Plenum cable

[mikeydidit]

I just received call from my sales rep. with Graybar. Apparently their are 3 places that make a certain component found in plenum jackets on plenum cables. One has just burnt down, and she is telling me that their will more than likely be a shortage of plenum cables in the near future. Have any of you heard this rumor?

Mike Jones
LSUHSC

 

[3rc]

It has been two years ago I heard that rumor ,and supposedly it was a chemical plant in LOUISIANNA, Dupont ,if I'm not mistaken , I figured it was back on line by now.

 

[mikeydidit]

I have found out a little more. I received a copy of a memo from Berk-Tek to what it considers its valued distributors and they are making them aware that their will be an increase in their cost of plenum cables. They are expecting a 10 to 15% increase in their prices. In another memo I read that Dupont is increasing their prices on Teflon FEP by $2.00 per pound. Apparently their were 3 manufactures of these products and now their are 2.

Mike Jones
LSUHSC

 

[Jtodd]

Well, I'm glad I recently took the requirement for plenum (where its NOT required) out of our specifications! About a year ago I did a price comparison and for UTP, plenum cable was about 2x the cost of PVC, but the killer was coax which was between 4 and 6x the cost of non-plenum. Gets really expensive when you have equal number of data and coax jacks! Then went and talked with Design and Construction and learned that we don't have any plenum spaces on campus, do we don't need it.

Justin T. Clausen
Physical Layer Implementation
California State University, Monterey Bay

 

[MarvO1]

Does this happen once about every 3 years? Seems like we have been through this before. Did the prices ever come back down from the last time? Maybe I'm getting this confused with some Urban Legend. CRS

MarvO said it