Cutting the cable?
4 years ago
Featured Answer
Sort by:Oldest
Comments (37)
Related Discussions
Cut underground wire!!
Comments (9)Out here in Arizona it's called Blue Stake, but like the others said, they only mark utilities belonging to the companies like power, phone etc. You must call a private outfit to have your own stuff located. We take responsibility for what we hit while trenching, the liability is priced into the job. Sometimes the customer decides to save money and dig it themselves, which we are glad to let them do. hey petey when do I get out of this stinkin cell, this dial up is killin me....See Morecutting cable
Comments (27)The term "dry solder joint" is sometimes used but "cold solder joint" is much more common and descriptive. In electronics, when hand soldered, the two wires, components, or components to circuit board, must be brought up to the proper temperature for the solder to flow into and over them - known as wetting. When only the solder itself is heated and melted, it never really makes a good electrical or mechanical connection between the wires or components and will soon fail. It's commonly referred to as a cold solder joint and is dull and gray rather than shiny and bright. Cooling of the solder too rapidly also leads to the same type of failure. I'm not sure why, but when ever I've been training electronic technicians, they've always wanted to blow on the solder joint after they've made it - it's the worst thing you can do and will lead to failure. The problem with soldering the large battery cables is getting them just hot enough and then also evenly all around. Too little heat will create a cold solder joint, and too much heat will oxidize the copper, which will resist the wetting action of the solder, or melt the insulation. A mechanical bolt-type wire clamp would work much better....See MoreCut the cable tv feed to my house. recomendations?
Comments (7)The independent contractors that Time Warner has used in this area for construction have made me wary and uncooperative with TW- as they have been uncooperative with me. In the edges of some farm fields, they assured the property owners that the cable would be plowed 36" deep. One farmer cut it three times with a disc harrow. I doubt that it was 8" deep. The contractor no doubt moved right along with the cable plow that day. They drove a big bucket truck over my septic tank- after I told them not to do so. They left after I talked with them, but came back when I was not there and that was the time they drove over the tank. Threw their scraps of cable, etc., down in my hay field at every pole they visited. Now I go supervise if I see them on my property. Just call them and tell them your service is out. No further comment to them is necessary....See MoreHansen Cable Railing Review (also called Aluminumrailing.com)
Comments (0)I recently completed a DIY install of Hansen's Cable Railing system. This is a summary of my experience. I selected Hansen after a great deal of research. Although there are cheaper options, their prices seemed to be midpoint, and their quality promised to be excellent. There were good points and bad points to my experience with Hansen, that I will detail shortly, but in the end I would recommend their product if you have no stairs, and recommend another company's product if you have any stairs involved. My build involved a (roughly) 13' x 22' deck surrounded on 3 sides with 42" cable railing, plus a stairs with cable rail on both sides and a handrail, plus a short run of 5-steps stairs with cable on one side, plus 13' of cable around 2 sides of a patio. Altogether, Hansen charged 8800 for the rails, posts, cable, fittings, screws, etc... I recommend waiting until your deck is built before ordering the product, as having different dimensions or angles then given to Hansen can lead to serious issues. However, I actually ordered before my deck build and made sure that the deck adhered to plans. After they charge your card for a deposit, Hansen draws up plans which they send to you for approval. This provides a comprehensive pick list of materials and ensures that their butt is covered if there is a problem. There is about a 2-3 week lag between initial payment and plan approval and when they manufacture and ship. The product came delivered by freight in a pallet of posts, plus a VERY long skinny package with the rails. I needed two strong people to carry the long package, and fortunately the delivery person used a forklift to put the pallet in a good place. During the install, I found that they made 3 mistakes (leaving out 1 cable for each side of the stairs and messing up the size of one post) but were good about fixing the problems. I went with mostly fascia mounted posts to maximize deck space and also strength of post supports, with some in concrete. The brackets and posts feel very beefy and solid. I went with the powdercoated color, and for the most part the product paint was excellent. However there was one post with bubbles on the paint, and all of the stairs post caps had terrible paint jobs. Their system feels very well thought out, with some exceptions I will mention shortly, and clearly they have engineered it to pass code. The install went smoothly. The positives were: my sales representative, Doug Heizenrader, was very helpful in both the ordering process and install process, explaining design and intall options. Also, they provide almost all of the hardware you need, in one convenient package. I had to buy a tool for cutting cable (I went with a Dremel UltaMax saw because cutting stainless cable is super hard), for swaging cable (got the Lehigh swaging tool), and had to purchase concrete wedge anchors for the brackets that went into concrete. The install process is: mount the brackets (4 large lag screws per post) which sometimes requires adding some washers to straighten the post. Then put all the posts upside down in the brackets, use a laser level to mark a consistent distance above the highest point of the deck, and cut all the posts to length. Then put all the posts right side up, install railing, then screw in the posts to the brackets. They provide excellent Tek screws for much of these tasks, and the amount of predrilling needed is reasonable. As for the negative, I was shocked to find that the stairs posts were completely blank, I was expected to drill these myself. This involves making a template (I used a piece of laminate flooring) and positioning the template against the top rail to properly position the holes. Although this may not sound like a big imposition, it is very time consuming because there are say 11 holes on each side of each stairs post. Furthermore, I found out (the hard way) that the holes have to be drilled at an angle that mimics the eventual path of the cable, or it is difficult/impossible to thread the cable and the cable wont lie right and will excessively rub. So I actually had to drill every hole TWICE. Similarly, I found that Hansen did NOT drill the corner post holes (where the cable makes a 90 degree turn) at an angle, with the result being that I had to drill these with my hand drill. Requiring me to drill these holes is really bad, in my opinion, because the result with a hand drill is far inferior to what hansen could achive with their machining; and drilling aluminum is difficult to get high quality results as the metal mushrooms easily. Not to mention the significant amount of extra time and effort. There is NO good reason that Hansen should require us to do this part of the install; given accurate rise-run measurements on the stairs, any necessary adjustments can be made by altering the height of the post, which is a standard part of the install for non-stairs posts. When I queried Doug at Hansen about this, he basically admitted that they do it because sometimes customers give inaccurate rise-run measurements. This is a piss poor reason to require customers to drill and achieve a lower quality result in my opinion. Also, their instructions are incomplete when it comes to cutting the cable. Their instructions are "cut the cable 1/2" from the face of the post after pulling it taut". However, this will be disastrous if applied to stairs, where you actually need to cut the cable 1/2" PAST the face of the post due to the diagonal path thru the post and the larger washer. I managed to catch this, but they should really include such directions for everyone. Another potential problem is that their fascia mounted brackets put the post a good 1.5" away from the fascia, and the cables 2.5"; if your decking does not overhang the fascia, this gap is excessive and a sideways foot can easily slip off the deck. Another tricky thing for those of us who have never swaged before, is to realize that the swage closest to the threads should not be closer than a half inch from the threads, as the cable only extends a certain amount into the threaded terminal. In summary, I found their system well designed, the product high quality, and their execution excellent. HOWEVER, I DO NOT recommend their product if you have stairs or if you have alot of 90 degree posts, as they require you to do alot of unnecessary work that comes out below standard, and they do not properly document the cable cutting process for stairs....See More
4 years ago- 4 years ago
Related Stories
DECORATING GUIDESA Vote for the Cable Stitch in Home Decor
Warm Up a Room With the Look, Feel and Memories of Knitting
Full Story
DECORATING GUIDESHow to Hide Your TV Cables
Make your TV room clutter-free by hiding your electronics in the wall
Full Story
MORE ROOMSOn Trend: Smart Solutions for Cords
Show those cables and wires who's boss with these clever solutions for the home office
Full Story
HOUZZ TOURSHouzz Tour: A 'Portlandia' Home Raises an Eyebrow
Cable TV came calling for this quirky home in Oregon, and it played its spaceship part to a T
Full Story
COLORRunway to Room: Spring Fashion Pops Into the Home
From streaks of nude to shots of neon, color joins shimmer, menswear, cable knits and more in the spring 2012 runway collections
Full Story
EVENTSTile Goes High Tech at Italy's Big Expo
Cutting-edge methods are creating tile looks from handmade to avant-garde, as seen as CERSAIE 2013
Full Story
HOME TECHCook Smarter With New Wi-Fi Kitchen Gadgets
Whip up meals with high-tech help, thanks to a phone-connected oven and teakettle, plus a web-surfing cutting board
Full Story
KITCHEN DESIGNDish-Drying Racks That Don’t Hog Counter Space
Cleverly concealed in cabinets or mounted in or above the sink, these racks cut kitchen cleanup time without creating clutter
Full Story
HOME OFFICESExpert Talk: 11 Desk Designs That Really Work It
Boring or inadequate desks don't cut it for productivity in a home office. File these desk designs and expert insight under "To Do"
Full Story
LIFEYou Said It: ‘It’s Different ... But Then, Aren’t You?’ and More Wisdom
Highlights from the week include celebrating individuality and cutting ourselves some decorating slack
Full Story
Sherry8aNorthAL