Any experience fishing ENT?

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Knuckle Dragger said:
What I have done in the past if you want go in the direction of the flex bit. Once you work the flex bit up to the point where you want to drill through. poke a hole through the wall large enough to push a snake hook through an catch the flex rod to pull the bit to the desired spot you want to drill through. (this may not be an option if you don't want to compromise any of the finish), but it can limit the damage.
Arilington one boxes are a good choice. They can be a real tight fit if you plan on installing intergrated duplex/USB receptacles.
Good Luck!
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Just checked the box dimensions again and the One-Box is 3.5” deep.... that should be plenty for me.


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brantmacga said:
That’s not the news I wanted to hear.

I guess I’ll have to see how well the devices fit before installing. I don’t want boxes supported by the drywall which is why I ordered the Arlington.


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I had "fitting issues" with Arlington one "nubs" and the Leviton brand USB duplex. Maybe the P&S brand is configured differently.
There are things you can do the nubs to make it fit but I'm sure I'd hear about it from the UL police.;)
 
Knuckle Dragger said:
I had "fitting issues" with Arlington one "nubs" and the Leviton brand USB duplex. Maybe the P&S brand is configured differently.
There are things you can do the nubs to make it fit but I'm sure I'd hear about it from the UL police.;)
Click to expand...

Oh I see, you’re talking about not having enough room on the sides, not depth ?


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For extended drilling, I welded a bit extension to a foot of 1/2 inch threaded rod. And then made various lengths of threaded rod, and used coupling nuts to connect them as needed. This is much more ridged then the normal drill extensions. When you get all the way through, you can tape some string to the drill bit and pull it out.
 
This has been incredibly difficult. The project got side-tracked a few days while I ran some new plumbing lines and installed a new tankless water heater.

Back to fishing the ENT, what I didn’t anticipate is how much it would catch on the insulation in the walls and hang up. This is not a one person job on insulated walls. And it seems all of my walls interior & exterior are insulated. Every wall has blocking also.

The other issue I’ve had is the screw that holds the 1” Klein swivel pulling grip has broken repeatedly. I went to Lowe’s and bought a pack to replace them as they break.

The wife and kids have been gone for a couple of days, and I thought I could knock a couple rooms out while they were gone. I was wrong. The house is a mess. There are holes in the walls that won’t have boxes in them before everyone returns. I’m clocking out for the day.

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ritelec said:
Just wondering, why are you using that and not pulling cable? Maybe future expansion but...? Wondering.
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Idk, because I’m a crazy person I suppose.

The main reason is because I intend to floor the attic space as above some of the rooms and close it in for storage. I wanted flexibility to make future changes if necessary, and having conduit would easily allow that. Is it necessary? Absolutely not. If this gets much worse I may give up and pull cable.


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Gotta mention, there was a job where I used a 36" bit MANY times and was pretty impressed with myself on what I was able to accomplish. Then I thought of all the plumbing, wiring, ducts that I could of potentially destroyed. So now I would rather open things up.

HA!! Except one day a couple years back I figured I'd get aggressive adding a ceiling light outlet in a cathedral ceiling drilled from an attic area...

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Why do you even want to use the smurf pipe? It is junky & needs a bigger hole than Romex. If you can drill the holes ok, just pull a string & fish Romex with it.

Long bits can be good but I have seen that they don’t work well on older hard lumber. Harder to get leverage with each extension too. Plus, the bits are often only good for a few used before they dull. In some cases, it is easier to cut the wall & have it patched afterward. I have seen them go off center & tear the wall anyway.
 
1. Not addressing the problem of pulling the ENT back through offset or critically small holes, but I would use a bit that has a transverse hole bored in it so that it can be used to pull back either a pull string or the ENT itself without depending on tape.
That way you do not have to hope that you can get a snake to follow the same set of holes that the bit/extension string made.
2. Are we going to be concerned about making sure that the holes follow the center line of the wall to comply with distance requirements from surfaces? The ENT is not going to provide any nail or screw protection.
 
I’m going to put this out there bluntly; I’m not asking for opinions on what I want to do in my own home.


Back to the subject... so what seems to work best is to drill the holes using my flex bit, and then pull a string up the wall connected to the flex bit. Then use the string to pull a glow rod down, and then connect the pulling grip to the glow rod and back up. Also tape the head of the pulling grip to help keep it from dragging insulation. When trying to pull the ENT up connected to the flex bit it’s impossible to keep from dragging insulation. It’s also really difficult to connect the 1” pulling grip to the bit while it’s in the wall on a 1gg cutout.

The issue is the insulation. If these walls were empty, the pulling grip connected to the flex bit would work fine I think.

For drilling, I’m using a 1-1/8” paddle bit through the top plate, then a 1” flex bit with an extension to get through the blocking. And a 1” pulling grip to pull the ENT back up the wall.


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Don't see the point of ENT in this application. But to each their own. I'd just run cable. Saves time and money. With the flex bit... I still have yet to find one I actually like. I would probably just pull the drywall and patch it. Or better yet rip it down. Replace whatever you need/want to while it's off. And then replace it.
 
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