Before doing battle, it helps to understand what you are up against. Knowing the enemy’s tactics and how he’s likely to be deployed helps to secure a victory. That’s why the DIY cable installer, about to tackle steel stud walls, needs to do his homework first. If you’re pondering a cable installation project for your media centre, first read-up on how steel stud walls are constructed. Although this article focuses on steel studs, if your home has timber studs, you'll also find some useful information in this article.
Rondo supplies steel stud wall and ceiling systems in Australia. The chances are that if your home has steel stud walls, they’ll use Rondo products. And the good folks at Rondo have made their installation manuals available on their site
www.rondo.com.au. The steel stud installation manual runs to 44 pages. There’s no need to read it all, just the first dozen pages or so, and the bits about window and door framing perhaps. What you’re trying to do is to understand how steel stud walls are put together (it’s not hard) so that you’ll know what you are up against when you do your installation.
For the DIY cable installer, steel stud walls have a big advantage over timber studs; service holes. The holes are located every 600mm along the stud, and are usually “bell-mouthed” so that you don’t need to use grommets to protect your cables. The service holes mean that the installer can run cables horizontally through the studs (as well as vertically between the studs). But note that a VGA moulded plug is too big for a service hole.
Planning is the key to a good installation. Once you’ve established where the gear is going to be located, sketch-out a plan of your cable runs. You’ll need a stud finder for this – tapping your knuckles on plasterboard is useless and hurts after a while. The idea is to find-out (without hacking into the plasterboard!) where the studs are. Your wall might have noggings as well. Since you’ve already done your homework on stud wall construction, you’ll have an idea what you are looking for. Bear in mind that the builder might have left some nasty surprises behind the plasterboard though – on the off chance perhaps that a DIY cable installer might try to retrofit a cable. And a word of warning on stud finders; they are not fool-proof and will sometimes give you a "false" reading.
It’s usually easiest to run your cables through a false ceiling. But there’s a big problem with this for the media centre DIY cable installer – eventually you will need to run the cable from the ceiling to the space between the wall studs because your outlet (speaker cable or whatever) will be 20cm above the floor. If you don’t have cornices you can cut some “service holes” at the junction of the ceiling and the wall. These holes can be repaired –
www.gyprock.com.au has a DIY guide on how to do this – but your aim should always be to leave the plasterboard intact.
I’d recommend avoiding service holes at all costs unless there is absolutely no other way, especially if you are not too handy at plastering. Utilise existing light sockets and power sockets as "service holes". A trick you also might like to consider is to “back-pull” an existing cable. The idea of back-pulling is to tape some string to the end of an existing cable (say the telephone cable) and pull the existing cable back into the ceiling. Grab the string and use it to pull your existing cable back to where it belongs, having first taped your new cable to the end of the string (i.e. piggy-back the new cable). But this can be risky for the DIYer, because if you snag your existing cable you will be in a bit of a mess. Stating the obvious, you’ll have taken the usual electricity precautions before messing about with existing cables or utilising light and power sockets.
With the planning done, you need to get some tools for the job. Electricians use a “tongue”. This is a 3 metre long bit of flexible plastic that has some nice properties. It likes to bend and twist, and I found it handy for installing cables (perhaps someone can send me a URL for one because I couldn’t find one using Google). If you can’t get a tongue, the “lid” of that plastic cable trunking stuff works okay. There’s the old standby – the wire coat hanger. Be careful though fishing about behind the plasterboard with a wire coat hanger if there are live electricity cables - switch the power off. Another useful tool is a “granny grabber”. Not only are these handy for when gran drops her fag packet on the floor, but they are great for grabbing cables in open spaces such as the ceiling void. Your two dollar store will have a granny grabber. Pick-up some string, some insulating tape, a “key-ring” torch and a small compact mirror for a lady's handbag from the two dollar store whilst you’re there. Finally, a plasterboard saw is essential, although a steak knife can substitute.
Having planned your cable runs, got your tools and acquired your cables, there’s nothing more for it but to set forth into battle. Be prepared for some skirmishes and set-backs along the way. Retrofitting cables can be a frustrating business, and having a bottle of grog handy helps to steady your nerves. But once you’ve done a good job, you’ll step back and glow with pride at your handy work. Hopefully this article will help you to avoid too many battle scars along the way.
Steel Stud Strife
