Phone Line trouble after removing security system

[drew]

The house that I bought had an old CPI security system that hadn't been used in years and I did not see the need for a system so the other day I was looking at the huge panel in my coat closet and realized that I had both power and a phone line in a nice handy box. So I disconnect the security panel and pitch it. I plug the modem into the phone jack and the wall outlet and set up my wireless router. I cleaned up and check the internet and it works great. So I go about my business for a couple of days and realized I hadn't been harassed by a telemarketer in a while (we like most people these days use their cell phone for everything, the only reason I have a home phone is for DSL). I pick up my land line and there is no dial tone. I check the other three phone outlets in the house and they are all dead. So I start thinking about the problem and hook up the phone to the outlet in the closet and lo and behold I get a dial tone. I take the router and modem and hook it up at another outlet and dsl works.

When I removed the security system circuit board from the closet, I assumed the wires that screwed into the circuit board went to the smoke detectors and door sensors. The board had a phone line plus plug that plugged into the phone outlet in the closet.

Does anybody have any ideas on what might be going on? Here is what I have sticking out my box. I have three 4 strand phone type wire (Black, Green, Red, Yellow) and three 2 strand wire (black,red). I pulled the sensors off the door and they seem to correspond to the black and red (three exterior doors). I would assumed one of the 4 strand wires would have to go the the security panel. I am guessing that at least one of the other 4 strand wires goes to my smoke detectors.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Bob F]

The security panel may have connected the phone signal pair back to the other 2 wires of the phone jack, which would carry the signal back to the junction box and on to the other phone jacks. It does this so it can sieze the line for alarm calls.

Or, it could feed it on through one of the 4 wire cables similarly.

You may be able to rewire the phone junction box to correct the problem, or wire a special splitter to feed your phone and feed the signal back into the closet jack.

If this doesn't help, comp.home.automation is a good place for this question.

[N8N]

The line seizure thing sounds very likely to me. Possibly you could rewire the cable going to that particular jack at the demarc and turn it into a regular two line phone jack. I suspect that it's set up to go "out" to the security system on the inner pair and "back" to the main point of connection on the outer pair and then all the other phone jacks in the house are connected to the "back" pair.

The reason that it's done that way is so that if you happen to be on the phone when the security event occurs the panel will take control of the outgoing phone line and dial out (disconnecting your call in the process.)

nate

[Roger Shoaf]

Here is an explanation of the alarm wiring:

Looks to me like you can de wire the line seize mode really easy.

[a2rjh]

You did not say whether each of the line had a DSL filter installed

[aemeijers]

Alarm systems usually have a 'line seizure' jack where they attach to the phone lines. As soon as whatever is plugged into the special jack goes off-hook, it disconnects all other jacks in the house. Replace the jack or connector block in the enclosure (or in the phone line leading to it) with a vanilla rj11 jack, and the problems should go away. The incoming feed to the house may be 2 of the 4-strand lines, rerouted through the enclosure. I'd map out your phone lines all the way from the phone demarc to figure out what is going on. Harbor Freight has tone tracers pretty cheap, and it is no harder than wiring stereo speakers.

If all of the above sounds like gibberish, look at some of the DIY alarm wiring sites or books for the pictures and diagrams. It isn't as bad as it sounds.

-- aem sends...

[trader4]

Agree. Security systems are wired so they are the FIRST component in the phone wiring path. They are inserted in SERIES, so that if an emergency signal call needs to be made, they disconnect the rest of the phone system, grab the line and dial. With the system removed, you need to just reconnect the goes into to the goes outa.

[Tony]

The phone line is normally wired to the alarm first. So if someone is on the phone, it disconnects them so it can call the police/alarm company. There was a phone line going into and OUT of the alarm box. You need to hook them up again so the line to the rest of the house has phone service.

[rangerssuck]

You have a line seize jack (probably RJ-31X). To get around this, remove the black wire from its screw and connect it to the same screw as the green wire. Likewise, remove the yellow wire from its screw and connect it to the same screw as the red wire. That's it (assuming the jack was wired correctly to begin with).