Hole in wall for cables

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geoffmuso

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Hi all,

I'm relocating my setup to two empty rooms seperated by a solid, brick partition wall, however I'm pondering at the moment what would be the best way of getting all the cables through from the control room to the live room. Since I would like to be able to have the option of controlling the PC from either live/control room, I will need a hole in the wall big enough to fit the plug of a monitor extension cable (maybe a DB25 as well) which might mean something like 4-6 cm diameter. The hole would go through to a fitted cupboard on the control room side, which I suppose I could use to block the gap as much as possible, as well as putting rockwool into the hole itself, but is this a feasible idea? How much will this affect the trasmission of sound from the control room to the live room? Any good suggestions for either the making, or the soundproofing of the hole?

Many thanks in advance,

Geoff.
 
Hi Geoff,

I was in similar position a month back- my walls are floated gypsum but this will work aswell with brick/blockwork.

I cut two seperate 2" holes in wall - one to run power and another for audio/ data. Cut a caulk tube in half - to give a roughly 4" tube (caulk is truly wonderful stuff -even the empty tubes are useful !) push fit into the wall,wrap the cables in DPC membrane where they run thru the wall, now rip up some rockwool - I had some heavy density stuff that I had used for floating a floor - and pack tightly into the tubes, tape ends of tube with heavy duty adhesive tape. When this is done you have a caulk tube cable package loosely in the wall - now caulk it throughly and jobs done.

I have isolated my PC in my wall void using this method and my soundproofing is unaffected. I have seen various suggestions of sand filled tubes, sandbag filled tubes but I can see how that will work that well aswell as being well dificult to achieve. If anyone has done it another way then please post.

Cheers
 
You can also consider building a dual-face jackplate, thus offering jacks on both sides. If its a straight through, then all your audio, power, midi, PC connections will still work.

A friend of mine did this between his console room and the main live room - mounted an ADC patch bay on each side, and had 52 TRS jacks between the two rooms. Using different jacks and connectors, one in theory could pass anything through. And a nice plate on either side could cover any excessive burrowing done into the brick, cement, etc.

The advantage to jacks (I think) is the wires can be removed, since they aren't chauked into the hole. Cleaner appearance and more flexibility.

Hope that helped,

Frederic
 
chaulk is your friend - and friendlier to your signal path then plate connections - which still require the gap around the wires to be filled - with chaulk ;)
 
sjoko2 said:
chaulk is your friend - and friendlier to your signal path then plate connections - which still require the gap around the wires to be filled - with chaulk ;)
Click to expand...

Chaulk is your friend, so chaulk up those jackplates!!!!!
 
Looking at my post I don't think I made it quite clear that the caulking doesn't actually touch the cables - the tape can be removed, rockwool taken out and a cable renewed no problem (OK u need a vacuum cleaner to suck up the rockwool fragments !)

Hope this helps. geoffmuso - what have u gone for ?
 
Transputer said:
Looking at my post I don't think I made it quite clear that the caulking doesn't actually touch the cables - the tape can be removed, rockwool taken out and a cable renewed no problem (OK u need a vacuum cleaner to suck up the rockwool fragments !)

Hope this helps. geoffmuso - what have u gone for ?
Click to expand...

Actually, I read your post twice, and I had the impression you were suggesting he chaulk the cables in tight :) So, now we understand it better, thank you for the clarification.

But I will still stand on my podium and scream "Patch panels!"

Running a few cables through the wall is okay but when you're running MANY cables through, patch bays (even if its computer connectors, and homemade), are a real life saver.

Sorry to be so insistant.
 
No problem frederic,

Infact I'm always on the look out for alternative ways - my solution's main saving grace was that it is cheap :) I may get round to posting some pictures. Have you any pictures of your patchbay installation - that would be cool.

Cheers
 
Transputer said:
No problem frederic,

Infact I'm always on the look out for alternative ways - my solution's main saving grace was that it is cheap :) I may get round to posting some pictures. Have you any pictures of your patchbay installation - that would be cool.

Cheers
Click to expand...

Me too - always looking for a better and/or cheaper way of doing everything.

Regarding pictures of my studio... I'm just starting construction, so over the next six months I'll have some pictures showing up on the web. Just registered my new domain and installed the new firewall for the web/mail/ftp server. Going very slow, thanks to other projects becoming "high priority". But I will have pictures very soon, starting with what the space looked like before chopping it up :)
 
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