SmartHomeUSA.com Home Automation

[rhuarch]

Hello all. I am in the middle of installing the structured Wiring System for my new home. I am using a Leviton SMC 420 and have 47 Runs total including voice, data, and video. All of the runs are using Belden MediaTwist Cat6 and Belden Duobond RG6 cables, and run through the 3 foot floor space between the Basement and the 1st floor. Here is the problem I am facing. There are a lot of power cables up there, and in several places I have been unable to avoid getting closer than 12" to the power lines running through the same space. In all cases it is less than 2 feet of the run, but for some runs it happens more than once, and in a couple of cases the Cat 6 cables are actually touching a power cable. There is one section that worries me more than any other. in the floor space directly above my Leviton Panel (about 6 feet) there are about 10 power cables running perpendicular so that all of my cable bundles as they converge have to cross over within about 2 inches of these power cables. My father in law doesn't think that this is going to have a very big effect on my data integrity but I am getting more and more concerned that it will. Is there anything I can do to minimize the effects of the EMI from these power cables? I have considered wrapping the bundles in heavy duty aluminum foil where they get too near power and then grounding the foil, but I don't really even know if that will have any affect at all on the EMI. Any advice would be appreciated. I am hoping that I am just obsessing and my father in law is right that going near power in a few places isn't going to cause a big problem, but I want this thing to work, and when the drywall goes up it will be much harder to fix if a problem does crop up.

[GeneLitt]

High-voltage lines transfer a noise onto nearby low voltage lines when the two cables are traveling in parallel. They actually transfer exactly zero when passing one another in perpendicular. When I run cables, I try to stay about 12" away when running the lines the same direction, but when I need to get them close, I change the path of my wire to get as close to perpendicular to the electrical lines as possible. When traveling in parallel with an electric line over a long distance (over 18") I zig-zag the wire along the distance as much as possible (remembering not to put too much of a bend in your Cat6).

Using this simple arrangement, I have managed to avoid signal transfer in almost every job for the last 12 years. I also do this to every other low voltage wire, including security and coaxial cabling, just to be safe. It is almost no cost in time or wire.