When my wife and I decided to mount our LCD TV to the wall instead of having it on its stand, we were faced with the problem of hiding all the cables and wires. There were the component video cables, power cable, RCA wires to connect the VCR, and the cable connection. That was gong to be a lot of ugly spaghetti to have hanging from the bottom of the flat screen.
I decided to use surface mounted wire moldings to hide them. After installing them I painted them to match the wall. While this does neaten things up, you can still see the two runs of molding that I had to use to contain all the cords.
I had considered putting them inside the wall, but seeing as the electrical panel for our town home was directly on the other side of the wall, I decided that it was going to be nothing but heartache to try to do it that way. The other draw back was going to be the extra cutting, patching, pulling, and painting that was going to be required to do it properly.
Now I have discovered a newer, easier, and cleaner way to accomplish this goal of a hidden installation. FlatWire Is the answer that I was looking for.
FlatWire is between 8/1000 (paper thickness) and 13/1000 (business card thickness) thick. FlatWire can be used to clean up audio, video, data, and (if the testing goes well) 120v wiring. It is applied to the wall with a spray adhesive, and is flexible enough to make 90°+ bends so that you can customize the installation to fit your specific needs. The wire is also paint-able and wallpaper-able as well.
For the cleanest installation you can feather joint compound out, using standard techniques, to make it completely disappear after sanding, texturing, and painting. If the wire gets the UL approval the company wants, you will even be able to wire your ceiling fan or sconce without cutting into the ceiling/wall or having to pull wire. Just shave a path through your acoustic ceiling, install the wire, and then patch the ceiling with standard spray patch. No one will ever be able to tell that it wasn't installed conventionally.
For audio applications it can replace speaker wire from 18g to 12g, and the sub-woofer connection as well. Just make sure that your speaker can either take a banana plug or RCA connection, and then buy the wire and the correct terminals.
Video applications include CATV cable, component, and S-Video connections. The wires are pathed to make sure that you get at least as good a signal as you would with conventional cables. Again, just make sure you get the correct terminal kit for your needs.
Data applications let you run the cable connection for your cable modem with out having the big fat cable running across the landscape. After you hook up your modem you can then run the CAT5 emulation wire to make your RJ45 connections for your network. It all installs cleanly and invisibly with very little fuss or muss for such a great looking installation.
Once the company gets its UL approval for the 120v applications, installing new wall and ceiling fixtures where and when you want will become as easy as applying a new coat of paint. They are also looking into making an outdoor approved product as well.
The wire is a little pricey when compared straight across to conventional wire, but once you factor in the labor costs if you decide to have a conventional installation, the FlatWire product is way cheaper. Even if you plan to DIY a conventional installation, the time savings of just having to use spray adhesive and paint to install is huge!
All in all I would have rather found out about this product BEFORE I did it my way. I just pray my wife doesn't get wind of it or I WILL be re-wiring our TV system on a weekend when I least expect it!
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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)
so... it's pretty nifty for retrofits, but what happens when you put a nail through it? or the building shifts and the drywall cracks?
ReplyIf you installed the wiring you should know where you ran it. If you go into a location where it is, but you didn't put it in the terminal connections all indicate the direction the wire came from. The company also makes a detector (similar to a stud finder) so you can trace the whole line. If anything traumatic enough to crack the drywall happens, the wire will take a fair amount of abuse (The site touts its durability and flexiblity), and then you just treat it like a cracked drywall joint, and re-mud, sand, and paint it back into obscurity.
so -I- know where i put it, but teenage child 10 years down the road putting a poster on their wall may not, and new owner farther dowN the road certainly won't.
it's NOT just a cracked drywall joint though. if there's say 1/4" lateral shift in one drywall panel vs its neighbor or w/in a plaster wall (moderate settling in older homes, where this is ideal for remodels but can be even greater) suddenly instead of a (for example) vertical crack which is easy to grate flat, hit with tape and mud, you have a flat ribbon with no ability to laterally shift (since it's flat) that will buckle around the fissure, and best case have to be removed from the wall for enough length to allow it to skew and remain flat, worst case it''ll stick on one side and pull free on the other and spread the surface damage crossing to the crack. you'd then be looking at reworking the entire run. even if it doesn't skew, but spreads (also common in settling) how much elongation can it take? that would propagate surface issues all along it.
imho, this would be great for stashing wiring under mop boards or under rugs, and running connections vertically to items directly above, but affixing it to surfaces is a recipe for serious repair work later on, that probably would have been straightforward if it'd been done the old fashioned way (and no i don't mean copper or alluminium in wooden troughs, those have expasnion/contraction issues)
putting a pin through the wire shouldn't cause it to stop working as each wire in the cable will actually be a thin strip
Replyno, but put a pin through the hot while you're grounded will tingle.