[sdiy] ot: tracing power cables in a house

[Tim Ressel]

A cheap way to do one of those 'toner' setups may be
to rig a 555 timer to oscillate at high freq then use
an AM radio to trace the signal. When ya touch the
right wire with the radio antenna it'll get louder. 

Hint: leave the cap off of the 555 (from pin 2 to
gnd); let stray capacitance do the job.

--TR

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the view never changes.
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--- Dean Stiglitz <deknow at deknow.com> wrote:
> hi all,
> 
> my gf's father has a house half gutted, and half
> wired...the electricians have not come back to
> finish the job (because they didn't label anything
> when they laid the wires...they have no idea what
> wire goes where), and for the same reason, he has
> been unable to get someone to finish the job.
> 
> i was hoping to be able to help him out by at least
> identifing/labeling the wires in the basement, and
> where they go.
> 
> i've seen some tools ($100+) that do this, but was
> thinking perhaps instead to do a little diy
> approach.
> 
> anyone done this (or something similar) and have any
> suggestions???
> 
> it seems i could (at the non-basement end) inject a
> sound source (radio headphone out) into the wires
> (hot to one wire, and ground to another) and use
> alagator clips or test probles connected to a
> speaker to find the terminating end in the basement.
> 
> another option seems to be to do a similar thing
> with a 9v battery and an led.
> 
> again, if anyone has any brilliant ideas that would
> save me time/money/frustration, i'd love to hear
> them.
> 
> deknow


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