Re: Surface Mounting a Keypad

["Jim" <alarminex@xxxxxxx>]

Bob La Londe wrote:
> The Napco Gemini RP1CAe2 is a great keypad.  On board expansion.  Easy to
> read.  Nice looking.  It has one problem.  Its a pain in the wazoo to
> surface mount on a hard wall.  On a hollow wall you can cut a hole in the
> wall.  On a prewire you have a box for it.  On a brick wall you are screwed.
> Sure you can bring the wire down nice and neat in a wire mold, but because
> the connector sticks out the back of the keypad you can't just slap the
> keypad on the wall at the end of the wire mold.  A low profile three gang
> box would be ideal... If somebody made one.
>
> Only had to deal with this a couple times, but...  what do you do?
>
>
> --
> Bob La Londe
> www.YumaBassMan.com

Hi Bob,

I haven't had to do this but once or twice but I think it's Wiremold,
that makes a metal shallow double gang box. I got it at a local
electrical supply house or anyone who sells the Wiremold line. Also, as
mentioned by another poster, Napco used to have a plastic back box, but
I don't recall if it will fit the new keypads or not. I'd imagine it
would because the foot print is about the same.

If I had to improvise, I simply screw two vertical pieces of wood lath
(small enough not to be visible from behind the keypad) That would
space the keypad far enough away from the wall to accomodate the
connector and splices and leave the top ( or bottom) open for the wire
mold (or what ever) to go behind the keypad, to keep the wire out of
sight. That would only be for a pretty crude install. If it had to be
nicer looking, I go get the Wiremold back box.

I just thought of something else. I've never had to use them but you
might be able to improvise something out of the "extensions" that they
sell for extending electrical boxes. I think I remember seeing both
plastic and metal extensions at Home Depot. If you could screw one of
them to the wall, the keypad would fit right over it. You'd have to
give it a look. I wasn't thinking about this application when I saw
them.