I'm installing an air conditioner above a bedroom window, but there's no electric outlet nearby. I'm to avoid running wire along the wall, and I noticed that the light fixture receptacle has an empty conduit pointing in the direction of the window.
If it reaches the window (or close enough to it) I could drill near the window and put an outlet there. However, I have no way of telling if the conduit continues straight ahead or curves to somewhere. I put a snake wire in it, and it goes in fairly easily more than the distance from the light fixture to the window.
Is there any way to trace the path of the empty conduit? It's embedded in a concrete ceiling, about two or three inches deep.
Best Answer
This is going to be slow, but see if you can affix a strong neodymium magnet to the end of your fish tape, and detect it with a well balanced compass.
Even better, use magnetic viewing paper, and have someone reciprocate the fish tape while you watch through the paper for a vibrating field.
I'd personally try a toner tracer first, but a magnetic field will be harder to block than a toner.
Perhaps you could use coaxial cable as your push wire. Attach the toner to the core on one end, strip back an inch of jacket on the other so most of the toner'e RF energy makes it down the cable to a point emanator on the far end. Then carefully follow that point as you push the coax down the conduit.