Telephone cable - extending

[Sting38]

Hi all,
I want to move the internal wall mounted phone socket so that i can move my router to a different place in the house.
There is already a cable running around the outside wall to where the socket is now but i need to replace it with a longer one for the new location.

What cable do i need?

Thanks

 

[Wayners]

Just add a phone cable from your existing box to new location.
If you unscrew the master face plate you add wires to that front face plate. Just 2 wires running to a new slave.
You are responsible for that.
Your main box is a master socket.
Has 3 wires connected in the back part which the phone companies owns. Don't mess with the back part of the master socket.

Look up the difference between master and slave sockets.

Oh.
I've moved a few masters sockets.
It's easy job. Just don't shorten the cables. Keep each one taped up.
Don't tell anyone though.

 

[opps]

@Wayners suggestion is the legal way of doing it. The NTE5 master box is the property of the network provider. If you remove the lower section of the face plate, you will see that there are tapering slots on the reverse side (numbered from 1 to 6). You will need to use an IDC tool to push the new cable into slots 2 and 5 (3 used to provide the power for the phone's bell ringer, but new phones don't need slot 3).

Here is a link to a suspiciously cheap IDC tool

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ethernet-Telephone-Insertion-Faceplate-Connectors/dp/B014V0OQD6/

You then simply run the cable to your prefered location and use the same coloured cores in the cable to connect to 2 and 5 in the new slave socket. You will need an exterior grade cable and clips.

Alternatively, if you have a junction box on the wall, some people use gel filled connectors (crimped with special pliers) and new cable to move the master socket.

The master socket only uses 2 of the cores in the cable and they are screwed to A and B.

BTW, if you do decide to move the master socket, you can bury a single gang metal back box in the wall. It means that the faceplate will not project so far from the wall.

 

[Sting38]

Thanks for the replies.
When we got the phone line turned on a BT engineer came out to have a look. The master socket is in a stupid place internally so I asked him if could move it. He couldnt so he ran a cable externally around the wall and back in to a new socket (slave?) in a better place.
All I want to do is replace that cable he put in (or extend it) with a longer one to a different position internally.
We only use it for the internet.

 

[Wayners]

You can run a new cable from that slave bt put in. Buy another slave socket and phone cable. You just use 2 wires.
Copy what's there.
Or
Run another cable from the master to a new slave.
Simple DIY job

 

[morqthana]

@Wayners suggestion is the legal way of doing it.

Yeah, but now we've got VOIP it don't work like that any more.

The NTE5 master box is the property of the network provider.

Mine is definitely my property. I know this because I definitely remember buying it to replace BT's. Can't remember why I did that though, but I'm sure I had a good reason.

And now I need to move it, so "illegal" or not I will be extending the incoming BT cable.

Here is a link to a suspiciously cheap IDC tool

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Ethernet-Telephone-Insertion-Faceplate-Connectors/dp/B014V0OQD6/

What's the betting that's made on the same production line as a genuine Krone?

 

[opps]

Mine is definitely my property. I know this because I definitely remember buying it to replace BT's. Can't remember why I did that though, but I'm sure I had a good reason.

And now I need to move it, so "illegal" or not I will be extending the incoming BT cable.

Personally I have no problem with you moving your NTE box, but it should be noted that NTE means "network terminating equipment". It is the end point of "their" network. Technically, you are not allowed to move it because it is part of their network and property. I have moved them before for customers, but I warn the customer before hand about the legality and try to source gell plugs and cable that matches the BT spec. Openreach/etc seldom have accurate records of where NTE sockets and cables are.

 

[morqthana]

I bet they DGAS unless something stops working and the customer complains.

I think I can manage to extend it without breaking anything, or bggrng up anything upstream, even if I don't use gel crimps or BT spec cable. I do actually have some genuine BT cable, but it's a bit stiff for internal use (plus I don't know where it is right now).

 

[davelx]

Absolutely right, openreach have enough to do with the fibre rollout without worrying about minor unauthorised modifications to a soon to be obsolete technology, as long as they don't impact the service.

Retiring the copper network

We'll be retiring the old analogue phone network at the end of 2025. By then everyone in the UK will need to have moved to a Digital Phone Line. Find out what this means for you.

www.openreach.com

 

[morqthana]

They're retiring the old analogue POTS - already have round here and we've now got VOIP - phone or cable to phone socket(s) plugs into the 431A on the modem.

But not all of the copper network - it's still FTTC/CTTP chez mois. FTTP is available (I'm guessing that's what the boxes and coils of cable added relatively recently to the poles in our road are all about).

On my to-do list, but low priority, is to look at getting full fibre from someone (Community Fibre are leafleting heavily round here, and I think they have a good rep), but I do NOT want the ONT where the existing copper cable enters the house (just like I don't want the NTE5 there and am going to move it), and I do NOT want cable run on the outside of my house. So however and by whoever, the fibre cable will run internally to where I want the ONT. I insist on it. And very-much-so-preferably entering the house at the eaves.

 

[pcaouolte]

They will usually install the ONT where you want it, but in every installation that I have seen there is a junction box outside where they join the cable from the street to the cable from the ONT. I have never seen the cable from the street fed straight into the ONT without that junction box. They will want that external junction box near ground level as they won't want to use a fusion splicer on a ladder, even if this means feeding the fibre down from the eaves to near ground level and back up to the ONT in an upstairs room.

 

[Harry Bloomfield]

They will usually install the ONT where you want it, but in every installation that I have seen there is a junction box outside where they join the cable from the street to the cable from the ONT. I have never seen the cable from the street fed straight into the ONT without that junction box.

Mine is without a junction box. Cable comes overhead, from the pole, to a bracket at the house eaves, then into my loft space, which is where the ONT is/was located, by me.

Decades ago, it used to get to the eaves bracket, then go down the outside wall, inside next to the front door - except the cable down the front of the house, kept coming adrift, flaming, and sometimes breaking. So I diverted it, into the loft, where I fitted the master, and wired multiple slaves, in almost every room, including the garage - all wired internally, and buried. No issues since.

When, a few years later, they came along to replace the drop wire, I explained where the ONT was, and that if the engineer poked a long enough bit of cable through, I would nip up there, and connect it. Sorted!

 

[davelx]

They're retiring the old analogue POTS - already have round here and we've now got VOIP - phone or cable to phone socket(s) plugs into the 431A on the modem.

But not all of the copper network - it's still FTTC/CTTP chez mois. FTTP is available (I'm guessing that's what the boxes and coils of cable added relatively recently to the poles in our road are all about).

On my to-do list, but low priority, is to look at getting full fibre from someone (Community Fibre are leafleting heavily round here, and I think they have a good rep), but I do NOT want the ONT where the existing copper cable enters the house (just like I don't want the NTE5 there and am going to move it), and I do NOT want cable run on the outside of my house. So however and by whoever, the fibre cable will run internally to where I want the ONT. I insist on it. And very-much-so-preferably entering the house at the eaves.

I have Community Fibre and so far very good. The responded quite quickly when a fox bit through my fibre. They use an OEM Linksys Velop router with a 2.5G interface facing the (Adtran) ONT. The fibre comes through a hole in the wall into an internal junction box (photo #3) and a fibre of suitable length plugs into that and the ONT. They let me have 2m and 5m cables for that so that I have options of where to put the router. So far I'm consistenly getting 160Mb/sec each way on a 150Mb/sec contract.

 

[morqthana]

They will want that external junction box near ground level as they won't want to use a fusion splicer on a ladder, even if this means feeding the fibre down from the eaves to near ground level and back up

That would be the type of installation which if done on my house would earn the installer a metaphorical punch in the face....

And although my position is one of aesthetics, there is also a genuine issue of how to fix things like junction boxes and cable clips to the wall. I've got EWI, so there's a thin layer of render and under that 90mm of EPS, so what fixings do you use?

 

[pcaouolte]

what fixings do you use

Something like this: https://ewistore.co.uk/shop/external-wall-insulation/swifix-external-wall-cable-connectors/