Wiring – How to replace wire next to another wire

low-voltagewiring

Currently I have, courtesy of the last owner, 3 wires running to the "socket" behind my TV. It's a coax and 2 audio cables (image below), and they go to the fuse box/meter box in the hallway. . I'm not sure how they run, but at least: in the wall they go up, through the ceiling (probably some turns there), and then back down into said box. The yellow PVC tube they run trough is about 1.5cm in diameter (also see below).

Now I don't need an audio cable there at the moment, but I DO need network. I have a "wire pulling spring" (not sure that's the correct term). I figured my options are:

  1. Attach the spring to one or all wires, pull everything out, pull everything I need back with the spring
  2. Attach new wire to audio wires and pull the audio out and the network in with one action
  3. Attach the spring to the audio wire, pull the spring in and the audio out in one go, then pull the network in with the wire pulling spring.

Option 2 and 3 mean that if I do get stuck, I won't be in a worse situation: the coax is still there. On the other hand, I imagine failure is easier if you don't pull out all the wires.

My question is of course: is there a dead-give-away best method, or are there options/considerations I didn't account for that might provide a 4th way or at least pick a certain winner of these three?

(As an added bonus I wouldn't mind some help or links to the best way to attach springs/wires to other wires for these purposes, but that's kinda a seperate thing.)

audio and coax

wires coming out in meter box

Best Answer

I would approach it first by trying to pull the network cable through with one of the audio wires. Strip the covering from about 6 inches/10cm of the network cable and separate the conductors in the audio cable about the same distance. Put the two cables end-to-end with the stripped parts overlapping and fold half of each cable back around the other and use electrical table to tape down flat to the original cable (folding the full cable may make your joint thicker and more likely to catch on the other wires in the conduit). Tape the remaining conductors down flat to the opposite cable (I adjust how I do this for the flattest seam with the specific cable being pulled). Now, see if you call pull that one cable through. If not, you may need to pull all three out, in which case I would pull a "pull string" rather than a fish tape -- electricians use a synthetic string that is lightweight but slippery -- and then pull the wires you do want back through.

If you have access to the attic, you should check to see if the conduit is continuous or if you will need to make one pull into the attic and a separate one back down.

Depending on the length of the run, you may also want to look into wire lube that eases the effort to pull them through the conduit.