Chorus UFB network upgrade

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webwat

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#575355 31-Jan-2012 15:01

Ragnor:
Elpie:

Last time the powers that be decided to improve internet access for my area we got moved off a cabinet that was 3km away and onto the central Palmerston North cabinet which is 8km away. So, I'm not going to get excited about the UFB roll-out just yet.

Distance effectively doesn't matter with fibre optics compared to copper, so I would be looking forward to it in your situation.

Except that 8km would be close to the limit for GPON on a 24way split. I doubt 8km from central palmy is included in the UFB contract, but at best would be close to the edge of coverage. They may find a way to get the "exchange" closer to you if there is population growth in the area, although Palmy didnt seem to be growing too much while I was there at Christmas.

Time to find a new industry!

Behodar

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#575370 31-Jan-2012 15:19

Take a look at http://www.chorus.co.nz/maps with "Chorus UFB Zones" turned on to see whether a particular property has planned coverage. It doesn't look like it quite reaches 8 km but there's no scale on that map so I can't say for sure.

Elpie

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#575918 1-Feb-2012 15:01

sbiddle:
Elpie: Had the same letter and same timeframe in my area of Palmerston North too. I'm looking forward to seeing what eventuates but am not holding my breath. My street was upgraded for VDSL too. It stops at my next-door neighbours and starts again three houses on the other side, leaving me in a dead spot with no access.

Ironic that most of my street has VDSL when all but two houses are occupied by elderly people. You guessed it - the two houses that aren't occupied by elderly folk don't have the opportunity to use VDSL :-(

Last time the powers that be decided to improve internet access for my area we got moved off a cabinet that was 3km away and onto the central Palmerston North cabinet which is 8km away. So, I'm not going to get excited about the UFB roll-out just yet.

Have you actually had an ISP run a Chorus prequalification on your address to see if you can get VDSL2? The coverage maps are a good guide, but can't be relied on 100%

Yep, Snap said it was a no-go. I'm in a hole that has no coverage.

Elpie

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#575921 1-Feb-2012 15:07

webwat:
Ragnor:
Elpie:

Last time the powers that be decided to improve internet access for my area we got moved off a cabinet that was 3km away and onto the central Palmerston North cabinet which is 8km away. So, I'm not going to get excited about the UFB roll-out just yet.

Distance effectively doesn't matter with fibre optics compared to copper, so I would be looking forward to it in your situation.

Except that 8km would be close to the limit for GPON on a 24way split. I doubt 8km from central palmy is included in the UFB contract, but at best would be close to the edge of coverage. They may find a way to get the "exchange" closer to you if there is population growth in the area, although Palmy didnt seem to be growing too much while I was there at Christmas.

Palmy is growing steadily but the area I live in can't. It's an old, established part of town with no spare land. According to the Chorus map, I am right in the corner on the farthest edge of a UFB zone.

As I said, not holding my breath.

raytaylor

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#576504 2-Feb-2012 21:09

mrgsm021:
Whatever you do, make sure you get in writing what is going to happen. Chorus is not obligated to move heaven and earth to get fibre to people - only to spend the least amount of money possible to get you connected. For most people this translates to the corner of the house closest to junctioning point in the street.

Also you have to be within 20m or something of the roadside. This means people that couldnt get telstra cable because they were in a back property or up a long driveway are going to have the same problem with chorus.

I am planning to let them install it on the fence along the driveway at the furtherst point, and then run cat 5 down to meet it.

I have seen a video on youtube of a telstra technician in australia showing how they pull the fibre through the ground using the old copper line as a pull cable. I am not sure if this was direct buried or in a pipe though.
Anyhow, their policy was to pull out the copper when they installed the fibre.

Ray Taylor

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mrgsm021

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#576543 2-Feb-2012 21:45

A bit of an update:

I had asked for someone at Visionstream to call me back to discuss what exactly they will be doing on my street -

I have a Vodafone 2100 cellsite in front of my house and it is fibre fed. When they installed that fibre for the cell site, they also put in a manhole in the footpath next to my driveway for easy access to the fibre.

Here is what they told me: They are simply going to use the manhole to extend the fibre cable to reach the last house on my street so hopefully they won't be doing any more digging right in front of my house but further down the street.

The work will apparently get underway next week, it was delayed due to waiting for fibre cables shipment to arrive.

chevrolux

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#576574 2-Feb-2012 22:22

raytaylor:

Also you have to be within 20m or something of the roadside. This means people that couldnt get telstra cable because they were in a back property or up a long driveway are going to have the same problem with chorus.

I am planning to let them install it on the fence along the driveway at the furtherst point, and then run cat 5 down to meet it.

I have seen a video on youtube of a telstra technician in australia showing how they pull the fibre through the ground using the old copper line as a pull cable. I am not sure if this was direct buried or in a pipe though.
Anyhow, their policy was to pull out the copper when they installed the fibre.

I am almost certain that won't happen over here. Don't know if it has been mentioned on here yet, the new pipe they are laying in the ground has a whole bunch of microducts inside it. As the pipe passes a property they crack it open, take out a microduct, and point it at the property. Then, from the new cabinet, they blow the fibre through the microduct to your front door. And most of the time you get push a rod down existing telecom pipes (inside your boundary) with a cable in it.
The problem is going to be when they get to all the areas that are direct buried/in old water pipe -and there are PLENTY of them.

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sbiddle

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#576622 3-Feb-2012 07:51

chevrolux:
raytaylor:

Also you have to be within 20m or something of the roadside. This means people that couldnt get telstra cable because they were in a back property or up a long driveway are going to have the same problem with chorus.

I am planning to let them install it on the fence along the driveway at the furtherst point, and then run cat 5 down to meet it.

I have seen a video on youtube of a telstra technician in australia showing how they pull the fibre through the ground using the old copper line as a pull cable. I am not sure if this was direct buried or in a pipe though.
Anyhow, their policy was to pull out the copper when they installed the fibre.

I am almost certain that won't happen over here. Don't know if it has been mentioned on here yet, the new pipe they are laying in the ground has a whole bunch of microducts inside it. As the pipe passes a property they crack it open, take out a microduct, and point it at the property. Then, from the new cabinet, they blow the fibre through the microduct to your front door. And most of the time you get push a rod down existing telecom pipes (inside your boundary) with a cable in it.
The problem is going to be when they get to all the areas that are direct buried/in old water pipe -and there are PLENTY of them.

Has anybody had anything to do with the Kelson rollout in Wgtn? This will be one of the first areas to have a fully completed network (still scheduled for Feb last I heard).

I'm curious as to how many issues they've had with trenching and hitting existing services. I've heard from people that there have been numerous cases of this and it's caused a lot of issues, but keen to know whether this is true, or being blown out of proportion.

raytaylor

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#576643 3-Feb-2012 08:32

unison took out a large chunk of havelock norths phone lines the other day when they cut a cable
unison have also caused a few power outages with their directional drilling. One major one last year in central hastings.

I reckon chorus will probably have the same sort of issues.

Ray Taylor

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naggyman

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#579453 9-Feb-2012 20:41

Here in Masterton, the microduct has been rolled up into bunches and duct-taped to the power poles. I am assuming they will come back and nail the duct to the poles later and string the fibre to houses from there.

Another interesting thing is that the Masterton District Council held their CBD upgrade from last year to this year so Chorus doesn't have to rip up the footpath for a second time. Very smart.

Morgan French-Stagg

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raytaylor

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#579472 9-Feb-2012 21:35

Up here, they left it in bundles on the poles, because the fibre blowing machine is in the back of a van, so they unroll it and poke it in through the back door of the van parked at the bottom of the power pole.

Then they blow the fibre through to where they need it, roll it back up and put it in the splicing box.

Very smart I say.

Ray Taylor

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