Routing cables and wires along the coach

[flloyd]

Soon, I will be installing a few items in my coach, a 97 XL, and was wondering if there are any good options for routing wires and cables (small signal stuff) along the length of the coach. For example, I need to run one or two pieces of coax, and perhaps some CAT 5 cable, from front to back, or, anywhere in-between.

Something tells me that there are no wiring raceways or duct work per se, and that I'll be left to my own devices. For example, I'll be installing one of the Wilson cell phone boosters and will need a long stretch of coax from front-to-back. Any suggestions?

-fred

[ajducote]

Fred,

I used the cable chase inside the bus on the passenger side floor. It was not easy, the bathroom, a few closets and the refrigerator got in the way. But I managed to get a couple of cat 5 cables run front to back. A smail pull tape comes in handy to get thru the areas that are hard to access.
There may be another choice. Look above your transmission for a few smaller diameter pipes that may run all the way to the spare tire compartment in the front of the bus. Some buses have any empty pipe that you can use to run cable.

[GDeen]

Fred,

When I was faced with the same situation in running coax from the rear to the front of my bus for TPMS, upon Kevin Erion's suggestion, I found several conduits under my Marathon. Most originate in the front bumper compartment and then terminate at various points near the rear of the chassis. Mine were hard to get to from the front, so I just found a likely looking candidate near the tag axle and ran an electrician snake through to find out where it came out in the forward compartment. You may have to pull weather boots off the ends to get access to them, and they are likely coated so you have to look carefully for them. As usual, make sure you have the bus properly supported before climbing under there.

[GSwaim]

I have been running cable front to back for entertainment & communication systems for several years. Some of the options include using conduit on the roof which is by far the easiest and safest but not my favorite way. Another option especially for a Cellular antenna installation on the centerline of the coach is to use the A/C ductwork. The only hard part here is it is difficult to make the exit from the ductwork and requires good foil tape and access to seal the transition. My favorite way to run cables is to pull the puc lights and snake from light to light. This is very time consuming but in most cases with a mountain of patience and plenty of time you can go about anywhere in the coach. The common trait between all of these internal ways of running cable is the risk of getting into inaccessable wires that when disturbed tend to come disconnected somewhere and cause things not to work. My reccommendation is to have a knowledgeable and experienced professional run these cables so you don't have bigger problems once the cables are run.

[Jon Wehrenberg]

All Prevost coaches have conduits that run from front to rear. The front end can be seen at the top of the compartment behind the front bumper. They terminate at the top of the area in front of the rear axle. As an alternative find the wire bundle the converter installed that runs front to rear and use that.

[rickdesilva]

Needless to say all converters are different. When you find a good wire chase be sure to run a few xtra cables or wires you can use to pull heavier cables if you find the need down the road.