Telephone junction box - 6 way via Cat5

[Vet Tech]

I am planning to set up a proper home computer network using Cat5e cable and it seems appropriate to use Cat5 cable also for the phone extensions and get everything done at the same time when I have the floorboards up.

The current plan is to have 6 phone sockets with say a max of four being patched in at any one time. The patch panel would be connected back with 6 x Cat5 cables to a junction box. The juncion box would have one cable coming in from the phone master socket which has a an ADSL filtered face plate type. That way I get rid of individual filters at each socket.

My problem is where to find a junction box that can handle one incoming and 6 outgoing cables. The max i've seen so far is four.

Assuming my wiring scheme is feasible, can someone point me in the right direction for a suitable junction box.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Use an 8 to one PABX!!

[Dave Plowman (News)]

I'm not quite clear what you want to do. For plain phone sockets around the house cat5 is a bit pointless as you can't plug a phone into an RJ11 socket. Nor is there any need to patch phone sockets - you can have as many as you want in practice. You may not be able to have a phone at every one, though.

Best way is to site a router close to the incoming line and run Cat5 circuits from that. You could patch those if needed to prevent 'unauthorised' use.

And run the phones separately using ordinary phone cable.

[Dave Liquorice]

It's feasable but not what I would do. Have a google on "structured cabling". Basically all the cables come back to a patch panel and are terminated on an RJ45 socket there, the other end also has an RJ45 socket(*). At the patch panel you also terminate any sources, say from your network switch (or just plug directly into the switch to the required cable). Wire up some of the sockets on the patch panel in parallel and feed the phone into that, then patch to the desired phone cables.

(*) Doesn't have to but it means any cable can be used for anything. Phones would need and adapter of course. That could be avoided by using a modular faceplate system and fitting a telephone type socket.

Dumping loads of filters and moving your ADSL modem to as close to the telephone NTE as possible and running a CAT5 from there to the patch panel/switch may well get you a noticeable increase in speed, particularly if you get less than about 3 or 4 Mbps ATM.

[Gordon Henderson]

Cables and boxes. That's so 90's ...

Save yourself the hassle of cabling, get a set of DECT phones and repeaters if neccessary.

Get a DECT base station that is VoIP capable (ie. Siemens Gigaset) and future-proof yourself at the same time.

Gordon

[Andrew Gabriel]

I can think of two ways to do this, depending on how flexible you want it and cost.

You could use a 20-pair patch box such as:

the exchange line up one side, and connect the sockets up the other side. Patch the required lines across using short pairs (or triples). This would allow you to have 6 lines patched if you route the bell (3rd) wire, or

10 if you don't. (I would not route the bell wire to the sockets myself - it screws up the balancing of the twisted pairs.) You can repatch krone connectors a number of times (providing you are using a good quality punch-down tool and not improvising with a screwdriver or similar), but they are not intended to support infinite repatching.

Other way is to make up a patch panel with 6 + 4 RJ45's, (or 6 + 6 if you might want them all connected at once) and use patch leads to jumper line to sockets. This would be easier to change patching, but probably more expensive and more fiddly to wire up in the first instance.

Get yourself a punch-down tool too, such as:

'll need it for the ethernet sockets too.

There are various types of modular faceplate which will take an RJ45 and a BT socket. In one house, I fitted plates with one of each, but bought enough spares to change the BT modules to another RJ45 when necessary.

[Dave Osborne]

Instead of connecting a cable to each of the 6 phone sockets on the back of the patch panel and then taking these six cables into a junction box, rather daisy chain all of the phone sockets on the patch panel and take the phone line in to the first socket.

[Pete Zahut]

Brilliant until you have a power cut and then the DECT phones don't work.

[Vet Tech]

Hi Gordon,

I've already got a DECT phone set up and I like the mobility it gives youm BUT it's no good at all if you want Sky multi-room where you have to give the Sky boxes access to a phone line so they can dial out. VT

[Vet Tech]

=A0 London SW

The plan was to have BT type phone sockets in the appropriate rooms. That way noboby could get confused between the computer network sockets (RJ45) and the phone sockets. VT

Both the phone cables and the network cables would spread out from the node zero patch panel.

=A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0 =A0

[Vet Tech]

Andrew,

Yes you have sensed correctly what I want to do. My apologies to the others if I didn't explain it to well. I've installed modest amounts of structured cabling for IT networks where I have worked, hence I'm familiar with the Krone tool etc. It was just the telephone side of things that I wasnt familiar with.

I'm trying to understand how to actually go about doing the two methods you suggest:-

1. In the first, am I correct in thinking that I would not need to use the main network patch panel ie just wire through to the extension sockets direct from your 20 pair patch box? That being the case, what is the maximum wires can I punch down into each slot? And which colour is the bell wire?

1. With your second suggestion ie the 6 + 4 sockets in the main network patch panel, would I be correct in thinking that the 4 cables coming into the panel would originate from your 20 pin patch box?

Sorry to be sopedentic but I want to get it right first time as I dont want to take up floor boards more than once.

VT

[Bob Eager]

That's right. I was originally going to take all our phones (15 round the house) into a patch panel. But I decided to use Krone strips in a box; after all, it's what BT use.

The convention, as I understand it, is to take all of the incoming wires up one side, and connect to the bottom of one or more strips. Then take the outgoing wiring and connect it to the bottom of more strips.

Then the patching is done along and between the tops of the strips. I think you can do 3 wires per connection but with this approach you really don't need more than two.

This way, I can change the patching (e.g. at the moment some sockets in the house are paralleled, and I can change that without disturbing the fixed wiring at all). I only have 6 extensions on the PBX, but that will change when I do the Asterisk box...

Note that you only need to do the floorboards once, as all the flexibility is concentrated in the Krone box (which in my case is on a wall in a cormer).

[Dave Liquorice]

I'd still run Cat5 rather than CW1308 just use a modular face plate with phone socket or just a phone faceplate but as it's probably wise to put at least two cables to every point(*) the the modular approach means you can have network and phone in a single gang sized space.

At the patch panel I'd bring the phone line up to a socket and have half a dozen other sockets wired in parallel into which you patch the phone line and then on to the required sockets for the phone sockets. Note this would be the filtered feed from your ADSL faceplate on the NTE. The unfiltered side should be as short as possible to your ADSL modem then run ethernet from it to your patch panel/switch/server/router/firewall or WHY...

(*) As you are aware it's the installation of the cables that is the expensive part, the cost of the cable is minimal in comparison.

[The Natural Philosopher]

Don't worry about that., Run on different pairs - unless gigabit anyway. Then Ethernet doesn't conflict, and you can use phone to RJ45 dongles - or wire up a separate phone socket.

gosh thats a very self important way of describing it..

[The Natural Philosopher]

as:

>>> Daisy-chain the exchange line up one side, and connect the

as:

> You'll need it for the ethernet sockets too.

Carry (ADSL filterd) two wire around and use master sockets/dongles?

No need for bell wire then.

Take incoming BT, apply to ADSL filter and then parallel it (phone output) up 6 sockets on your patch panel or whatever. Its not ideal from a REN number basis to run 6 phones off one line, but if you wont use a PABX, it will have to do.

Just lay the cables firsts, and sort out the ends later.

[Dave Osborne]

That being the case, what

Two wires per punch-down slot.

[Vet Tech]

prolonged senior moment on my part.

If I have 6 strands coming in on one cable from the NTE5 master, then I guess would need 6 x 6 strands out to go to the sockets in the 6 rooms. Or do I just use the Blue and White pair as suggested in some web sites?

VT

[Dave Liquorice]

A phone only needs a pair(*) but when wiring up the cables from the patch panel sockets to the wall plates wire all 3 pairs as you would for a network connection. You'll never remember in X years time what is where.

KIS&SS - Keep It Simple and Standard, Stupid.

(*) Some phones will require the third ringing/anti-tinkle as well but many modern phones don't and if you are only tone dialling then anti-tinkle isn't required either so you only need a single pair.

[Bob Eager]

It's up to you....I wired all 6 as I was using standard phone cable, and it might come in useful one day. But modify the stuff below if only bothering about one pair.

So...6 strands (3 pairs) coming in. Each Krone strip takes 10 pairs in each side (the two sides are connected together, pair for pair). Run the incoming cable up one side of the box, and connect each pair to a spare 'pair' on the bottom of a strip.

Now, for each outgoing cable, do the same. I did 3 cables (18 strands, 9 pairs) on each strip (wired to the bottom). In your case that would be 2 strips for the outgoing stuff.

So far, there's no connection between incoming and outgoing. To do that, get some spare wire (I just stripped back the sheath on a length of phone cable) and link the TOPS of the strips as appropriate. So you'd run a pair from the incoming blue/white pair to the first outgoing pair. Then another to the second outgoing pair, etc.

At this point you could stop, if you just want the one pair. But all your fixed wiring is 'in the box' so you could connect other pairs later just by cross-connecting in the box.

The nice thing is that there are different flavours of Krone strips. Common ones allow you to insert a plastic peg in them to isolate a pair (it breaks the connection 'across' the strip); there are also 10-way ones that 'break' the whole strip. You can also get 'tap' pegs that allow you to tap into a connection to check it.

If you're around Kent, you're welcome to come and take a look!

Make CERTAIN you use solid core (not stranded) wire...

[tony sayer]

In most CAT 5 cabling the Orange and Green carries the data, the Blue and Brown pairs aren't used except for some power over ethernet systems and IIRC Gigabit ethernet .. so yep use the blue or brown so if something gets crossed plugged it won't matter...