Homemade Cable Reel Support

When pulling fairly long runs of cable, a reel support is a really useful to to have. The first time I really needed one, when pulling eight or nine runs of cable from the attic to the basement, I was fortunate to be able to place a broom handle on some nails and position it directly above the opening I was pulling down.

In Alexanders closet I have to drop two runs of 14/2 two wire, and one of 12/3 three wire, so I built this simple reel holder. There are two matching bases built out of 2x4, 15" for the riser, 12" for the edge foor, and about 8" for the flat foot, glued and screwed together. A hole is drilled in each riser about the same diamter as the bar, which can be of any length to accommodate one, two or even more rolls of cable. In this case, the bar is a cutoff section of the century old heating water supply pipe I removed from the floor in the last post.

Heating The Unheated Room (Part 2)

I finally had the courage to rip up the floorboards in Alexander's bedroom to begin the task of wiring the baseboard heater:

Two floorboards have been removed from the closet wall (top of the photo) to under the window (bottom of photo), exposing the hundred or so year old hot and cold supply pipes.

Removal of the two iron pipes reveals the shallow notches cut into the joists, as well as the lath and plaster of the living room ceiling below.

Short sections of two by six (extending about six inches left and two inches right of the floor opening) have been sistered up to the existing joist using PL-Premium and a few 3 inch screws. These provide virtually no additional strength, but will provide the openings through which electrical cable serving this room will be drawn.

The first run of cable, a 12/3 NMD-90, to supply the 240v baseboard heater. Additional cable serving outlets and ceiling pots in the living room below will also run along this opening.

Heating The Unheated Room

There are five bedrooms upstairs at the Fieldhouse, and one of these (Alexander's) is unheated, due to its location directly above the formal living room below it. The living room has sliding pocket doors on the interior walls, which essentially prevent a vertical run of heating conduit to the room.

In the twenties? when the house was changed to forced hot water radiator heating, a radiator was placed under the window. It was removed in the eighties when the house was returned to forced air heating, leaving the room cooler than the rest of the upstairs in winter.

In the past we have been adding supplemental heat by way of an inexpensive plug in oil filled radiator style heater, but these have poor temperature control, so I decided a proper baseboard heater with wall mounted remote control would be a suitable addition.

Pictured is the Dimplex LPC baseboard heater, a very slim, attractive, true European style baseboard heater, about seven inches tall, 24 inches in length, and just under two inches deep. It will be installed under the window, with the remote unit in the wall switch gang near the door.