HDMI disaster - help please.

[headcase]

So you would be happy to have a junction box just randomly on your wall near an edge? Can you imagine any woman thinking that ok? A chimney breast especially on an older house is single skin of brick with 2 coat plaster, there isnt any room to fit trunking in there and there is no way you can chase into a single skin of brick as over the years the heat from the fire had dried out the mortar so yes as a professional its common practice to plaster a cable into a wall, if that's what a customer wants then that's what they get.
Remember you are talking about someones living room here not a commercial install where things change quite often. As long as you put in a decent lead set then there is no problem.

Edited by headcase on Thursday 12th April 15:55

[davepoth]

headcase said:

So you would be happy to have a junction box just randomly on your wall near an edge? Can you imagine any woman thinking that ok? A chimney breast especially on an older house is single skin of brick with 2 coat plaster, there isnt any room to fit trunking in there and there is no way you can chase into a single skin of brick as over the years the heat from the fire had dried out the mortar so yes as a professional its common practice to plaster a cable into a wall, if that's what a customer wants then that's what they get.
Remember you are talking about someones living room here not a commercial install where things change quite often. As long as you put in a decent lead set then there is no problem.

Edited by headcase on Thursday 12th April 15:55

I had a similar issue. We just drilled through the chimney breast at a 45 degree angle less than a brick's width from the edge of the wall.

[talkssense]

davepoth said:

I had a similar issue. We just drilled through the chimney breast at a 45 degree angle less than a brick's width from the edge of the wall.

Agreed

Or, go under the floor, or just stay away from chimney breasts full stop.

Customer s always right though, and the number of people who I guess still want TVs on a chimney breast must be high.

Personally, I'd go for a flat wall, corner mount, or stand in preference to a chimney breast everytime, and would always try and avoid a run where you can't pull something through later

[h0b0]

I had a customer insist we put the TV above the door. We tried to get them to move it but they refused. It just didn't look right as there was a huge fire place in the middle of one wall and all the furniture was now pointing at the door. That was more annoying than mounting TVs at picture height or above fireplaces.

[Autopilot]

headcase said:

So you would be happy to have a junction box just randomly on your wall near an edge? Can you imagine any woman thinking that ok? A chimney breast especially on an older house is single skin of brick with 2 coat plaster, there isnt any room to fit trunking in there and there is no way you can chase into a single skin of brick as over the years the heat from the fire had dried out the mortar so yes as a professional its common practice to plaster a cable into a wall, if that's what a customer wants then that's what they get.
Remember you are talking about someones living room here not a commercial install where things change quite often. As long as you put in a decent lead set then there is no problem.

^^ This!

I'm not a pro so did scratch my head for ages as to how I'd go about doing this! I have two fireplaces in my living room and due to the unusable space along the main wall between them ( a wall has been removed so left with a bit poking out) the only option I had was to mount the TV on the chimney breast. I bought a super thin (Samsung D8000) screen as it would be most sympathetic (well, as sympathetic as putting a tv up on a chimney can be!) to the room. I marked up on the wall where the power lead, aerial, HDMI and ethernet cable come out of the back of the TV and then got the hammer and chisel out.

Getting the cables to run round a corner was a nightmare! I managed to get them in to a piece of conduit but had to slit it down the side and slide the cables in. I had to use 2 bits of conduit, the first is sunk in to the wall and goes as far as the corner of the chimney breast. The second bit continues on the other side of the corner (going in to the alcove) as it obviously won't go around corners! I did my best attempt at making a corner piece by cutting the ends of the conduit at 45 degree angles, but due to the size (and rigidity) of the cables inside, there are some exposed bits of cable in the corner. The conduit was screwed in to the wall and used some expanding foamy type stuff to fill some of the gaps. I actually ran two bits of conduit from the TV as I didn't want the power lead running in the same channel as any of the signal leads, aerial, HDMI etc. In hindsight, the conduit was bit of a time waster really. You can't slide the cables round a corner so there is no way anything is going in or coming out of there. If I needed to make changes, I'd end up having to get the plasterer out again to put the wall back together. As the quote above said, there was really only just enough room to get the conduit in there so in my case, the only purpose it really served was that it may have given the plasterer a slightly better surface to work on as I did flatten it off a bit for him.

I don't see this as a problem though. The HDMI has enough length on it so that if I changed TV (not that I plan to!), the lead would still reach far enough to get to a different area to plug it in, it's not just set to the length/position of what I have now.

I'd rather the install look good now and worry later if I needed to make changes. All leads were tested before they were put in to the wall so I'm not concerned about anything failing, I'd just have to take that pill if it happened.

Now I've done this, would I do it again? Yes, yes I would. Unless another option became glaringly obvious (not that I think it would), then I don't really see any way around it. Just accept the fact that the cables going in to the wall are consumables and you'll need to buy more when you move!

[Autopilot]

davepoth said:

I had a similar issue. We just drilled through the chimney breast at a 45 degree angle less than a brick's width from the edge of the wall.

I looked in to doing this but due to the number of cables I needed to hide for my amp, I ended up building a false wall in the alcove (a gap around 1.5" between plasterboard and the wall) so figured whatever went behind there would be stuck once it was all plastered anyway.

[danyeates]

I've never done this, but wouldn't you just bury some conduit into the wall with the end terminating at the hole in one of these:



and one of these as a faceplate:

[headcase]

You wouldn't be able to post your wires up. The hole in the back box was only designed for twin and earth so the hole isn't big enough to get one HDMI lead through let alone several with coax/optical and what ever else you plan on sending up there.
If you wish to install with the option of replacing cable as a later date there are only 2 real options and both can only be implemented for a straight down cable drop.

1 on a studded wall where the TV height is below the noggin (you could remove the noggin or notch it but this involves cutting open the wall) so you can cut a hole in the plasterboard behind the TV then another at socket level and drop your cables through. You can make it neater by using a plasterboard back box and a brushplate or a standard blank with a flange ground off.

2 Chase in a large piece of trunking ideally the stuff used for central heating pipes. Terminate the ends in a metal back box as shown above with the top or bottom cut away.

If you have a 90 degree bend in any direction then you have absolutely no chance of pulling wires through at a later date. You could install pipework with swept 90 degree bends that was of large enough diameter to fit a cable through and fit this with a pull cord and plaster that in but its worth remembering your wall is there to hold the roof up so if you remove too much of it pulling cables through will be the least of your problems.

Also adding the word 'Just' to any sentence dosent make the reality of anything any easier.

[stanwan]

Hmm.I'm trying to figure out how to do something similar. Currently, I plan to build a new stud wall and integral framework to support the TV and bracket. I'l l use a run of conduit to run the cable horizontal until I reach the alcove next to the fireplace and then a 90 degree turn at the edge of the chimney breast to the back of the alcove. A piece of timber set flush to the side of the alcove will hide the cablesand also allow removal to install an pull though cables.

Any one spot a flaw in my plan?

[CarbonV12V]

Interesting views and opinions.

I am doing something similar at the moment but in an old farmhouse with no stud walls and irregular bricks and plaster.

There is definitely not enough room to channel out suitable conduit and even if there was I wouldn't fancy the chances of being able to pull the cable through given the route under the floor (lots of foundation walls, holes and angles that it would need to be pulled through).

I am running HDMI and network cabling from my computer area to an media area (Media player, XBOX, etc connected to a Bose box) and then from that area to the TV (on the wall). Not a huge room but odd shaped with an unused chimney breast!

I have therefore just decided to run the cables in the plaster (having the whole room reskimmed) and prepared to either run visible cabling or dig out and replace in the future should any fail.

I have both brush faceplates where I can pull the HDMI cable through and guess the length required and Euro module plates with connector tails that I can just plug the main length of HDMI cable in and then run a separate smaller cable from the Euro module to the AV kit. The second option (which is my preference) uses additional cables and connections (which may impact on signal) but will be neater and allow correct length cables to be used.

My only concern (besides the cables failing in the plaster which I will live with) is the number of connections/joints in the HDMI cable with the Euro modules - is there any way to improve these. I will be testing this weekend before plastering in.

[B17NNS]

Well after initially feeling positive having read a few of the comments on here I was rapidly disheartened after reading a few posts on other forums. I called a few local electrical engineers too and they said the same.

Impossible.

You will therefore imagine my absolute delight when Mark (our very own 'Headcase'), turned up as promised this morning wielding his trusty soldering iron. I did my best to keep him furnished with tea as he worked his way though what looked like hundreds of paper thin wires.

Less than an hour later came the shout 'give me a hand up with this TV' and all was done. HDMI cable repaired, the Mrs' happy, velvet flock wallpaper intact and all well with the world

Mark, you're a legend and we can't thank you enough.

I'll post a little bit about the system when I get five if anyone's interested. It's only a cheap and cheerful little bedroom set-up but punches well above its weight.

Anyway, off to watch a DVD.

Once again, thanks Mark

[headcase]

No problem

[dirty boy]

im said:

Can I just ask what the logic was in chasing the cables into the wall direct and not through conduit buried in the wall or even conduit running around the skirting board? Clearly, at some point, the cables were either going to fail, become obsolete due to new HDMI standards or become obsolete due to new technology.

I'm not having a 'pop' at you, just wondering why you went for the worst possible option.

Mine is stuck in the wall, mainly because the builder went ahead and threw the plasterboard up over them before i'd have a chance to do something permanent - I couldn't be bothered to ask him to pull it down.

Yes the wire will be obsolete, but i'm assuming the obsession with wireless will continue anyway, and internet tvs are the future.

[dirty boy]

headcase said:

No problem

Top stuff by the way.