c/cable-installers

Ditched my old cable stapler for a hammer tacker after a job in Phoenix

I used to rely on that electric stapler for everything (thought it was saving my wrists). Then I got a call for a new build in Phoenix where the drywall was so hard the stapler just bounced off, took me twice as long. Switched to a $15 hammer tacker halfway through that job and never looked back. Has anyone else hit a wall where a staple gun just won't cut it and went manual?

Satellite dish on a roof that was basically a trampoline yesterday

I was on a three-story townhouse roof in Cincinnati yesterday, and the homeowner swore the roof deck was solid. I stepped onto the ridge and my boot went through a rotted spot, dropping me right through the attic insulation up to my waist. Has anyone else had a near-miss like that, and do you carry any specific gear for checking roof integrity before you climb?

Chat with a homeowner yesterday changed how I think about attic runs

Guy stopped me while I was running a new drop in his attic and asked why we don't just use those flat ribbon cables that go under baseboards. I told him about signal loss and interference, but then I thought about it later - he's got a point for basic internet setups, maybe I'm overcomplicating some jobs. Anyone else ever had a customer point out something simple that made you question your whole approach?

Took me 2 years to realize I was bending coax wrong

I always had trouble getting a clean 90 degree bend on RG6 without kinking it. Kept blaming the cheap cable until my buddy Dave from my shop in Denver showed me his trick. You put your thumb on the inside of the bend and pull the cable tight around it, not just push with both hands. First try came out perfect and I felt like an idiot for messing it up so long. Anyone else got weird little tricks for new guys that nobody teaches in training?

Man, I miss the days of crimping everything by hand

I started installing cable back in '98 and we used to strip and crimp every single connector by hand. Took me about 3 minutes per connector at first. Now these new guys come in with these compression tools that do it in 30 seconds flat. I fought it for years, swore my way was better. Then last month I had to redo a whole 48 port patch panel because my hand-crimped ends kept failing. Borrowed a compression tool for the second try and it worked perfect. Anybody else notice the old tools just don't hold up like they used to?

I finally snapped at a customer who tried to tell me how to run cable

Last Wednesday in Denver, I was running a 150 foot drop through a finished basement and the homeowner kept following me around saying I should go through the wall cavity instead of along the joist. I stopped, handed him my drill, and said go for it. He stared at me for 10 seconds then went back upstairs. Has anyone else had a customer try to micromanage a simple install?

Bought a $200 cable toner that lied to me every time

Picked up one of those fancy Fluke toners last month thinking it would save me hours tracing lines in a new build in Denver. Turns out it kept picking up phantom signals from nearby live wires, sent me chasing the wrong coax for 3 hours straight. Anybody else had a toner that just flat out fibbed on you?

Old timer told me to zip tie the coax at every joist and I fought him for months

Tbh I thought this old timer on a job in Nashville was just being extra. He said to zip tie the coax cable at every single joist instead of every few. I ignored him for like 3 months on different jobs. Then last week I had a service call where a homeowner was getting pixelation on their main TV. I traced the line and found a bunch of the cables were sagging between joists. That little bit of movement was enough to mess with the signal over time. So I went back to that spot and redid it his way with a zip tie at each joist. Signal cleared right up. Guess the old guy knew what he was talking about. Anyone else ever get humbled by advice from a veteran installer?

Dropped my crimper down a crawlspace vent in Louisville

I was running lines in this old house and my favorite Klein crimper slipped right out of my hand, fell through a floor register, and landed in the ductwork below. Spent 45 minutes fishing it out with a coat hanger and a magnet on a string while the homeowner watched from the kitchen. Has anyone else lost a tool in a really dumb spot and had to MacGyver it back?

Found a weird trick for fishing wire through insulated walls

Last Tuesday I was stuck on a job in an old house near downtown, trying to get coax through a wall that was packed with that blown-in cellulose insulation. After fighting with the fish tape for like 20 minutes and getting nowhere, I grabbed a shop vac and taped a piece of PVC pipe to the hose. I shoved the hose into the wall cavity through a small hole and let it run for a minute to clear out the insulation. Then my fish tape slid right through like butter. Saved me from having to cut into the drywall and patch it later. Any of you guys ever tried something like that for tricky runs?

DAE have to deal with homeowners who "helped" by moving the cable drop?

Went to a job in Phoenix last week and the guy had moved the coax line himself. Wrapped it around a tree branch. Signal was garbage. How do you handle customers who mess with your work before you even get there?

Remembering when we used crimp connectors for everything

Back in the early 2000s I swore by crimp-on F connectors for every residential job around Austin. Then I tried compression fittings on a big apartment complex last month and finally saw the difference - zero signal losses across 60 units. Anyone else make the switch later than they should have?

Shoutout to the old timer who told me to stop yanking coax

Ngl I used to just pull cable as fast as I could through attics in Phoenix. This one guy in his 60s watched me for like 2 minutes on a job near Camelback and goes 'youre gonna snap the copper core doing that.' He showed me to always leave a 6 inch service loop and use a little tension gauge. Has anyone else had an older installer teach them one little trick that saved them a ton of callbacks?

I finally looked up how much RG6 we actually go through each month

Honestly, I never really thought about it until our warehouse guy showed me the numbers last week. I found out my crew alone goes through about 3,200 feet of RG6 coax cable every month, which blew my mind. That's almost a mile of cable just from three trucks running residential installs in the Nashville area. We're doing an average of 12 jobs per truck per day, and each one takes about 80 to 90 feet for a standard home run. The stat came from our inventory system that tracks every spool we pull. Has anyone else ever checked their monthly totals and gotten surprised by how much cable you're burning through?

Overheard a young installer say trenching is dead... I'm not so sure

I was at a supply house pickup last Wednesday and heard two guys arguing about trenching vs directional boring. One said nobody should trench anymore because it tears up yards and takes too long. But I've been doing this 20 years now and I still trench for most residential jobs, especially when the ground is soft and the distance is short. It's faster if you know what you're doing and it costs the customer less. Has anyone else run into this push away from trenching, or am I just old fashioned?

Fiber vs copper for a 400ft run - no contest

Had a job last month out in Maplewood. Customer wanted internet in a detached garage. Thought about pulling RG6. But the run was 400 feet. Signal loss would have been brutal. Grabbed a spool of single-mode fiber instead. Took an extra 20 minutes to terminate but the signal was perfect. Anyone else dealing with long runs switching over?

The elderly lady who tipped me $20 for putting her modem in the living room instead of the bedroom.

She said 'nobody ever asked where I wanted it before' and that simple comment has stuck with me more than any big commercial job I've done, has anyone else had a customer say something that just hit different?

The 10 year old drop amp I swapped out last month that changed everything

I replaced a drop amp from 2014 that was still passing signal but had a voltage drop of almost 4 volts under load. Customer's internet was cutting out every night at 8pm exactly when the neighborhood maxed out usage. Anyone else see old amps slowly degrade like this before total failure?

That time a fellow installer swore by using lubricant gel on coax cables

Old timer named Rick from a job in Charlotte said slicking up the cable with gel would save me time on a long conduit run, and after fighting with it for 45 minutes dry, I finally tried it and pulled 200 feet through in under 10 minutes with zero snags - any of you guys use that stuff or just rawdog it like I used to?

Spent 3 hours trying to fix a signal issue that was just a bad barrel connector

Had a job yesterday where the customer kept losing internet every time the wind blew. Checked the line outside, checked the modem, swapped splitters. After way too long I finally looked at the barrel connector on the side of the house and it was corroded. Replaced it in 30 seconds. Anyone else ever chase a simple fix for way too long?

Found out cable clips can destroy your own wiring if you push too hard

I was running a new line in an attic in Austin last week and heard a crack when I hammered a clip over the coax. Pulled it back and saw the jacket was split clean through, never noticed that before in 5 years of doing this. Has anyone else had clips damage their own cable like that?

Talking to a dispatcher in Nashville changed how I plan my routes

I was on a job last week and the dispatcher told me I should start grouping my calls by street number instead of zip code. She said I was wasting 2 hours a day driving back and forth across town. Has anyone else tried sorting their route by address order instead of area code?

Pro tip: Check your compression fittings before you leave the truck

Last week I had a job in a older house in Columbus where the signal was dropping every 30 seconds. I spent 45 minutes re-terminating ends and checking splitters before I realized my new batch of compression fittings had a bad batch of o-rings. Swapped them out with some older stock and the signal locked right in. Anyone else run into dodgy fittings from a certain supplier lately?

PSA: Check for old phone lines before you drill, almost hit a gas line in a 1920s house last month

Had a chat with a retired installer that flipped my view on old coax runs

I was finishing a job in this 1970s split-level in Akron last Tuesday, pulling new RG6 through a tight chase. The homeowner, an older guy named Frank, was watching and said, 'You know, we used to run RG59 with just a pocket knife and a prayer.' He told me about doing whole apartment buildings in the 80s with no toner, just tracing lines by sound and feel. He said the worst was when you'd hit a staple and have to start over, but you learned the 'give' of the wall. It hit different because I was there with my $150 Klein toner and my fish tape, complaining about the old cable, and he made it sound like an adventure. Made me appreciate how much easier the tools are now, but maybe we've lost some of that gut feel for the walls. Anyone else have an old-timer drop some wisdom that changed how you see a routine part of the job?