A cable laying assistant

when we bought our first house in 1964, I was able to use my youngest
brother-in-law - then only 6 - to pull all the cables through under the
ground floor.
+++++++++

Surprised that nobody has suggested a remote control car. They're pretty
cheap these days and if it gets lost, you can reel it back in using the
string (you did tie a string to the back didn't you?).

Paul DS

In article ,
Paul D Smith wrote:
when we bought our first house in 1964, I was able to use my youngest
brother-in-law - then only 6 - to pull all the cables through under the
ground floor.
+++++++++

Surprised that nobody has suggested a remote control car. They're pretty
cheap these days and if it gets lost, you can reel it back in using the
string (you did tie a string to the back didn't you?).



cars can't clamber over sleeper walls

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Please note new email address:

Peter Duncanson:

This post appeared in alt.usage.english earlier
today. I though it might appeal to inhabitants of
uk.tech.digital-tv. (Copied with permission)

The context was a discussion about the ground
floors of houses and the space beneath them.

In our first house were trying to lay a new TV
cable underneath a suspended floor; the gap was
too small for a person to crawl through. So I
hit on the idea of attaching a string to the
cat, putting her under the floor at point A, and
calling her to another hole B at the other end
of the house.

It worked fine except that she didnt go straight
from A to B; instead she explored the underfloor
space for some time, winding her way round vari-
ous supporting walls en route; and we had for-
gotten to measure the string before she set off.
When she emerged we tied the string to the ca-
ble and pulled it through. It took an awful lot
of cable...

A very similar story emerged in Russian IT circles
around 2008:

Once I had urgently to lay two score twisted pairs
along some hundred meters, most of the distance go-
ing over a dropped celing at three meters' height.
As the only sysadmin in the office I understood I
couldn't do it myself in acceptable time, and fell
to badgering my boss about hiring off-site wiremen,
to which he grudginly coneeded. I rolled a techni-
cal project, sent it out to several companies and
waited.

One offer stood prominently out from the rest. The
applicant claimed they would complete the work in
one day and for as little as a third of the sum de-
manded by any other competitor! To be safe, I
called them asking whether they had understood the
project. They said they had understood it well, and
the speed and the low cost were due to their having
a cable layer. I was mystified, for I had dealt
with cable layers in the army and was cudgelling my
brain as to how this device might be fitted to lay-
ing twisted pair over a dropped ceiling.

On the appointed date only two wiremen arrived with
folding ladders and insturments. Watching them un-
load, I anxiously awaited the miracle-device capable
of automating the process, but there was none. In
return, the last to come out of the minivan was a
small dachshund. Anticipating my astonishment, they
explained to me that this very dog was their cable
layer.

With the duchshound came a special costume with a
handle along the spine for carrying, a harness for
the head with a LED flashlight, and a breast-band.
Laying of cable was accomplished by fixing its end
to the breast-band and letting the duchshund into
the place with poor access. The trained animal
would swtifly run at the sound of a voice or the
light of a falshlight hauling the cable. Our ceil-
ing sufficiently firm to hold the dog, which had
enough strength to pull the cable over fifty meters
at a time.

The rate of cable-laying through long and inacessi-
ble areas was fantastic. The duchshound ran along
corridors, thither on the dropped ceiling and back
hither on the floor scaring the female workers.
Even the accident of a tile's falling off the ceil-
ing did not daunt it. The cable acted as a safety
rope and the dog descended smoothly to the floor.
The guys said it was used to such situtations.

Jokes or no jokes, that company had the dog on the
books: they showed me the documents. They completed
the work in less than a day and without the prepara-
tory unwinding of the cable and therefore without
off-cuts, but our own work had stalled, for every-
body came to watch the cable layer at work.

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wrote:

Peter Crosland wrote:

A good story nonetheless but I doubt the RSPCA would approve.

The RSPCA in recent years seems to have thrown away the idea of Common
sense with some of the prosecutions it has pursued

I can see some of the reasons the RSPCA wouldn't approve, it's been said
the car didn't take a direct route, and others have pointed out that
pulling tangled cables isn't easy, what if the cat had got it self
"tied" around something in an inacessible position?

I don't believe the story as wriiten though , if the Cat went straight
from one whole to another fine, but pulling a cable that has been
wound around brick supports No. Anyone who has pulled cable or pipe
will know how little an obstruction has to be to make the task very
hard or impossible.

The story as told did say pulling a string, to allow pulling a cable,
not directly pulling the cable.

On 2015-09-28, charles wrote:

Whiskers wrote:

Lift more floorboards between points A and B, then have humans thread
the pipe or cable. Probably not so much fun for the humans of course -
and do remember to count all the pets and children before and after!

when we bought our first house in 1964, I was able to use my youngest
brother-in-law - then only 6 - to pull all the cables through under the
ground floor.

An early apprenticeship!


--
....the reason why so many professional artists drink a lot is not
necessarily very much to do with the artistic temperament, etc. It is
simply that they can afford to, because they can normally take a large
part of a day off to deal with the ravages. [Amis _On Drink_]

On 2015-09-27, Peter Duncanson [BrE] wrote:

This post appeared in alt.usage.english earlier today. I though it might
appeal to inhabitants of uk.tech.digital-tv. (Copied with permission)

The context was a discussion about the ground floors of houses and the
space beneath them.

quote

In our first house were trying to lay a new TV cable underneath a
suspended floor; the gap was too small for a person to crawl through. So
I hit on the idea of attaching a string to the cat, putting her under
the floor at point A, and calling her to another hole B at the other
end of the house.

It worked fine except that she didnt go straight from A to B; instead
she explored the underfloor space for some time, winding her way round
various supporting walls en route; and we had forgotten to measure the
string before she set off. When she emerged we tied the string to the
cable and pulled it through. It took an awful lot of cable...

Janet.
endquote

Interesting. The people who work work cable & satellite TV companies
in the UK seem to try hard to avoid running cable under floors: the
usual practice is to bring the cable up to the house, run it up the
walls, around outside corners, &c., & finally take the cable under the
edge of the roof tiles, or through an air brick, or as a last resort
drill a hole through the outside wall right where the socket will be
placed.


--
Why is it drug addicts and computer afficionados are both
called users? --- Clifford Stoll

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 10:43:32 +0100, Graham. wrote:

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 08:04:05 +0100, wrote:

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 02:40:32 +0200 (CEST), "Graham."
wrote:



In our first house were trying to lay a new TV cable underneath a
suspended floor; the gap was too small for a person to crawl through.
So I hit on the idea of attaching a string to the cat, putting her
under the floor at point A, and calling her to another hole B at the
other end of the house.


--
Peter Duncanson, UK (in alt.usage.english)


Now that's what I call a practical cat.

I'm not sure I fully believe the anecdote as told.

Did its training on CAT 5 cable.

G.Harman

Damn. Why didn't I think of that?

How about, "CAT 6 cable"? Damn! you've missed another chance :-)

I know, try "I bet it's now an expert with CATV systems." Oops! Another
missed opportunity. So sorry. :-(

--
Johnny B Good

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 12:05:49 +0100, Mike Barnes wrote:

Brian-Gaff wrote:
Ah yes, This reminded me of a similar thing many moons ago when a
person wanted to put his hose pipe under the floor so he could attach
it to an indoor tap.

Same problem the hose needed to be very long indeed after pulling it
through.
There has to be a better way.

Limit the amount of string you give the cat.

That's the antithesis of the saying, "Give him enough rope to hang
himself with." I wonder how you'd determine the limit to save the cat
from reducing its life reserves by 11% (assuming it still has a full
complement of 9 lives). :-)


--
Johnny B Good

Johnny B Good wrote:

That's the antithesis of the saying, "Give him enough rope to hang
himself with." I wonder how you'd determine the limit to save the cat
from reducing its life reserves by 11% (assuming it still has a full
complement of 9 lives). :-)


Cats taste of fish. At least the ones I run over do.

Bill

"Johnny B Good" a écrit dans le message
de groupe de discussion : ...
On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 10:43:32 +0100, Graham. wrote:

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 08:04:05 +0100, wrote:

On Mon, 28 Sep 2015 02:40:32 +0200 (CEST), "Graham."
wrote:



In our first house were trying to lay a new TV cable underneath a
suspended floor; the gap was too small for a person to crawl through.
So I hit on the idea of attaching a string to the cat, putting her
under the floor at point A, and calling her to another hole B at the
other end of the house.


--
Peter Duncanson, UK (in alt.usage.english)


Now that's what I call a practical cat.

I'm not sure I fully believe the anecdote as told.

Did its training on CAT 5 cable.

G.Harman

Damn. Why didn't I think of that?

How about, "CAT 6 cable"? Damn! you've missed another chance :-)

I know, try "I bet it's now an expert with CATV systems." Oops! Another
missed opportunity.

The more so since those systems are based on twisted purrs, I believe.

So sorry. :-(




--
Johnny B Good