Wiring in a DSL filter

[Jan Philips]

Yes, sometime the phone will need to be replaced.

[LouB]

Check the phone book or even local large flea market. There are many guys in the biz that charge way less than the phone companies.

[DA]

I doubt it's any different from the standard red/green but nothing prevents you from saving the plug you just cut off and looking at its wires (plug is transparent - everything should be visible). Whatever are the colors of the wires connected to center pins - those are the only ones you should worry about.

It would not be a good idea to not have a modular plug when you use an adapter such as DSL filter on a phone line. It is exactly why the connection is not permanent. What if you need to connect a DSL modem to that outlet? then you'd want to filer out which is a pain if it's hardwired. That said though, if you are certain you are not going to want to filter removed from the outlet, I think the better way would be to use a phone faceplate with filter inside. Basically, the thing replaces the faceplate and the jack with an all-in-one assembly and the one I have laying around in a box of old parts somewhere even has two prongs to hang the phone on if it's a wall-mount location.

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[Jan Philips]

It is an emergency phone in an elevator so that will never happen.

That is what I want to do but the phone is attached to the wall and there is no apparent way to get it off.

[Jan Philips]

As far as I can tell, it is permanently attached to the wall. I can't get it to budge. I have a photo now.

[Jan Philips]

OK, the photo is one of the ones at

it is rotated from the way is actually is.

[Jan Philips]

Whoops, you can't get to it that way. Here it is:

[aemeijers]

It is probably hung off 2 screws or studs in t-shape holes on the back. Push up hard on the bottom end, and it will come loose, and there you will find either a Ma Bell style wall phone plate, or a special baseplate that came with the phone. There will probably be a modular jack in the base plate, and the phone either snaps into the jack, or has a short jumper cord with modular connectors where you can add a DSL filter in-line. (It would hang down in a loop below the phone, unless you can tuck it in the wall panel somehow.) I gotta give points to the installer- that is an innovative use of a cheap kitchen phone, and it took some fussing to get it to set flat like that. Exactly where were planning on splicing the DSL filter in? It won't work on the handset cord, if there are any electronics in the base. Or were you going to do it where the wire feeds into the elevator shaft? (In which case, an inline surface-mount jack and screw-to-rj11 adapter would let you plug the filter in.)

Having said that, that doesn't really look like a commercial-grade elevator emergency phone, if your local code people or insurance carrier cares. If there is only one POTS line into the building, it should probably be on a dedicated wire all the way back to the demarc, and plugged into a 'line seizure' block like an alarm autodialer uses. If somebody needs to call out on that phone, and they are the only one there, it would suck if one of the other phones was off the hook.

-- aem sends....

[Jan Philips]

I pushed on it, but maybe not hard enough. I'll try harder tomorrow.

This is an emergency phone in a residential elevator. Outside the elevator is a switch box for the AC, but the phone line runs through it too.

Yes, basically.

I'm not sure if there is enough room to get a surface-mount jack plate in the switch box.

It is residential, not commercial.

It is on the same circuit as the other phones in the house.

[Don Wiss]

Polarity only matters for Touch Tone dialing. If your phone is a rotary either way is fine.

Don (e-mail link at home page bottom).

[Jan Philips]

I've gotten a wall jack with two phone jacks. I'm going to wire that inline and with a 6-inch male-to-male cord and the DSL filter, it should work.

Thanks for all the help!