How to Pull Electrical Wire Through a Pipe or Conduit 3x faster - How to wire a She Shed
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 26 ส.ค. 2023
- How to Pull Electrical Wire Through a Pipe or Conduit 3x faster - How to wire a Shed
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There's a place and time for either method, vacuum and mouse is great for a hot panel. I worked mostly big jobs, so a vacuum might already be in use by someone else. The main thing is to use your tools properly, safely, and not rushed.
Well said
😂
For inserting more wires in a live conduit and panel, I use insulated fish wire with the metal hook end taped over, it worked every time. I don’t think the vacuum method would work here.
Okay, but hold up a second...is no one going to talk about how incredibly sharp that knife must be?!
I am so glad someone noticed the knife. It is very sharp, I love that thing!
@@TheJacks It was hard to miss. The cut on my middle finger (tried to make an obscene gesture to a vegetable cutter today) started aching when I watched this.
Hah I had the same thought, “man, that thing’s sharp”
@@TheJacksthat a way a knife is suppose to be a dull knife is more dangerous than a sharp one
Saw that
This has the greatest value to one who has zero experience doing it. Thanks for sharing your skills and for the extra time to video it.
Glad it was useful for you
Nice vid! I worked with an electrician who used compressed air tank to shoot the string through 250', worked slick!
I have seen that but I figured more people have a shop vac. Thanks for the c comment
Vacuum buddy
Vacuum buddy
I always put the vac on the other end and let the vac suck it through. Never fails.
Yeah like I was saying that's how I did it for years, until somebody showed me how to do it this way which makes it work better when there's water or dirt in the pipe.
Same this method blows lol 😂 it would have taken way less time to tie the bag on a nylon string, insert partially in the conduit, and suck from the other conduit.
If you bend the first wire 180 degrees and tie the string to the bend so that the string is pulling from the folded part of wire the wire then keeps itself central in the conduit and passes obstructions such as joints and turns much easier.
That is a really good tip, that's how I always pull when I'm using a fish tape. And the other video that I posted about the Milwaukee electric fish tape that's exactly how I taped those wires
I use plastic grocery bags for this. For small pipes I've figured out that you don't need to blow up the rat. It just needs wings that fills the pipe. In larger pipes you do need to inflate the bag. In especially large pipes you need to put light filler in the bag to keep it expanded. You can get rats designed for the specific pipe that you're using. The knot he's using is called a Chinese finger knot. When I use them I do 3 or 4 half hitches with a base hitch that's locked with a square knot.
I agree
I’ve been a electrician for 35 years and never been hurt by a dangerous fish tape pulling wire . Seems like a lot of work, fish tape much easier.
By dangerous, I meant that when you're pulling it moving it it's spends around could get hit in the face, also I don't like putting metal fish tapes into live panels. But you're absolutely right a fish tape works great especially if you know the tricks on how grip them with your lineman pliers when the polls get tight
@@TheJacks There's fiberglass fish tapes for live panels.
Same here. An smart electrician would have put a draw wire in the conduit when it was laid in the ground.
@@BearsTrains A smart electrician uses wire pulling goop, too. I like more goop and less tape.
With fish tape you save time, no noise, no more equipment, no power consumption. I trust my f t
I had a similar situation recently. I hooked a bobber to the end of my fishing line. Opened up the bail on the rod/reel. Blew it through with my leaf blower. Hooked fishing line to string and then pulled the wire with the string. Worked great.
Interesting, leaf blower would push enough air for sure. Thanks for the idea
Genius!
Had a electrician on big long runs he had a pet mouse or gerbil and would tie a light weight string around its hips put it in the pipe with some food at other end then whistle for it and it would negotiate elbows tees ECT it was cute and worked great he kept it in an old lunch box with a screen lid
Practical advice like this is the real gold on TH-cam! Thanks for sharing!
Thank you
Carpenter here, was on a job awhile ago and saw another guy was really pushing this wallboard screw. Before I could saw stop the screw went home. I told him you better take that out hope you didn’t hit a pipe. He took it out and a big long tangle of string came out with it. He was a fourth year apprentice and I explained what happened and why we use just long enough screws and only enough force to grab metal or wood stud, if it fights stop move screw. I told sparky what happened he looked at print and said no wire in it yet and he’ll put in new string.
That's close I've had guys actually stick screws directly into large gauge wires like 200 amp service wires before they got turned on sketchy stuff
Glad to see a seasoned carpenter both watching the guys around him, correcting and teaching them, and communicating well with the other tradesmen. Wish all were truly professional like you! 👍
Forty years in the trade and I've pulled miles of pipe. I am not a fan of blowing. It's been my experience that blowing will often lose enough pressure to not get all the way through the pipe run but if you're sucking and get the bird to go in the pipe it's unlikely to not get all the way to the end. Plus the added benefit if there's water in the pipe it ends up in the vac and not all over the guy at the other end.
I defentaly see your point. I have found myself a situations were sucking wouldn't work, and blowing it gets the string through. Thank you so much for taking the time to comment and watch the video.
If it is underground after you get the string in pull a ball of rags thru , sometimes you will get a bunch of crap if it has been sitting
When you have a hard pull and PVC 90's a string will sometimes cut a slot in the last elbow stopping you from pulling through the last 90* bend . If that happens, pull your wire back, and use a larger diameter rope to pull, It will usually slide over the slot and let you complete the pull.
That is a great tip
When a heftier-than-easy wire pull was anticipated for PVC run, a contractor I worked for would use rigid elbows with PVC adapters to avoid that issue.
The flat nylon tape shaped string works well too because the flatness makes it much less likely to wear a hole in the plastic conduit.
i think this is a older electrician that thinks they are funny. so im gonna grab a bigger rope and pull it thru the same path cut by the smaller rope? quit teaching apprentices to start thinking and not be robots. critical or analytical thinking eventually comes to a young electrician after they screw enough things up
I use the pull rather than push method. Same principle, really, but I think pulling relieves you of needing to build a contraption. You just form your hand around the throat of the pipe and turn the vacuum on. I also use a grocery bag. Works like a charm.
Great tip
Agree.
49 year telecommunications used the vacuum method with no problems safer and less work than the snake what ever gets the job done.
Take care that you don't blow water into a hot panel through underground conduit. Safety first.
Ya , this isn't for going back to a panel for sure
For shorter runs, I just use my hand to couple the vacuum and string to the pipe. No bottle needed. Thanks Jack!
That's a great idea, I had another guy comment that you should just put the small bottle of string in the vacuum I'm going to have to do a video on that.
"Watch out this fish tape could be dangerous!"
*pulls out massive pocket knife*
🤣
Hahaha👍
Retired electrician at 5am watching a guy blowing a line and pulling wire ☕️
Thank you for watching😉
Used to skin TW with a dull pocket knife by rolling the wire over the blade with my thumb so that pig sticker you have is just a tad to long and sharp for me but it could be handy if I ever need to stab a house or maybe an engine block 👍🏼
indeed, bet he loves that knife, he just needs to be careful with it, never forcing it, in order not to damage the edge, that hard steel is very brittle, almost like glass; straight razors were like that @@bagadonutz5717
Depends on the run size of pipe/wires and how many elbows.
There is way to much tape on that leader it just makes it harder to pull round corners that long, a bit of cheap dish soap it flies in no stress or friction burns.
True
The excavation contractor on my house project used a leaf blower to install the pull strings in our conduits. It has so much volume and velocity of air that it really doesn't take any taping or sealing on the blowing end.
That is a great Idea, thanks
When I would stagger mine, I snipped all the tips on an angle, especially the 10, 8, 6 etc. My harnesses were mainly Exane 12awg and 14awg. stranded, but there may be 50 wires in the harness. I've pulled thousands of pulls and made up the harnesses for other people and other shops. (I was a burn-up and rewire tech for a major railroad.)
We also used an white emulsion for putting rubber parts together. Or if it was a large diameter we used "Owl Snot". A yellow gel made for pulling wire.
THANK YOU for what you are showing.
The problem. And I won't lie I usually do cut my larger wires, I was pulling four to engage wires through a one inch pipe so I didn't really have too much stress on it catching.
Good that you mentioned STRANDED wire, it makes a great difference Vs Solid, also the yellow 77 gel helps to pull the wires Thru effortlessly
AWESOME Excellent instructional video. Thank you.
Thanks
Terrific video. Great method. I've pulled a lot of wire. I learned a lot (I could've used) from this video.
For that knot, look for the Magus Hitch (you can also use the Rolling Hitch). Both these hitches have a powerful aspect: When you pull on them they cinch down on the line or wire they're tied to. (Holly of Wind Hippie Sailing had the steel cable backstay on her mast snap in mid ocean. She tied it back down with a rolling hitch. A steel cable. >1000 lbs of force on it.) The advantage of the Magus Hitch is it's easier to untie later.
If you tie several knots you might also consider the multi wrap Fisherman's Knot (the one used on the Prusik not the fish hook one)
What's also important, (and obvious to most people, but not to me back in the day....) is when you wrap your electrical tape towards the front as Jacks does here, all the lips of the layers of tape are facing away from the pull. You won't do it the other way many times before those lips start catching.
I also like using wax, but I wasn't the guy who knew how to pull wire, I was the guy who learned from guys who knew how to pull wire. So I needed every advantage.
The last time I snaked anything was in June in the middle of the Pacific Ocean 160 miles south of the Aleutian Islands on top of a sailboat. We had to turn the third reef line (rope) around and run it back through the boom of the mast. No fish wire, just string, (no vacuum - wouldn't have worked anyway.) I used all my wire pulling mojo and a lot of luck. In the end I had to weedle out the para cord (messenger line) from in between a couple of crooked gaps I could not see. Used an aluminum coat hanger from a hotel in Vietnam. (When my laundry came back, I saw wire and put the hangers right in my sea bag.) When I cut the hanger wire I left it jagged - that's what I snagged the messenger line with. Had to do this on both ends, was surprised I could do it at all.
Thanks for all the great info.
Tie a piece of foam to a string put it in the tube, put a vacuum on the other end. It sucks it right through.
Nice vid bud. Lots of good comments and you took the time to respond to all of them
Thank you. For me it is all about helping and building a community. I hope to put out more useful bids soon.
As an industrial electrician, I have used the same principle many times. I tie a string to a small rag (rag), using shop air. Using this method, one could literally blow the rat for miles, but NEC requires a pull box every 100 feet. Thanks for the informative video.
Thanks for the comment
You know , watching anyone doing something that you never have done before and benefit the information, we all learn something new, isn't that what we are all about is learning from each other, great info.
Glad to help, thank you.
That was worth watching. Thanks!
Thanks
Great, job and technic, thanks for posting..
Thank you
I learned a few things there, cheers for making
No Problem, more to come.
I appreciated the tip and liked your speaking and presentation style. Well done, will help me!
I am greatful, any other subjects I can help with?
I love this idea !!!
Sweet, glad to help
Amazing video. Thanks for sharing.
No problem thanks for the comment!
Greetings from Reno, Nevada.
Great project.
Thanks from Ellensburg WA.
Great info bud enjoyed watching
Thanks
I am trying to make more content like this.
Excellent video and at the precise moment I'm starting a pull.
How did it go?
excellent, I only ran 60' of 4 wire 6g through 3/4" pvc but was quite quick and can I say fun?@@TheJacks
Thank you!
Anytime, thanks for commenting
Great video 📹 👍
I always stretch my black tape. Good to know I've been doing it right all these years. 🎉
Good instincts man
I was working as an Operator at a large Refinery. Suddenly the ENTIRE facility shut down. Turns out a contractor ran a metal fish tape thru conduit straight into a main Load Center, shorting something out. Tripped the entire feed. Idiot was lucky to have survived.
I guess that's why they call a sparky's lol. I'm glad he was okay.
When I was an apprentice, my journeyman foreman had me pull steel fish tape through a conduit with wires...learned some were live when a 277-volt fireball blew in my face and melted off the head of the fish tape. He was silent the rest of the day as he knew he could have killed me!
I could see where the blow method work better with connectors and couplings at our non-sealed or non compression. Good video
Thank you
Good vid , will definitely give it a go when I get a shop vac .
I've used a hand pump in the past and it worked really well .
I think it was called cable buddy here in South Africa.
👍
Awesome stuff!
Thanks , here to help!
Thanks!
Wow that is amazing, thank you so much. If there's anything else I can do to help you through let me know
Put the string spool inside of the vacuum
That is a interesting idea
Nice video ,Thk you for sharing
Thanks 👍
Good advice!!!
Thank always trying to teach
Thanks much, good idea, just plan good to know for the brain locker!
Skills and tools for different situations. Thanks for the comment
Great tip thank you
👍
Thanks
Thanks k you for watching
THank you!
No problem
i found that sucking works better than blowing. if there is not enough vacuum, cover the feed-in hole until the vacuum builds enough then let it go. the longer the run, the longer you need to hold for the vacuum to build. even a piss-weak vacuum cleaner can do the job if you let the vacuum build. also, the first knot i tie is a hitch then lots of timber hitches (on that job you did i would have done about 10) through to the end. also, i have a go with pliers squashing down any snag points as well as more tape.
Yes the pliers were really well, as far as sucking versus blowing it's all about having different skills for different situations.
@@TheJacks , yes.
@@TheJacks , i'll tell you about a job the boss and me did one saturday when no-one else was around. it was a huge brand new bus factory. all conduits were installed in the slab without draw-wires. he's at one end with the vac and i'm at the other end feeding the rope in. nothing's happening. the rope moved about a metre then no more. weve done this before on smaller jobs and everything was fine. not today. this was a big site. 200m x 400m. these conduits are large and long. then we got the idea of blocking the feed until there was enough vacuum then release. this worked. the more we let the vacuum build the fastyer we got all pull-ropes installed ready for the team on monday. .the boss borrowed the wife's home vac. no big industrial thing here. i cant imagine a way to build pressure with the blowing method.
Thank you master
That is not me, but glad to help
Great video!
🙏
Thanks, Congratulations.
Thank you
tnx man
Glad to help
Nice demo
Thanks
Thanks for sharing
Thanks for watching!
Woah, that knife!!!! That's like....Samurai sushi chef cutting sharp!
Got to have a good knife
Thanks for the help.👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍😂😂
No problem
Well done.
Thank you.
This is pure, genius, step-by-step. Thank you.!
Thank you for watching
Beautiful.
Semper Fi
👍
Wow, you're a genius.😂
👍
THANK you
No problem thanks for watching
Suggestion: Fishing bobbers. Once you've shot the string through connect a big red fishing bobber to the string. Make sure it's a good solid hold. That way the string won't accidentally fall into the hole while you're waiting to prep your wire.
It also acts like a lockout flag so people working nearby know it's a waiting wire pull and don't tinker with the dangling end.
That is a great Idea thanks
You might also use several small bobbers as "parachutes" to pull a small string through, since hard spheres are not going to get caught on pipe burrs the way a plastic bag can. Then the small string can be used to pull through the small rope shown in the video. And of course, cut all the pipe burrs out when building the conduit run... if that is up to you and not some careless lunkhead. @@TheJacks
This brought back a funny memory.
I started work in a shop that the owner had built himself. The first time I used the washroom, I look up at a shelf over the toilet and sitting there was a can of "Wire Pulling Lubricant". I almost peed on the floor laughing.
Ya everything electrical sounds dirty I swear.
Good job budd 😊
Thanks, stay tuned for more!
These methods come in handy with really long runs where your fish tape isn’t long enough or won’t push through conduit.
I agree it's all about knowing different tricks for different situations. Thanks for the comment
That's a nice knife.
Thanks
I bet you could 3D print an attachment for your shop vac to do this. Might result in a more consistent seal, and the string inlet could be rounded over to prevent snags.
That is correct, to be honest what works the best is if you work with a smoker have them tap the bottle with a cigarette makes a perfect circle no catcing
A funnel works great !
Yep, I did it. I laughed when is went woosh. Fun job!
I'm glad when it went Mach 5 for you
@@TheJacks LMBO...Thanks again.
I started thinking about Chris Farley while watching this gentleman.. LOL
First time I've ever heard that but I could see it
Great video! I have seen this done with purpose designed equipment to blow fibre optic cable around a plant, but never thought about using this low tech approach...One thing for people to consider is that if they are struggling with the vacuum only getting the string so far, try switching ends and use the opposite technique...
Right
I am retired now ..but a long time ago I made a reduction from pvc pipe of 45º with a small piece of soft sponge tied to the string....and I was using sucction part of shopvac.
That's awesome, basically a homemade pneumatic piston
Tks
Glad to help
Digging the long trench for the conduit is the hard part.
Yeah I had my buddy do it with his excavator, we hit a cable line that wasn't supposed to be there, the main power line going to the well that wasn't supposed to be there, but we did miss the propane line so there's that
@@TheJacks Glad you're still here! No 8-1-1 pre-dig phone line and/or requirements where you're at?
A good tip is always add a extra string so in the future you can pull more wire later if you need it aka Cat6 or something.
Cool, although in this case you're not allowed to run voltage with line voltage in the same conduit according to the NEC. But that trick would work great if you had to pull another circuit later
@@TheJackscorrect. I wouldn't even want to use a string with existing conductors because the string will burn through the insulation very easily.
like a magic trick!
👍
I used compressed air and string to run ground wires thru plastic tubes 20 years ago.
Yeah it's not a new technique but it's not one The kids nowadays know about I feel like
To make my sail, I always cut the bag at a 45 degree angle angle then tie a short piece of string from comer to corner. Tie your string to the loop and blow or suck. You can then untie it or cut a tail so you can use the bag lots of times. I use compressed air and blow.
Wow that's a good idea, my thought is I always have a sandwich bag of my lunch You never thought about making it reusable
Also worked that way, to reuse your mouse/sail. Used plastic shopping bag corners.
Thank you ! Been doing this from time to time and that really will speed things up ! Most times I just build the piping with the wire in it already, piece by piece over the whole 160' length... TIME CONSUMING !
Glad I could help. Thanks for commenting
Farmers use wire to build hogs/chicken pens. Electricians pull conductors.
@@jamesgarrett2129splitting hairs are we😂
Great detailed explanation thanks;
Just curious now, how the heck how do you sharpen that knife? i mean,it cuts like a new shaving blade..
Standard sharpener
Nice👍
🙏
Neatest trick I saw was when guys were pulling big wire through a 5" pipe to a transformer pad. They were using a boom trucks steel cable and winch to pull, but right at the last 90* there was some concrete that would let the cable through, but not the wires. They had to pull the wire all the way back out, and then the attached a large chain to the cable and tied a knot in it. They were able to pull the concrete out with the chain, and then get their wire in.
That sucks but it kind of comes with those giant transformer pads.
What size wire are you using for a 160' run? Seems like there'd be excessive voltage drop on those little wires; correct me if wrong. Thanks for the video, by the way.
No worries, I'm running 2 20 amp circuits, so I upsize them to 10 gauge wire. Shouldn't have much voltage drop to go any higher then that at 161 ft. And no problem.
@@TheJacks Awesome, thanks for responding. I'm about to do a 140' run with a 60A breaker to my workshop. By my calcs I have to use 4AWG to keep voltage drop down to around 3%.
I wasn't trying to be a wiseguy if it came across that way.
Thanks again.
4 awg copper not aluminum
@@TheJacks Yes, using copper.
👍👍👍.Thanks
Thank you
5:07 me : high amount of build up to this moment I’m ready for Mach 5 just like you said and then….. nothing . 👏 👏 👏 well done sir , well done
It went, I cut the bottle with to much of a v so it caused the string to catch
Wow, thats a lot of arsing about, in UK we have nylon draw tapes of various sizes. A thing I find useful is yo puff down some talcum powder as it makes the inner pipe slippery and reduces friction on tape and cables. There is stuff like Yellow 77 but I cant stand the mess it makes.
That is a good tip.i would have used mule tape but it was not enough weight to worry about.
I’ve wired a few OR’s and XHHW wire was required and lube wasn’t allowed. Only talcum powder
Shop-Vac, plastic grocery (or Home Depot) bag. Bucket of string. Tie the bag to the string and stuff it in the conduit. Haul the Shop Vac to the other end of the conduit and start sucking. Tie your cable to the string I did a 1,000+ pull of fiber optic cable with this method many moons ago. It took about 15 seconds to get the string pulled.
That's awesome it went so well for you, I can't say my pulls have always gone that smooth 😓
The bottle works fine for sucking as well but we normally uses a small piece of sponge and we have pipes we made right angles to the right sizes for various diameter conduits.
Yep I was talking about that another comment of the greenly tool that you can get that does that. Thanks for the comment
We used a similar method to feed 3/4/0 through some 4 inch conduit! Now that's work and there is no other way to do it. The mouse was a slightly less than 4 inch ball of taped rags and sturdy string through the middle of it. Then attached the pull rope to the wire. We had a vacuum cleaner about half the size of a VW bug to push or pull the mouse with.
That is a hardcore way and a long day. I hope you got it though!
I've used factory, and every kind of homemade mouse imaginal. The latest I've tried is a party balloon blown up to about the ID of the conduit. Amazing how that works.
You're the second guy that comment about the balloon I'm going to have to give it a shot make a video about it.
Awesome video it help me a lot cause I was struggling with the little foam mouse, if you don’t mind me asking what brand is that knife? And where can I get one?
Hey bro if you go back in the comments I put a link in there a while back, I don't remember which comment though. It was actually a cheap knife off Amazon It was only like 30 bucks, it's a 10-in folder
Thank you
vacuuming can only ever get less than one atmosphere of pressure. Blowing air through can be more than just one atmosphere. This was the process I was told about for running draw string through ducts in the pavements except they used supermarket bags as the ducts were bigger.
I love the science.
Good...point. Because based in good science!
Posting the truth on Y/T will get you banned thou..
I actually had to show the guys at the power company this trick when they brought the wrong snake. Another thing I always do is to pull a spare pull string with the wire for future pulls.
Been a lot of comments about me not pulling an extra string but in this case it was 11x16 shed that was only getting two circuits.
Are you normally using stranded wire for this type of installation? Seems it would be more flexible than 12awg solid wire.
Yes on this it was stranded
Better lookin at it than lookin for it ;)
Sure!
I could have been done with it.. w/ a fish tape. Vs the Mach 4 procedure but i did enjoy the video.
You are right but it is all about tools and trick for each situation. I am glad you liked it. I will try to make more content that you will enjoy
Listened for 7 seconds and subscribed . Is your fish tape even long enough. I ran 50 ft with 4 90s yesterday. All good. Over 100????
Yes, it was a 250 foot tape. The string I showed was a smaller one than the one I actually blew cuz I didn't want to run out. I used a 2 gallon bucket when I actually blew the wire. And I've done this trick on a 490 ft pull, you can see the ditch in this video th-cam.com/users/shortsoh_srFzxrIk?si=r-TBPWS24hylsT8y
9:20
I see a lot of guys wrapping the tape the same way you do, but i prefer pulling the electrical tape from top to bottom.
Do you think its because i'm lefty?
And last question..
Rather than having the rope getting fed from the opening on the side of the bottle, since you blow the rope down the pipe with the vaccum, could you pass the rope through the vaccum ??
Pass it through the intake of the Vac, through the Vac's hose, and down the pipe? Of course, with the little bad acting as a parachute..
That is a great question, in the video and the thumbnail I show a smaller bucket of string that only does about a thousand feet but it didn't have enough in it for the run so I'm actually blowing the string out of a 5 gallon bucket of string. But one guy suggested I just put the little bottle in the vacuum like you're saying and I'm going to definitely make a video to see if that works
@@TheJacks 👍
Great content - well done
Thank you