Wiremold for rewire?

[muscleup123]

I have a customer who wants his knob & tube system retired, and to limit the demolition required to install new wiring, he wants me to consider wiremold as a solution when bidding the job.

I've only used wiremold in a couple of isolated situations, and I'm not sure what residential limitations are imposed by the NEC. I've yet to pull out my book, but I wanted to get the opinions people with more experience with the product myself.

Please let me know if it's can be used extensively as a replacement system to the existing wiring method. Thanks!

 

[macmikeman]

There are no special restrictions on its use for residential other than those things the code requires for that particular wiring method in general use. My two cents- ugly method, but thats me.

 

[480sparky]

It will look terrible, but it will comply with Codes when properly installed.

IMPO, you may try to present a second price to the HO with any necessary demo and include hiring a drywall pro & a painter to follow you and fix things up. Your labor & materials will go down some, and that will offset the repairs.

 

[K8MHZ]

I try to avoid Wiremold but sometimes it's the only choice. If done with care it can actually be installed to work and look very well. I do suggest not to rely solely on the double sided tape to secure it. Add some screws. It doesn't take much time and will prevent the Wiremold from coming off the wall and freaking out the customer.

 

[iwire]

Wiremold offer s system to do the entire place, I have never used it but it looks like it could be done nicely. $$$$

The baseboard is the raceway. Of course you would have to use it everywhere to make it look right.

Access 5000

 

[mdshunk]

I certainly use my fair share of 500, 700, and 2000 when it makes sense to do so.

 

[muscleup123]

Wiremold for rewire?

Thanks everyone! I'll investigate further...Robert

 

[satcom]

I try to avoid Wiremold but sometimes it's the only choice. If done with care it can actually be installed to work and look very well. I do suggest not to rely solely on the double sided tape to secure it. Add some screws. It doesn't take much time and will prevent the Wiremold from coming off the wall and freaking out the customer.

The double sided tape to secure it, is approved for the low voltage Wiremold, the line voltage wiremould does not have tape, we had to remove a pile of it from a DIY job, and replace it with the approved wiremould. Check it out, I may be mistaken on the approval.

 

[stickboy1375]

Go for the industrial look, pipe it all in... :grin:

 

[peter d]

I've done a few wiremold "rewires" and the end result is exactly what the other have said. It looks like garbage after. The other drawback is that WM is labor intensive so beware of that.

 

[peter d]

Go for the industrial look, pipe it all in... :grin:

Yes, with PVC coated rigid!!

 

[brian john]

Old house, I would think few fire stops, maybe little insulation. Time to go fishing.


I re-wired a house when I did residential and we fished better than 90% of the wiring crawl space and attic. The other 10% we removed some floor boards for lights and baseboard for the remainder of outlets we could not fish.

 

[al hildenbrand]

Back in the '80s I did a rewire of a condo for an Art History Professor. The core wiring method was black rigid metal conduit and was installed circa 1912. It was a second floor unit with a flat roof with minimal (a few inches varying to not quite a foot) access between the roof and the ceiling of the unit.

The Professor spec'd Wiremold 2100 (now V2100).

The cap molding of the three piece baseboard was removed, permitting the installation of the 2100. It's only 7/8" deep, so it was just slightly proud of the 3/4" baseboard. The cap molding was replaced after my install, and the whole baseboard / Wiremold affair was "marble-ized" by an 1800s painting technique.

The effect produced a stunning installation.

Regrettably, the flush receptacles for the V2100 series are no longer manufactured.

However, examining the V2400 series shows a product that is more spacious, and better suited for today's needs, especially the dual channel V2400D that will carry communication in one channel and power in the other.

The installation was time consuming, especially because of the constraint on breaking into walls or ceilings and the somewhat torturous path the homeruns had to take, but the end result was truly great.

 

[muscleup123]

Wiremold for rewire?

Thanks this is great information!

I understand that installing this type of system is more labor intensive, but does anyone have a rule of thumb, so to speak, for estimating the required labor? Again, great info!!

 

[mivey]

If you believe the estimating guide:
for one person:
about 100 feet per day
about 16 boxes per day

As for me? I just would not put it throughout a home unless the place looked like junk already. If I did, I would ask that they just forget who did it, because I would not want anyone to know it was me.

I have installed some in commercial locations that already had surface wiring and some very limited amounts in residential for places that would not be seen all the time.

That being said, I would not take issue with the install described by Al in #13 as the finished product sounded nice. With that much time invested, why not use the method in #12, which is the way I would tackle it.

I despise exposed wiring methods in finished areas.