Telecom n00b needs some wiring help 2

[TwystedPair]

Hey guys.. Here's my situation. I work for a smallish advertising company with not a whole lot of IT support. I am a Windows Sys Admin who has just been told that all of the telephony duties now fall under my responsibility. I do have some phone switch experience, but on a very very low level. Whenever I had wiring or large problems with the phone switch or VM system, I would call in help. I don't have that option this time, however. Now for the question.

We are doing some expanding into a new space in the same building, which is going to require a new closet. I have been told that the closet and all of the offices in the new space have already been wired. I just need to make the connections on the patch panel in the new closet, and then jump to two other closets and then into my server room, eventually connecting to the phone switch. I've also been told that I have plenty of space for the new phones in all of the closets and on the phone switch. I've been told by a few people in the know that the whole process from start to finish shouldn't take longer than a few hours. They say that all it is is making some cross-connects in each closet. First of all, am I screwed? Secondly, where do I start????

Please be gentle!!!

Thanks.

 

[wires]

You will need a toner, probe, punchdown tool, crossconnect wire, paper, pencil and your thinking cap.

First survey the jacks, punchdowns and cables. Hopefully you will be able to make sense of what goes where and come up with a simple sketch of how to make a circuit from the office wallplate to your phone switch. Hopefully everything is marked but now is the time to tone a few and be sure your sketch reflects reality.

Next connect one wallplate the the new office space back to the switch hook up a phone and test it. If it works GREAT! If not go back to step one and modify your sketch and try again. Repeat as needed...

First circuit working? Good! Go ahead and hook up the rest of the circuits. Neatness counts.

It isn't all that difficult and hopefully there are some professional examples in the closets already. Try to make your work look like what is already there. Crossconnect wire should not be pulled tight but should have enough slack to make it easy to trace wires by wiggling. If 66 blocks are used bridging clips are useful.

How many phones are you needing to connect?


Good luck!

 

[TwystedPair]

Thank you so much for the reply wires. It is very important to me and my career at the best company that I have ever worked for to make a good impression on this project. I have been reading up on cabling for the last 2 days and everything that I learned in Intro to Networks 8 years ago is all starting to come back to me. Like I said before, all of the hard work has been done for me and all I need to do is make the cross-connections and jumps from the IDF, to another IDF, and eventually into the server room. I probably wouldn't have even have taken on this project if it didn't seem so easy in theory.
The first closet in the new space was easy. Again, please forgive my lack of knowledge of terms. I made cross-connects from the station block to the system block. All of the (insert correct term here) "ports" on the blocks are labeled. The station block is labeled with the wall jack numbers and the system block is labeled 1-24, 25-49, etc. In my mind, I know that the system block is connected to the patch panel in the next IDF, which is connected to the patch panel in the server room, which is then cross-connected to the patch panel connected to the phone switch. Here is where my inexperience and lack of understanding come into play. When I'm in the first IDF, how do I make the jump from the other IDF? I do know that all of the closets are tied together. When I walked through briefly with the cable installers, he showed me that I had enough spots on the system block to connect all 25 lines. My stupid question is, what do I cross-connect to?? I see station blocks labeled with wall-jack numbers, and system blocks labeled 1-24 etc.. I'm not even sure if my questions are making any sense, but I'm hoping someone out there understands what I'm trying to say.

Again, thanks for the help. I can't wait until this project is over so I can get into some training classes so I can do this job right!!!!

 

[TwystedPair]

Here is a link to some pictures of what I'm looking at.

http://s261.photobucket.com/albums/ii47/mattyatkins/

 

[LkEErie]

I understand what you're trying to say, I just don't know how to answer it. For the sake of clarity, let's call the frame where the switch is located the MDF, and the closets IDF's numbered 1,2 and 3.

On the lower right of your MDF, there appears to be a set of tie cables. The picture quality is so poor that I can't zoom in to see the numbers on the desi strips. Normally, when we run IDF's, they are tied back to the MDF and not IDF to IDF, the reason being that the switch is in the MDF room and the IDF's don't have equipment that feeds any other IDF. It also appears the the last two rows on the bottom are reserved for telco demarcs, and that the 4th row from the bottom is not completely full and the 3rd row is the last 25 pair feed to an IDF.

If you don't have a basic toolkit, GET ONE. A toner, probe, butt set, punchdown tool are absolute minimums. Get a multi-punch tool also if you are going to take over the installation work. Order a spool or two of Cat-3 single pair cross-connect wire.

Now, start with the new closet. You're going to see a tie cable to somewhere. Does it go back to the MDF? How many pairs? It may have ties to more than one destination. Make note of that. Your mission is to find the shortest and quickest route back to the MDF. If it is really only going to another IDF, then go to that closet and do the same thing, try to find a quick route to the MDF.

The best, of course is that you have only one set of cross connects to run from the MDF to the IDF in the closet closest to your new phones. The worst is that you have to jump to all the closets in-between. For clarity, call them MDF, IDF-1, IDF-2, IDF-3. Using all closets, in the MDF you would jumper from the switch to IDF-1, then in IDF-1 you jumper from MDF to IDF-2, then in 2 from IDF-1 to IDF-3, and finally in 3 you jumper from IDF-2 to the station cables block. Try to make your jumpers look like the ones in the lower right of the MDF, where the first 12 jumpers feed from the left and the next 12 or 13 from the right.

Now might be a good time to mention that you make an Excel spreadsheet of the work you do to start a cable plan.

Happy wiring.

LkEErie

 

[TwystedPair]

LkEErie,

Your post is very helpful. Thank you for taking the time to respond and I'm glad that you understood what I was trying to say. I understand most of what you are saying, except I didn't take a picture of the patch panel in the MDF. Both of the patch panels that you saw were in IDFs. It is a very long distance from the new IDF to the MDF, which is why I'm jumping to another IDF first. I will call the IDFs 1-3, starting with the one closest to the MDF and ending with the new IDF in the new space. I was told to jump from IDF3 to IDF2, which is on the same floor about 100 yds away. From there, I am to jump to IDF1 which is directly above IDF2. Then from IDF, I am supposed to make the jump to the MDF. I am told that the tie line from IDF3 to IDF2 is already run, and IDF1 and 2 are obviously tied together and to the MDF because there are existing phones that those closets service. You said "4th row from the bottom is not completely full and the 3rd row is the last 25 pair feed to an IDF." I think a big part of my question can be answered by understanding this statement. How do you know that the 3rd rw is the last 25 pair feed to an IDF? You can tell that just by looking at it??
I do have a basic toolkit with a punch down tool, among other things. I'm fairly positive I have the toner, probe, and butt set as well, but do not really know how to use them. (Very bad, I know. My lack of knowledge is a very short term problem)
I believe that I am already finished with IDF-3. I had fresh, labeled blocks to work with and I cross connected the station block to the system block. That was easy to do. There is a tie line, and I am told that it goes to IDF-2. The route to the MDF from the new IDF has already been laid out for me, and it is to jump to the other 2 IDFs before jumping to the MDF. Now for the million dollar question. I know where the system block is in each IDF, and I have verified that I have enough room for the new stations. What do I cross-connect to in each IDF to jump to the other IDF?? In my mind (very inexperienced mind you) in IDF-2, I should have a new block in IDF-2 that the tie line from IDF-3 terminates to, that I cross-connect the station blocks to. All I see in IDF-2 however, is a bunch of cross-connects between station blocks to the system block. I think this is where my earlier question comes into play. How did you know from the picture that "3rd row is the last 25 pair feed to an IDF?"

Thanks again for the help. You have no idea how much it is appreciated!!!

 

[LkEErie]

I'm guessing the first pic is IDF-1 and the other pic is IDF-3 with 30 cables and a 50-pair tie cable to your IDF-2.
Or, maybe the first IDF is IDF-2 and the 50 pairs headed to IDF-3 are sitting in the middle of the frame as those unused 50 pairs.

If the picture you took is of IDF-2 you have a huge problem. If it's of IDF-1, you have a smaller problem. Either way, it's time to get your cable contractor back in to run feed cables from the IDF's to the MDF for closets 2 and 3. You don't have a spare 50 pairs to feed 50 pairs through this frame. I count 39 horizontals in use for station cables (36+3) from this picture, that's 234 house cables. Then, I see the 50-pair termination, probably your new pairs, and then 300 pairs at the bottom of the frame, of which pairs 223-250 look unused, 251-275 look to be CO's (fax machines and the like) and 276-300 is unused except for the cable terminated on 287 and 288.

To run through this IDF, you need to cross connect the first 25 pairs of your 50 pair cable 25 inlets and 25 outlets going from the MDF to another IDF. You would need the same in another IDF. The doofus who did each IDF should have cabled a 50 pair or greater home run to the MDF. In view of the fact that you have already run 234 house cables which would use up 234 or more pairs of the 300 pair tie-cable just for this IDF, it needed a 300 pair count just for this IDF alone, and the small closet needed at least 50 pairs for the 30 house cables.

LkEErie

 

[wires]

How do you know that the 3rd rw is the last 25 pair feed to an IDF? You can tell that just by looking at it?? "

You can't tell much by just looking, that is what the toner and probe are for. Hopefully the tie lines (cables connecting the IDFs to each other or to the MDF) are marked in some way.

Connect the toner to the first pair of the tie line in the closet where the station 110 blocks are located and take the probe and try to find the other end of the cable. To do this punch a short length of crossconnect wire down to the first pair and use it to connect the toner. Take the probe and with both the toner and probe turned on you should get a tone through the probe speaker when you bring it near the toner (toner generator). Once you know what the tone sounds like go try to find it in the other closets. Don't be fooled by faint tone that is inducted into nearby wiring, when you find the pair the tone should be quite loud. Tone a known cable and see what it sounds like.

By repeating this process in the other closets you should be able to map all the tie lines.

Take notes, make drawings and test with the toner to BE SURE your drawings are correct. Don't go punching down a bunch of wires before getting one path established and a phone to work.

Once again - how many phones will be in the new location?

 

[mikeydidit]

TwystedPair

Keep in mind that all you are doing is extending dial tone from the system to the set. This is done through tie cables to the closets. If you can get dial tone from the system by placing a jumper wire on a jack to a set and it works, then cross connect it down the line. When you get it done, then duplicate what you did the first time, and Now you are a phone guy.

The tone will let you place it in the jack, to the closet, back to the system.

What phone system are we working with BTW???



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