Trusted
Mum's place is on a back section down a long driveway. The existing copper is under a asphalted driveway and seems to have broken somewhere buried. Mum has relatively recently asphalted the driveway and wasn't keen to have it with an ugly different colour patch. Needless to say, Chorus/Downer wasn't keen to repave the whole thing (and I didn't expect them to).
After a *lot* of to-ing and fro-ing via her ISP (Vodafone - who actually provided some pretty good customer service overall in this one), Chorus/Downer eventually agreed to run a new cable down the fenceline. From following similar threads about UFB installs, this almost seems to be Chorus' preferred install option so I don't know why it was a problem. It seemed like a no-brainer to me, but it took a while to get there. Making things even more complicated was that fibre is due in a couple of months, so I think there was an all-around lack of enthusiasm for replacing the copper.
The conduit seems okay (ish - see further below) up until it reaches a carport, where it runs up at a 45 degree angle for a bit, before the cable only (no conduit) runs up and over the carport, down another wall before going into the house.
Queries:
- The angled conduit upwards isn't weather sealed. There also isn't any kind of drainage hole along the conduit. While the hole itself is reasonably sheltered by the capping, I would have thought the cable is going to wick the water straight down into a puddle at the bottom of the conduit. Is this okay?
- Is bare cable actually okay going up, over and down the carport without any covering? Is it going to degrade in the light? Is it okay (and should it) be painted?
I'm actually pretty underwhelmed by the standard of the installation overall. First, the conduit isn't even straight along the fence - it takes a pretty big dip down at the end. While most of the screws are stainless, they have also used some yellow zinc wood screws (i.e. intended for interior use only, they will rust outside). The clips used to attach the conduit to the fence are galvanised, but they've cut half the clip off to make it fit under the capping - again, it's going to rust where it's cut, but it also makes the hold against the fence pretty poor. Finally, they've installed a new plastic box (demarcation point?), but haven't bothered to level it properly, so its on a noticeable angle.
I'll end fixing most of these relatively easily (maybe not the plastic box - triwing security screws), but I don't think I should really have to. I'd be fine letting the little stuff slide, if the installation itself had been done properly without all the fuss. Right now, it just leaves a sour taste in the mouth.
As I say, fibre is due in a couple of months, so I'm not going to die in a ditch over this stuff, but it would be good to know what is acceptable and what is not and making sure it is all fixed when the fibre goes in.
EDIT: re-doing paragraph breaks
