Speaker wire through floor instead of in wall?

Doesn't anyone make a floor plate so you can go straight down through the carpet into the crawl space and back up again instead drilling through sill plates and tearing walls up?

 

I just did that, installed a 3" conduit under a porch I closed in. Just did drywall today, so I'm a ways from the floor. I plan on notching a couple of removable floor planks (say 5" square) that I can pop in around the wires.

 

They make single gang plates with small holes in them, if that's what your looking for.
Or, you can get a metal plate and drill your own hole.

 

I drilled a 1" hole in oak flooring at a corner so it could be patched with a plug later if needed.

 

I go through the carpet into the crawl space without a plate, but I'm probably not as particular about that sort of thing as most people. I just do it directly behind the electronics.

 

Me, too. A drill, and an accessible drop ceiling below a wood floor, are your friends.

 

I had a 2" plastic pipe with elbows at each end installed under the wooden floor in our previous house when we created a new lounge by extending the front of the house.

In the house that we've just moved into - which has a concrete floor - I had the builders dig a channel to hold a 2" plastic pipe with elbows (again).

They installed the pipe and then concreted it back in, leaving some string running through it. I then used this string to pull a load more pieces of string through and then used these multiple pieces of string to pull my speaker cables through.

The cables drop into the pipe by the wall behind the rack and emerge from the pipe in the centre of the front wall behind the TV. The cables went in before the carpet went down and now all that can be seen are cables emerging from the edge of the carpet.

There are four cables and eight banana plugs on each end. I tied the plugs together in pairs and made sure that two pairs sat behind the other two pairs to create a narrower package. The plugs were then wrapped up inside a food bag that I'd opened at both ends and this lot was then wrapped in brown parcel tape with the string emerging from the front. It looked like a giant brown parcel tape cigar with string coming out one end and cables coming out the other.

The tape with string emerging from the front stopped the plugs from folding back and jamming in the pipe. The food bag kept the tape adhesive off the cables and plugs. With pushing and pulling, the cables disappeared into the rack end of the pipe and emerged a short while later at the speaker end.

This use of a pipe under the floor means that - with care - I can upgrade my speaker cables without any major building works. It also means that the cables are hidden from view and protected from damage and the curiosity of young grandchildren.

 

Are you talking about something like this (to hide the hole you drill in the floor)?

 

I would be very careful of using speaker terminals on a floor. You never plan for an "oops" but they happen. You get that speaker plate wet while listening to tunes and watch out. I drilled a hole in my floor and ran the *wire* through it. Much safer that way. Of course I had young children at the time so planning for an "oops" was a necessity.

 

In my case, it's a TV and carpet at one end and a hi fi rack and carpet at the other. The holes themselves are open, not capped bu tlie under the carpet.

Neat idea though to keep rubbish out of the holes and to look tidy in a technological way.

 

A friend of mine used those caps on top of / through the carpet, he just had to cut out the right diameter hole. Not sure if he used a specialized tool for that or just a utility knife, a template and patience.

Right now my rear speaker wire runs across the floor (under the area rugs and furniture), but when I finally get around to running them through the basement I'm going to use those caps just to make a neater install.

 

Yep. Is that plastic? I'd prefer brass so it matches the brass outlet plates I have but beggar's can't be chooser's

Thanks. I new there had to something out there.

 

When I Google "brass cable hole cover" I see some on eBay... I'm at work so that's about as thorough a search as I can do right now. I'm not even sure what they are technically called, but "cable hole cover" seems to point in the right direction...

 

Think I am going to go with something like this, and then seal around the wire and the extra hole with silicone.

 

Something like Sugru might work for sealing it up, and giving a more finished final appearance:

http://sugru.com/

 

Thanks.

Many (many....) years ago in the Navy we used a black sticky substance that we called Monkey Shi! to seal holes where conduit and wire went through watertight bulkheads. Tried googling it to no avail

It seems similar to the polysulfide I use in the teak grooves/seams on the deck of my boat. It stays flexible and "never" dries out. Think I am going to try that first. I just want to keep any drafts and creepy crawlers from coming up through the holes.

 

I use that expanding foam stuff that they sell in a can as insulation. You give it a little squirt and after the foam dries, you can cut the excess off with a razor blade. Makes it a snap to remove later but still keeps the basement bugs away.