atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Cabling Telephones Systems Wiring Constructive Criticism II

It's been a while since the original thread was posted, so I'll start a new one.

Here's a few pics of the project I've been working on for the past 18 days.

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3463/3390557337_2283319209.jpg?v=0[/img]

Cables coming into the room:

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3419/3391627552_147c162b44.jpg?v=0[/img]

Down the wall (before firestop was in):

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3660/3390817583_49c4bacd42.jpg?v=0[/img]

Turning the corner:

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3639/3390821717_ac8f0da6a6.jpg?v=0[/img]

One more of the MDF:

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3429/3391641622_77d3e98ddf.jpg?v=0[/img]

And the conduit I put in for the elevator cab: what a pain that was, lol:

[img]https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3617/3391627424_5b005a8611.jpg?v=0[/img]


Yes, Cat5e and 110 blocks for phone (not my call). Other than that, I'd like to get some feedback on this so far.

Jack

Jack, I think I'd have made more of an effort to keep the cable types and colors separate. It seems like it would have been easier to wrestle four smaller bundles than two big ones, especially the coax cables. I'll bet that 10-12 feet of ladder rack with hardware wouldn't cost much more than all of those D-rings and the associated labor to install them.

I'd have tried to plan all of my slack cable storage in the dropped ceiling out in the hallway if possible instead of trying to dress slack in full view.

I'd have also allowed more separation with the 110 blocks and used distribution troughs to reduce the eventual jumper congestion.

I'd have been a bit more thrifty with the cable lengths. It looks to me like when all is said and done, you might have 2,000 feet of waste.

I know that Embarq pretty much screwed you out of that luxury by placing their BET right smack in the middle of the wall. I can't say that I'm surprised at that. They can't mount their hardware straight, but they damned-sure can find the dead center of a sheet of plywood with their eyes closed. That's the same with all telcos though.

I'm with Ed

Would have color sperated and had 4 bundles.

Would have aleast put some ladder rac from the wall to the Rack instead of free hanging the cable.

A slack loop in the hall. If you are planning on the loop right above the blocks for a slack loop it will look horrible once you use it.

Probably would have done the 110 blocks on top of each other instead of beside each other. Ofcourse the carrier did not help you with any spacing on the back board. I'm sure your plan is to put in some management for jumpers.

Even at that looks preet good. Alot better than most around my area would do it.

Brian

Kind of a small space for all that cable. I'm sure you had to work with the space that was given to you but is there room for the PBX and all that data equipment for your 200 plus data cables?

Thanks for the input so far Ed, Brian and 94astro. It is very much appreciated.

Initially I had planned to run all four colors separate, at least in the phone/electrical room, so I installed the 4 4" conduit stubs. I admittedly could have, but keeping it separate in the hall too would have been impossible - no space for 4 rings of sufficient size to mounted side by side, or wiretrays. Ditto a hall service loop, though I admit that's a much better idea and execution than what I have.

The good news is that this project sits where the pictures end, so I can use some of your suggestions. I'm interested in the ladder rack, distribution troughs and 110 block spacing you guys mentioned. Got any links by chance to products along those lines?

Embarq didn't really hose up the backboard - there is an electrical panel out of frame that they had to stay 3' away from, but they should have mounted the RJ-21X? to the left of the BET. EC could have run his EMT differently so that jumpers do not have to cross it.

I hope to not need the service loop in the D-rings - that was more of a contigency plan of not having to use splices than anything that would look pretty if used.

There's just shy of 800 pairs of phone station wiring going onto the 110 blocks. That said, there will be ~100 jumpers total, because only the first pair is used and every guest room has 2 phone home runs (jumpers daisy chain across runs). Should I place the phone home runs side by side or up/down on the block? i.e.:

201 201 202 202 203 203
204 204 205 205 206 206

or

201 202 203 204 205 206
201 202 203 204 205 206

for the best/easiest install and serviceability?

I think the former looks a bit easier to work on, with the jumpers not completely coming across the station wiring. There's also an odd handicap room here and there, and they have three home runs of wire per room for phone, which makes the vertical, numerically ordered layout a bit less practical.

I'd thought about laying out all the 110 blocks in a single vertical row, but I'd have them from top to bottom of the backboard that way, and the 185 or so phone cables wouldn't fit behind the blocks without further spacing the blocks from the backboard. I couldn't think of a way to accomplish this without the end result looking ugly as sin. Do 110 blocks come with longer legs than standard?

I know we'll need another 18" x 4' of backboard for the cable company's taps. As for our gear, I think I have enough space on the rack for everything we need. The Mitel units will only take up 10u at the most. The switches will go between patch panels, and power supplies and what not basically in the middle of the rack.

I hadn't initially planned on doing the pp/110 work on this job - my bid on that was "too high", so they just wanted me to do the cable pulling. After their lowball guy stuffed up another project, they came back to me. I ran all wire "down to the floor" - it's the way I was trained.

2k of excess sounds about right Ed. The orange cable is cat6, black is CATV, and the white is for internet. I can use the excess on the former for a rack mounted service loop. There is just over 14 miles of v/d/v wire in this building (440 home runs x 170' average), not including any CCTV or sound wire. This MDF is at the end of the building, and there was no space anywhere on the ground floor to install an IDF (which would have saved probably 10k' of cable).

Space... originally our PBX room was a generously spacious 15'x25', which was promptly turned into a business center/library. We went from that to ~16 sqft of backboard space.

I'd like to know the best way to secure the rack to the floor. The rack directions mentioned an optional anchor kit, but I forgot to write down the part number. I was thinking of installing two expanding threaded anchors into the slab and putting bolts into them.

This is by far the biggest closet I've worked on. Most times it's less than 90 cables in an IDF, with no more than 5' across the room and 8' to the floor. Here it was 5x that many cables, with roughly 30' of cable past the 4" EMT stubs (16' down the wall, 4' past the corner, 10' down).

Sorry to be so long winded here... I'd just like to make this job as good as it can be, from both aesthetic and serviceability standpoints (and cost too) before I get any further along. Any more feedback would be great - nothing, save the elevator phone line (in red), has been terminated yet in the MDF, so I've got some time and options.

Jack

I think it looks very nice, I have been in some 911 offices that do not look as nice as this.

Everyone has their own preferances as to how to lay out wire runs and back boards but in the end if the installer can understand the layout and has done some future planing it is good.

Just hate it when someone else gets to it and messes it up. I have seen 911 centers with cables runing across the floor to racks and so much old abandond equipment still in place that it makes me sick.

What type of facility is this?

A new hotel with 74 guest rooms and ~100 runs of various cable to miscellaneous locations. There are five home runs to each guest room (2 phone, 1 internet, 1 CATV and 1 ITV).

Thank you for the kind words, FdTech.

Jack

What is ITV?

Internet TV. I don't fully understand how it is supposed to work, but the customer wanted and paid for it, and so we installed it. My best guess is that TVs will have or do have internet capability, and they want to take advantage of that.

Two years ago, we did the same on another project. Two years later, all of that wire is still hanging in the IDF, unterminated and unused.

Corporate IT specs...

Jack