I recently had a demolition job where I removed a TON of data and alarm cabling for a company in the city. I now have hundreds or maybe even thousands of feet of Category 3 network cable in 6 conductor and also 1/2" thick Category 3 cable that has… I don’t know, maybe 20 or 30 or more, conductors in it. Also picked up lots of 4 conductor alarm cable and a huge amount of Category 5 - 8 conductor cable. Not to mention a bunch of pot lights and flourecsent light fixtures in great shape. The lights were just what I needed!
As for the cable, I think I’ll have enough for the 4X8 we are working on now, a future around the wall layout, and then some! [:D]
I am wondering though, how useful is this cable going to be? It’s not much good for buss wires I suppose because of the gauge but it would be ok in short lengths for feeders I imagine. I suppose it’s going to be fine for lighting etc. In the case of the 1/2" thick cable I could double/triple/quadruple the conductors for more ampacity and maybe still make use of it? I am looking for ideas and suggestions anyway.
I am going to have much more than I will need. Is there likely to be any demand for cable like this? Should I list it on eBay? Should I junk what I don’t need?
Just wondering what thoughts there are on this? Anybody?
It should be good for feeders & power pack communications.
I have a whole roll of phone cable I got off of Bell after they finally buried the second phone cable to my house. They wern’t going to re-use it so I asked for it. This I plan on wiring up the walk-around controller for my Starr-Tec Hogger power pack with this.
I also have been taking a lot of the wiring off of the automotive parts we chuck at work after the company is done with it. These are good for feeders & hard wiring my Athearn BB loco’s.
Free stuff is out there. You just need to be in the right spot at the right time.
The other item I have that I got second hand through the car dealership i was working at was a couple of dash mounted cup holders out of Dodge full size pickups.
You can indeed double (or more) those extra wires. You double the current capacity every tome you parallel two similar wires. By themselves they are good for feeders, lights, Tortois machines etc. Copper is at an all time high price right now so don’t throw it away. The cost of shipping it may not be a help trying e bay.
Cat 5 wire is # 24 or #26 wire size. It can be solid or stranded. If you got yours from inside a wall or ceiling it is most likey soild. Use only stranded for walk around throttles. It is always in twisted pairs. Cat 5 wire is designed for mechanical connectors where the insulated wire is pressed onto the connector. Some brands are hard to strip for soldering and the heat will usually melt some of the insulation.
Good for signals and indicator lights etc. Maybe not go good for track wiring.
I tend to think DCC reduces the number of wires needed, however, anyone making modules can benefit from multi-conductor cables. Before selling off figger how much you need. I’m interested, but maybe I have enuff anyways. I dunno, never know, as time progresses, I might need more.
Yes the cat5 is of the solid variety rather than stranded. You are right. Using the solid for walk around may be a problem one day as the flexing will eventually cause breaks in the conductors I imagine.
I had heard recently that copper was getting pricey. I wish I had known before I moved as I left behind about 300 lbs. of 6 ga electrical service wire…among other things. I just had too much stuff! [V]
Yes, shipping can kill some of the best eBay items. I have been wanting to buy an old truck out of the US for a while now but it won’t fit in a bubble mailer! [:(]
I don’t want to get into a situation where I am advertising anything for sale on this forum and that is not my intention, so if someone wants some cable they could pm me and discuss it. Anybody that is local to my area could likely have what they needed. Just like that.
I did the same thing on an interior demolition about 10 years ago. Still have a couple hundred feet of phone line left. Someone said it’s good for switch machine wire.
I thought it would work for that as well. Also for relays for led indicators I guess. Really just about any low current, low voltage application on the layout I imagine. Anyway, I am a happy guy to have got ahold of it. Besides the cable I got a network wiring panel with punchdown blocks that correspond to RJ-45 jacks on the front of the panel. I do have a punchdown tool and crimper with the RJ-45 Die so I may try to incorporate that as a distribution point for alot of my wiring. Guess I’ll have to get the RJ-6 die for my crimper if I start fooling with loconet type stuff one day.
As you can probably tell, tell wiring, electronics, lighting, annimations, etc. are one of my favorite parts of building a layout.