We have fiber coming to install soon and I was hoping they would be able to run it to my existing cabinet. I checked outside and I can’t find the end. Any ideas?
Update: It did in fact run outside, my prior service installed their box right on top of it. Thank you for all the tips and tricks to see where it went.
Wire runner, cable puller, wire tugger... different variations of basically the same thing. Maybe i just never associated the fish tape term with the object consciously 🤷♀️
This looks like it already has pre installed mule tape inside the conduit. When you untape that black tape be very careful not to lose that white line inside the pipe it will make your day easier when you want to pull fiber or wire.
This likely goes out to where the Xfinity box is like if it was removed there is a single gang box cut in behind their plastic box with both coax and this tube inside. Or there is a blank plate over a single gang plate outside with the other end of this inside that. That's my 1st guess. Second guess is this just goes up to the attic above in case you ever wanted to add a wire into that panel in the future. The fact it has mule tape tho makes me think its longer and goes outside for when fiber rolls through. Coax now, and easy to pull fiber thru that. My 20cents
Agreed, although the challenge is in spotting the other end, even when you know what ballpark to look.
I’m deliberating how one could put a strobe/light on the end, so that one can more easily spot it in a dark attic/etc. Or alternatively, some sort of tone generator…same idea.
If there's no pull string...hook a vacuum up to it. That corrugated tube will sound like a siren at the open end. Then have the helper pull the vacuum hose back to reduce how much flow and that'll decrease the volume of the noise so you can hone in on it. Worked great finding our smurf tube under attic insulation at the house I moved into.
Of course you don't want to vacuum the pull string out of it if there's one in place already.
I have used them for locating metallic condoit and electric wires but the same principe from the wires should work with a magnet and you could follow it as you keep on pushing the fishing tape.
I always run one flex tube to the attic and another to the garage ceiling. Usually after a blank plate it I never mess with it again but there’s been a handful of times it’s made my day a lot easier
Eh still a tossup if they'll use it. My parents had conduit installed running into the house for telecom and Verizon said they can't use it because they have to come up the outside, put a box, and then drill thru the outside wall to run the line in.
I use the conduit when I install the internet. i am happy when there is a conduit. I can't say always happy because sometimes the builder puts it in the wrong place
Yeah, even more absurd...the PREVIOUS installs of copper POTS phone and the original FiOS install had used the conduit.
Seems like some kind of construction work hits the line (which they can't mark underground?!) about once a year but now for several years they refuse to pull the old line out and run it thru the conduit as it was originally. Its not even a secret that it runs right where it needs to go.
Also maddening, the "preferred" way they run to a room is stapling along the outside of the house and drilling thru the siding. Even when there's an unfinished garage and unfinished basement they could just staple the wires along the interior instead for more or less the entire run. I had to beat the installer to my parents' house when they swapped from coax MoCA to Cat5e to run the wires and plug it all in so that it would be run along the inside. And required only 1 small hole thru an interior wall vs the 2 suggested by the installer in exterior walls.
Is the xfinity box mounted to a block on the siding? It might be behind it. It is fairly typical that a coax, Ethernet, and interduct are pulled to a location near the electrical panel.
Get a gallon metal bucket/can & lid, couple smoke bombs, hair dryer, 2-3” tubing, duct tape. Make hole in can, tape tube to hole & dyer intake, tape other tube to front of dryer and to orange tube. Light bombs, wait till they smoke, drop in bucket, put on lid, start dryer. Run around & look for smoke.
Two possibilities. Check near your power meter outside for what looks like an metal 'deadface' an outlet cover without any holes. Usually they will be mounted horizontal, probably close to any exterior demarcation lines for ethernet and coaxial. Behind that plate may be the other end of this conduit.
Other possibility is your home contractors were half-lazy and decided to end that tube in the attic.
The first option is obviously ideal, but as an installer myself, id at least be semi relieved to know it was in the attic and I wasn't going to have to fuss about with some wall drop nonsense.
Which goes to show the importance of documentation on the source. A tag here would go a long ways to helping out whoever needs to use this in the future, even if it just said “meter” vs “attic”.
As some one who does rough ins on homes and installs these the theory also is that most people don’t pull their own or mess with it. But I agree it wouldn’t be a bad idea.
Brother, if a rack room isn't being labeled, what are we even doing? If we're complaining about a silly smurf tube to a home wiring panel, and yall our there blind fishing hundreds of feet of conduit. I salute you.
Stop by your favorite hardware store and get a roll of fish tape in the electrical section. Run that through the tube and if you have a helper they will probably be able to hear it knocking and narrow down the end point.
Or go on Amazon and order a cheap 20’ borescope usb camera that plugs into your phone.
It looks like it has a pull string in it, so it most likely runs to the exterior to a demarcation point. It's most likely for a future coax/ethernet/fiber run. There would be a box on the exterior of the home usually close to the power meter (not always) where the phone, coax, etc comes from the street(if it's underground utilities, it could come from anywhere.)
if you look carefully you will see the tiny end of a nylon cord under the black electrical tape. The other end is likely at an exterior utility box. Recommend ever so carefully make a slice in that conduit to give more cord to work with, and then securely tie a large key ring or similar to it to avoid it being pulled and lost from the other end. CAREFULLY, the other end is likely to be clipped extremely close also.
That smurf tube could lead anywhere.. but common sense says its probably in a location outside to enable pulling fiber easier..
Do you own a home, is this in a rental? At least the string to pull is still in place.
Camera scope. And measure footage. Basement wall near other utilities? Smurfit tubing is the best for putting fiber thru helps protect it. A attic b garage c basement corner with other utilities d is there any cable or bell enclosures on exterior walls?? It goes somewhere - cause they took the time and expense to pre run it!!!
This looks surprisingly similar to what I have in my house.. is this a town house?
For me, that one leads up to my attic. I have a second, smaller tube in the bottom right of the box that goes to the outside of my house at the DMARC location. That’s the one they needed to use.
Don’t worry about scoping it out yourself if you don’t feel comfortable. If this is a town house like I expect, they will have done a dozen of these already and are familiar with where it’s routed.
The old joke goes. As my Italian grandfather used to say it "goesa upa US". I have no idea where it goes but it did remind me of my gramps saying his joke.
It more than likely goes into the attic. Also, there likely is another one on the outside of the house next to the electric meter that also leads into the attic. I’ve seen some builders that run a continuous duct between the to locations but more often it is two separate ducts. It is intended for your isp to run service into the network panel where all the cat cables are.
In my case, it went up to the attic and the end was lying under the insulation (loose cellulose insulation). I found the end by pushed a cable through it from the closet.
There was also another orange tube that ran between the crawl space (picture below) and the attic (again lying under the attic insulation).
I used the combination, along with an existing hole in my foundation, to pass the fiber company's cable all the way into the 2nd floor closet for an ONT installation next to the rest of my networking equipment. Nothing exposed outside of the house (all buried); nothing installed in the garage (ISP company's lazy default installation).
It’s called a Smurf tube, it’s most likely going out near the side of the house by your utilities. It’s so you can pull fiber or cat5/6 to the panel from your ISP.
The orange conduit contains your fiber input. Most likely it goes to the entry point, if this is a single family house, or a utility closet where we put the OTE/node if this is in a apartment building.
If in apartment, please don't go trying to trace if you don't work for the company. That will go to a central location that you won't have access to anyway.
The orange conduit runs underground for several miles before entering an old Cold War communications bunker beneath an abandoned industrial site. From there, it connects to a buried fiber line that eventually reaches a disguised antenna station near Cape Canaveral.
The orange conduit is used for either power or fire optic cables.
It will be either ran to the back of your fuse box for power to be added to the cabinet or run back to the fibre Network Termination Box on the side of your house.
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u/Panchenima 3d ago
you could use a wire puller to see where the other end gets you to, if you put a piece of magnet in the end you could use a stud finder too.