loop vs. ground

[coniglio]

i have eight CO trunks in one route, which is the backup route for calling out if T1 is busy/disabled. Two of the trunks are loop start; the remaining six are ground. Not understanding the difference between the two (and not looking to just yet), what i want to know is should they ALL be either LOP or GRD? I understand my signalling has to match the central office but is this something I should correct in my switch and with the LEC? make them all ground or all loop? thank you for your help.

 

[wdhb]

GND start trunks offer better disconnect supervision & guard against double siezure. Having said that, I've seen 100's of systems that use LOOP start & they never have any real issues. As a rule of thumb, I would ay if you haven't got alot of traffic or experience trunks locking up, LOOP start is fine. You're right in saying you need to match your LEC, probably make no difference leaving them as they are.

 

[huddleto]

One of my sites converted last year from Rolm to Nortel Opt. 11 and the 11 did not like my loop start lines. I had to put in an order with the LEC to change them over to ground start. I also recommend some surge protection on those LEC lines, unless you're into buying Universal Trunk cards.

 

[hawks]

I vote Ground start

 

[coniglio]

well one of the two loop lines keeps generating a TRK153 alarm. LEC has their end as loop. Do you suggest I change BOTH of these two loop lines to ground? Thank you for your advice.

 

[dnc16]

We always have 2 loop start trunks with our ground starts mainly for power outages in the buildings. One is for the Power Fail Safe module. With the loop starts, as long as the CO is still up, there is always dial tone for analogue phones
that are fed from the Power Fail Safe, when the power is out. Plus in some places the is a law saying even in no power situations, there must be a way to dial 911.

 

[coniglio]

okay, thank you.

 

[matthew517]

Loop start trunks will hang on you instead of disconnecting. This will cause issues with calls coming in and out. Also it will tie up you voice mail ports.