Quick question- what can I run in a cable raceway?

...cleaning the wires up is with a cable raceway.
You have a five foot section of this or similar mounted to the wall just above the floor?
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I think there's a nomenclature issue here. That's a cable management duct (or ductway), not a raceway (ignoring that some mfgs/vendors call it a raceway). It's not intended for single conductor, single insulated wires. It is intended to make cables look neater, which is your application. Running an extension cord, CAT5, and DMX cable in it for five feet will be no problem. (Insert NEC language here about "permanently" installing an extension cord, i.e. affixed to building.)

I've run CAT5 (carrying MA-net) for 300' alongside three sets of 4/0 feeder on the floor with no issues.
 
So, every FOH snake that has power taped to it is no good? Every loom that has power and DMX taped to it is also no good? Yes, I get the theory, but in practice I have never seen an issue. I got cable w/ power, signal, and data all in one jacket and it works fine.... and been like that for 15 years.
@Footer @FeRDNYC has already posted this but I'll repeat it anyway.
It will work flawlessly until it doesn't. When it quits working, Edsel Murphy will have a hand in choosing the time, you can be sure.
One of the joys of doing things right ALL THE TIME is having fewer things to check, repair, replace when problems arise. Not IF but WHEN.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
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the photo above is a new LEX product
i guess they do not have a problem with DMX running next to 120VAC

for lighting control
just keep the high voltage away from the low

audio really should have separation.
 
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@Footer @FeRDNYC has already posted this but I'll repeat it anyway.
It will work flawlessly until it doesn't. When it quits working, Edsel Murphy will have a hand in choosing the time, you can be sure.
One of the joys of doing things right ALL THE TIME is having fewer things to check, repair, replace when problems arise. Not IF but WHEN.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.

Then every venue that has an FOH trough should have two. Electric cable picks should have two. Maybe DMX comes from SL, power comes from SR. I have Meyer designed cables that pack 110v, RMS, and analog signal all into one cable. Never had an issue. This is a nice theory, but in practice with shielded cable in the real world I have yet to see any issues.... nor have I heard of anyone else having an issue. Hell, I see L21-30's on FOH snakes all the time. In installations, sure, do it. But day to day stage operations I would not worry about it.
 
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Like Footer said, we have a ton of snakes and looms with audio and power bundled in the same run and we send them out on a daily basis on all of our jobs and I'm willing to say 99% of the time IF there is an issue, it isn't related to the proximity of the cables. I can't honestly think of anybody having an issue. Maybe its just luck... maybe its maybelline.
 
Like Footer said, we have a ton of snakes and looms with audio and power bundled in the same run and we send them out on a daily basis on all of our jobs and I'm willing to say 99% of the time IF there is an issue, it isn't related to the proximity of the cables. I can't honestly think of anybody having an issue. Maybe its just luck... maybe its maybelline.
My deceased co-worker and friend of nearly five decades had a saying: "It only works for 'them' cuz they don't know it shouldn't." Greg based his saying on things humming and / or cross-talking whenever he broke the rules of separation and crossing at right-angles.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
My deceased co-worker and friend of nearly five decades had a saying: "It only works for 'them' cuz they don't know it shouldn't." Greg based his saying on things humming and / or cross-talking whenever he broke the rules of separation and crossing at right-angles.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.

We all know the reasons why we "shouldn't" but like I said, it hasn't ever caused a problem. We almost always have more separate xlr to run something if we needed to, but it always sits unused in a case because the looms with power and audio or power and data have been consistently problem free. For years. We did a show in a convention center a couple weeks back where we had nl4/nl8 for widelines and xlr and a ton of power all running on top of each other and no problems. I don't know. I get the reasons, but haven't had to deal with them in reality.
 
Then every venue that has an FOH trough should have two. Electric cable pick should have two. Maybe DMX comes from SL, power comes from SR. I have Meyer designed cables that pack 110v, RMS, and analog signal all into one cable. Never had an issue. This is a nice theory, but in practice with shielded cable in the real world I have yet to see any issues.... nor have I heard of anyone else having an issue. Hell, I see L21-30's on FOH snakes all the time. In installations, sure, do it. But day to day stage operations I would not worry about it.
@Footer @Dionysus Believe as you like. I found and corrected an installation in @Dionysis 's building in London, Ontario, Canada where a 70 volt paging amplifier was sweating to death with it's neon output indicator always illuminated solidly 24 / 7 whether pages were in progress or it was quiescent. I traced the fault to oscillation above audibility due to one of the amp's microphone inputs being routed over from his McManus Studio in the same 1/2" EMT as the amp's 70 volt output. The mic line was a foil shielded balanced pair of Belden 8451. I can't recall what the output wiring was, possibly it was 24 gauge Bell quad with two conductors for the 70 volt output and the second pair being used for low voltage DC to toggle a 70 volt attenuator's bypass relay. This was in 1983. Re-routing the foil shielded microphone-level pair out side the conduit solved the oscillation problem even though the 8451 ran parallel to the EMT from the rack in the basement SM office all the way down the corridor ceiling to DSL of the McManus. The 1/2" EMT was definitely grounded by the metal ceiling structure which supported it throughout its run.
EDIT: I stand by what I posted: It will work flawlessly until it doesn't.
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
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I can actually think of a lot of cases where things went REAL south. A local sound company blew 17 cabinets in 30 seconds before sound check in what we now remember as "The Doyelstown County Massacre." The culprit was a single speaker line bundled with mic lines that sent the system into ultrasonic oscillation. Now, modern sound equipment is a little more resistant to ultrasonics then things in the 80's were, but by far this is not the only case. More recently, (8 years ago) I found myself called out for the second time to a house to replace a network adapter. The second time out, I clipped the cable ties that held his cat5 to the power cord going to his surge suppressor. End of issue. Do people do these things every day and not have a problem? Yes. Does it sometimes cause a problem? Yes. It's so much simpler to simply avoid things your gut tells you aren't right. As I said before, why add another variable if you don't have to? No point dancing on a mouse trap.
 
agreed
you can have really bad things happen when high voltage gets linked with low voltage.
(many stories )


the best design is to have isolation between high voltage and low voltage
the electrical code demands this, when addressing installing systems in buildings

in equipment there is always high voltage and low voltage
and that is dealt with differently than building wiring

as an example
( a dimmer rack has the DMX wire in very close proximity to the mains)
(the new dimmer strips being manufactured have the control wire (DMX) running in the same enclosure)
(the new LED fixtures have power and control next to each other where they plug into the fixture)

regardless, we are dealing with a one installation in this thread
a five foot run of cable to clean the underside of control counter

clean your booth up to be safe keep the high voltage cables away from the low voltage cables

that deals with the Electrical and control

Audio , speakers and mics
that can be a different story as IF from the AC lines can potentially be induced on the audio

with that said i will leave that part of the conversation to the audio and AV folk.
 
I can actually think of a lot of cases where things went REAL south. A local sound company blew 17 cabinets in 30 seconds before sound check in what we now remember as "The Doyelstown County Massacre." No point dancing on a mouse trap.
@JD You've reminded me of this twice now. "The early bird gets the worm while the last mouse gets the cheese."
Toodleoo!
Ron Hebbard.
 
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hey all,
I’m doing some clean up work in a HS lighting booth and one of the ways I’m cleaning the wires up is with a cable raceway. I wanted to know if any problems could occur for running a extension cord wire, DMX, ETCnet through the same raceway. The distance in the race way is only about 5 feet. Is this okay or should I do something else?
Thanks in advance!! P.S- I attached an image of what I currently have done (not done yet)
There are a lot of good ideas being floated around in this forum. If you have 2 hours and want to be extremely careful you can use 3/8 all thread and run a 4 " wide cable tray above and parallel to the original raceway for your data lines to get some breathing room or run flex conduit above the raceway and terminate the flex conduit into a 4x4 open ended electrical box behind your console/patch bay.
 

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