Measure once… Cut twice, right??

I love doing carpentry products.  The smell of sawdust plus the sound of power tools and nail guns blazing.  When you are finally done there is nothing better than a nice finished project that is solid and looks good.  But out of all the lessons I have learned when doing carpentry projects, the one that has helped me the most (aside from keeping your hands clear of the blades) is “measure twice, cut once.”

When you are looking at the design of a system you want to make sure you look at all your measurements carefully.  Below are a few of those areas.

Equipment Placement

When putting equipment in your design you must take note of things like line of sight, rigging hardware, rigging points, structural supports, optimal location, and much much more.  If you don’t plan on these things you have the possibility of equipment blocking the screens, being installed too low, positioned wrong, and potentially cause the system to not work correctly at all.  You may even have to add equipment later to make it work right causing an increase in costs.

Wire length

The advice I have here is you cut wire shorter but you can’t make it longer without creating another connection (which is bad practice).  Always leave yourself about 3’ – 6’ of extra wire beyond where the connection will be.  You can cut them shorter and use the short cable sections for jumpers later if they are long enough.

Extra tip: If your installing hardwired components in ceiling grids.  Leave enough room for you to work on the equipment on the ground or scaffold so it is easier to connect correctly.  You can always coil the extra up above the grid.  This makes for faster work and better installs.

Conduit length

Never, never, never ever, cut wire to length for any conduit that you are not 100% certain of the length.   If you need to run a tape measure through first so you can make sure.  Conduit paths are not always straight lines.  Especially poured concrete floors. Listed below are the NEC and ANSI codes associated with your installs.

Codes:

NEC 346-11: “There shall be no more than the equivalent of four quarter bends (360 degrees total) between pull points, e.g., conduit bodies and boxes.”

TIA/EIA-569, 4.4.2.1: “No section of conduit shall be longer than 30m (100ft) or contain more than two 90 degree bends between pull points or pull boxes.

Following these guidelines will help you keep from wrestling a horrible conduit run or put too much stress on the cables and have them break.

Tip:  Put pull boxes in long runs to help you meet these guidelines and save your back.  Avoid putting the pull box under the stage.  No one wants to pull wire on their back.

So measure twice, cut once, save thousands.