one of two ways. Plonk down a whack of dough and get it done in one shot, or do it "piece-meal". The latter method may not involve going into debt or having to mortgage the wife and kids. Either way, I figure in about a six months he have a complete system up and running (which beats having no system at all and "smooth walls").
Not necessarily... We often lace our keypad wires and don't want them stubbed out because we like to make sure our keypads are centered above the light switches.
Same with low temp sensors, glass breaks and thermostat modules...
The gentleman wanted to cover the wires. He said he doesn't want an alarm. Spackle fulfills his requirements and requires no further technical support. Best of all (from his point of view), spackle does not come with a 3-year, renewable contract. :^)
What part of "I want to buy whatever is supposed to be hooked up to the wires. I will not actually hook up an alarm, I just want to cover up the ugly wires" didn't you understand??
We tend to keep our alarm cables away from mains cables (as the cables to our switches normally run vertically up from the switch) that is the last place we would expect to find an alarm cable over here.
You don't have to keep them 9 feet away from ac lines. We put them above light switches all the time...of course we always drill our own holes and route wires at least a foot from the ac...that seems to be enough.
| >
| > BIG NIGE wrote: | > > I would expect that the cable in the corner is for a motion sensor | > >
| > > I would have thought that the second cable would have been for a | > > speaker/sounder | > >
| > > funny no mention of cable for keypad !!!!!!! | >
| > Not necessarily... We often lace our keypad wires and don't want them | > stubbed out because we like to make sure our keypads are centered above | > the light switches. | >
| We tend to keep our alarm cables away from mains cables (as the cables to | our switches normally run vertically up from the switch) that is the last | place we would expect to find an alarm cable over here. | | |
Find a company willing to put switches on the windows and motion on the corner wire and glassbreak on the flatwall wire. You may find a company willing to put in an alarm in stages...I've done this for folks on tight budgets. Might be just as cheap to actually install an alarm.
I always kept my alarm wiring at least one foot away from parallel 110 VAC cables and 2 feet away from 220 VAC. That worked for me. The strength of the electromagnetic field around an AC cable is directly proportional to the voltage on the cable but inversely proportional to the distance from the cable so
1.4142136' from 220 VAC would be the same as 1 foot from 110 VAC but who's measuring? :^)
It's fairly common practice to install the keypad a little way above the light switch. Doing so even with the low voltage cable running in the same stud bay as the 110 VAC for that little distance won't cause problems. If you want to be extra careful, run the cables along the nest stud and drill through behind the keypad.
Crash rightly mentions drilling your own holes. Never run low voltage cables through the same holes with the house electrical cables. I've ripped out and rewired a few jobs where some idiot pretending to be an installer pulled speaker cables through the electrician's cable holes. The guy may have been using one of those levitating ladders and... umm, never mind. :^)
Alarm wires are run separated from 110V wires. But when a Keypad is lined up over the light switch it tends to blend in much better and is more pleasing to the eye.
Sort of an issue with the guys I work with. We try not to do ugly work...
Glass breaks can be lined up vertically or horizontally with door/window frames.
Smokes in line with ceiling lights or centered between doors or some such.
First thing I was taught (after how everything works and is affected by its environment) is that when folks pay 5 - 10 million dollars building a home (for 2 weeks in the summer) they don't want things thrown up any which old way... They tend to view everything as a decoration.
If I can find a location that is both functional and aesthetically pleasing that's the spot.
Of course I use the same reasoning in a 50,000 dollar home as well. Way I figure it, if someone is paying money for me to put something in his house - I'm not gonna do it in a way that would piss me off if it was done to my home.
That said... a keypad stuck out on a wall all by its lonesome would be an eyesore and piss me off. (I know, sometimes ya gotta... but those occasions are rare.)
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