Neat-O: Cleaning out the Closet

It would be one thing if the owner of this Southern California home could blame his closet wiring mess on the San Andreas Fault. But unfortunately, it was the fault of the original installation company that the owner needed to call on another CE pro to check out why his low-voltage panel doors wouldn’t close.

The client found San Diego-based Audio Impact as a referral from another of the integrator’s customers, and the tidiness of this result will likely earn more referral calls.

When system designer Ryan Lipkovicius of Audio Impact visited the home, it didn’t take him long to discover the wire spillage and sources of the homeowner’s complaints. Along with simply being unable to close the panel properly, the owner noted his home’s sporadic telephone and Internet problems.

“None of the master suite closet space in this immediate area could be used. At first glance, it was obvious why the panels wouldn’t close,” says Lipkovicius. “Upon further inspection, there were notable cable patches and splices. The modem and router were dangling in place by the Cat 5e Ethernet cable that was connected to them.”

The panels contain equipment to systems from Control4, Russound and Lutron, plus wiring to the home’s security cameras. Problem is, there’s just not much real estate to navigate in the master suite and the original installer obviously did not put much work into securing everything included.

Audio Impact technician Ernesto Vega was tasked with re-organizing the panel mess and verifying all of the related systems, in what turned into a seven-hour project.

As you can tell by the “after” image, Vega cleaned up the all the wiring foremost. He also labeled all of the cable destinations’ room names, added another network switch to activate all of the home’s data jacks, and added a surge-protected power strip for the gear, according to Lipkovicius.

“There was not a great deal of space, and it had to look clean,” says Lipkovicius. “We also had to identify the cables, re-identify the devices on the network, and modify and customize the metal can door to hold the Apple router.”

The Apple product came into play because of the homeowner’s noted poor wireless reception. Vega installed an Apple Airport Extreme as a wireless access point and flush-mounted it to the panel’s exterior with a custom bracket.

Now the only mess in the closet comes from not properly hanging up clothing.

Congratulations to Ryan Lipkovicius for a Neat-O! installation. We’re looking for over-the-top projects. Cool, unique, tidy or meticulous, share your best work with our readers. E-mail your submissions, with high-resolution images, to managing editor Arlen Schweiger at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).