Where my cable comes into my new apartment there are a number of coax cables labelled with rooms that don't have outlets. I bought a toner and probe (Fluke Pro3000) to try to trace them in the walls, but I'm having trouble getting it to work.
First, I attached the toner's black lead to the internal wire and the red to the connector outside. The probe sounds when it's near exposed coax (and near an outlet when I tested it on a known cable), but the tone disappears as soon as the cable goes into the wall. I also tried red to internal wire black disconnected with similar results.
On the advice of The Internet, I then tried red to internal wire, black to true ground (the handle of my fuse box, which I assume is grounded). This lit up EVERY coax and telephone wire in the entire apartment with very audible tone through the wall, making it impossible to trace any given one.
Any thoughts on what I'm doing wrong? Clearly the probe is capable of picking up tone through the wall, but I need to narrow it down to individual wires.
Best Answer
The point of coax cable is to protect a weak signal from outside noise. That also protects the outside from a signal on the coax.
What you need is something that puts out a signal that can be picked up when connected only to the shield, so there isn't a balancing counter-current on the interior conductor.
I am fairly sure such exist; I can't recommend any specific products.