Window sensor installation question

[jcwren]

I'm installing a new system in my pre-built house.  I'm about to install the magnetic switches in the sills of the 1st floor windows.  I've pulled wire from the panel location to underneath the windows (unfinished basement) and left a few feet extra feet, but in some cases, not enough to up to the window itself.  And a couple of zones have 2 windows on them.

My question is about how people handle this sort of issue.  I was planning on using 1/2" holes from underneath, and 3/8" holes in the sills.  For some reason, I thought the switches I ordered had 5' leads (the door switches did, the window switches have 6" or 8").  A 1/2" hole isn't really large enough to stuff the Dolphin crimps through, and if I did, it might be difficult to get them back out if I need to replace the switch or some-such.

Is it acceptable to extend the switch wires (solder & heat shrink), so they will come out through the 1/2" hole?

And should I use some sort of small box, like an RJ-45 surface mount box to protect the crimps, or just dress them out and tuck them under the insulation bats?

What do the commercial installers normally do in a situation like this?  I'm under the impression they might pull the wire all the way up through the sill hole, crimp or solder it, and then stuff it back down.

Thanks!
--jc

[ChosunOne]

The usual way to install window contacts is to pull the wire from the panel all the way out the 3/8" hole in the window sill.

_Some_ installers will then crimp the Dolphin crimps to splice the switch leads and stuff them back into the holes.

My theory as to why they do this is that most companies have separate Installation and Service Departments and installers almost never have to go behind themselves. This also explains why a lot of companies use the 3/8" switches instead of the 3/4" flanged-housing switches that can always be popped back out 2 years later without destroying the switch.

After decades of experience in the Service Department, wasting countless hours of trying to fish crimp connectors hung up in 3/8" holes,
I've entertained uncounted fantasies of death by slow torture for installers who did that. I've also lost count of the 3/4" holes I had to drill next to the 3/8" hole because that was the only way I could get to a splice.

All I need to say to you on the subject is that if you push crimp-on connectors into a 3/8" hole, you'd better hope you don't ever have a problem that needs the switch splices checked--that's if you're the one who has to troubleshoot it.

I strongly recommend solder splices where they have to be tucked into holes; and splices that are streamlined so they don't have anything to catch if you have to pull them out.

[jcwren]

OK, that's make sense.

So for daisy-chaining adjacent windows on one zone, how's that handled (mechanically, not electrically)?  I'm using 4-conductor wire fully supervised loops with the EOL resistor in the panel.  Run the 4C cable up to window 1, along with another short section of 4C cable, splice and stuff, then the other end of the short 4C to window 2, splice and stuff?

The advantage of stuffing the splices into the wall is that they're protected both from accidental damage, and it makes it harder for the system to be compromised.  That's traded off against maintainability and the fact that in a residential installation, someone trying to compromise the sensors at the splices is probably pretty low (I'm guessing on that one).

I have since recalled that when I did my previous home, I used Scotchlok UG, UR2 and UY2 connectors (as appropriate).  Any reason not to go that route again, if I'm going to tuck the splices under the insulation bats?  I've done some reading, and a few people have opined while the Dolphins are good, the Scotchloks are better (and I have a few hundred of each anyway, so the cost isn't a factor).

My previous system was a Moose Z1100, installed in 1987 or thereabouts.  It gave me 7 years of problem free service before I moved out of that house.  I'd like the same sort of track record for this one, but I have to imagine that some of the installation techniques have been updated, and I'd like to do it right.

Thanks,
--jc

[ChosunOne]

I'm about to leave for the day and will be off the internet until late tonight probably, so I don't have time for a long explanation. The way I would do this may not be the way other techs would do it.

I've been in the alarm industry for about 35 years, nearly all of it in Service rather than Installation, and that has given me a different perspective of how to install systems. There are some procedures that work fine 19 times out of 20, or 99 times out of a hundred. Being in Service, I didn't see the 19 or the 99--I saw only the 20th or the 100th time that a problem developed. In some cases, I saw it 5, 10, or even 20 years after the installation.

So for reasons I don't have time to explain now, I would install 3/4" flanged press-fit switches (don't have time to look up a model #), and I would pull the unbroken quad (4-wire) cable all the way up to each switch location and make splices only in one wire of the quad (the same wire for all switches), connect the junctions with solder (for a streamlined junction) in a way that leaves the splice (meaning the feed and return legs of the quad) accessible by pulling out of the 3/4" hole at least 6".

This will mean being conscientious about how you leave the splice. You may never need to access those splices, but if you do, then you will really need to access them. It's insurance against one kind of possible disaster.

For reasons I'll be glad to explain later when I have time, I'm extremely adverse to leaving splices and wire inaccessible in walls. This is not from an overactive imagination, it's from decades of memories of having to add as many as 6 wireless doors/windows, and 6 wireless zones; because a splice couldn't be accessed in a single zone loop.

That's all I have time for now. I'll try to log back on later tonight.