I "manage" as a volunteer the wiring and systems for phone, PA, computers and power in a non-profit summer camp in Maine. This includes the outside plant. We have 24 buildings scattered on a 1 square mile property, with many 600-feet cable runs in trees and utility poles.

Last week-end we had a 800-foot cable run, replacing a bunch of old phone and PA speaker wires that were strung (not lashed) 10 to 20 years ago by my predecessors.

I'm trying to bring order to the chaos and apply some better practices, such as lashing cables to a messenger strand, routing cables away from power lines, using waterproof junction boxes, etc.

This being a non-profit, budget is tight. We can afford 1/8" strand, not 5/16". We can't afford specialized hardware and a lasher is out of question.

But I still needed to lash 800 ft of cable, and we could rent a bucket truck for only 2 days, so I had to come up with a solution.

Behold, my homemade lasher.

[img]https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...anBDdGZueXNXMHltLUlGTzkxSnNVdUNUeklrSWFB[/img]

I made it out of 40$ worth of 1 1/4" PVC pipe and fittings. It uses spools made with PVC pipe and discs machined on a lathe.

[img]https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...anBDdGZueXNXMHltLUlGTzkxSnNVdUNUeklrSWFB[/img]

The body was glued together and then sliced in half on a table saw. The two halves are snapped together over the cable bundle and held together using worm gear hose clamps.

The device was built hastily in a few hours. There was no time for testing. A standard 1200' reel of lashing wire was transferred to two homemade spools.

It was used extensively over during two days, including a miserable rainy day. It performed flawlessly with no need for repair or modification.

More pictures and details are available here: Google album

Look for tiny comments at the bottom of pictures.

Edit: I don't know why my pictures don't show up in the text.