leaky building reclad - UFB structured cabling advice

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#94416 10-Dec-2011 09:18

I'm involved in ornganising a reclad for an apartment block in Auckland.

We are going to recable for TV / satellite - so we only have one aerial amd one satellite dish on the roof rather than a satelite dish on the wall of each individual apartment.

Wondering whether we should take the opportunity to install any cabling to each individual apartment for UFB. To be honest I'm not sure what is involved at all. I'm guessing that we should cable from each apartment to a common junction box easily accesible to the road.

Any advice would be most welcome.

There are 16 individual apartments.

{MOD EDIT : SP : More info added to thread title, good call Regs}

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Snowflake

#556468 10-Dec-2011 20:58

its awesome that you're thinking about it, and at a time when it makes the most sense! i'm sure someone here will chip in with some recommendations.

i wonder if there is a chorus fibre already running past... might even be worth trying to contact someone in the connections dept

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chevrolux

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#556737 11-Dec-2011 22:14

Ideally you would have a small comms cabinet in each apartment. You already have a switch board per apartment right? So next to that I would put a comms cabinet. You can get electrical boxes that look identical to the switch board so dont worry about having a giant cabinet sticking out the wall. Everything can be flush mounted. Inside the apartment you might have 3 or 4 outlets? (not sure how big these places are). So each outlet is home run back to the comms cabinet in that apartment. I would use cat6 as it is pretty much the same price as cat5e but for ease of use in an existing situations cat5e might be easier for you to get down existing cavities etc. Then from each apartment's comms cabinet I would run 2 cables back to a main cabinet for the building. One for voice one for data. Both can be cat 6 and dont have to be exclusively voice and data. Really you can get away with one but my philosophy is if you are pulling one cable through then why not just pull 2. Probably where the existing telecom demarc is a there will be ducting in the foundation making it so much easier when fibre is bought in. We have been bringing fibre in to a alot of commercial buildings lately and it is amazing how many of the demarcs arent actually in the comms room making it very hard for us to do a neat job as trunking/piping the fibre around the place is the only way to go.
Anyway, the cabling, in short it would be a fairly major job but if you are pulling linings anyway then it is too much of an issue. There are guys on here that can tell you what gear to put in each apartment's cabinet I can remember the brands/product codes. We generally just use pdl/dynamix gear for residential jobs as it is cheap and caters better for low numbers of cables. Dynamix do a nice 12-port mini panel that would work nicely but that is a waste when you might only have 3/4 outlets in the apartments. Hills do a good range of termination gear too. Oh and signet.

My 2c. Hope it helps.

Sam

edit for missed words

Zeon

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#557834 14-Dec-2011 12:14

chevrolux: Ideally you would have a small comms cabinet in each apartment. You already have a switch board per apartment right? So next to that I would put a comms cabinet. You can get electrical boxes that look identical to the switch board so dont worry about having a giant cabinet sticking out the wall. Everything can be flush mounted. Inside the apartment you might have 3 or 4 outlets? (not sure how big these places are). So each outlet is home run back to the comms cabinet in that apartment. I would use cat6 as it is pretty much the same price as cat5e but for ease of use in an existing situations cat5e might be easier for you to get down existing cavities etc. Then from each apartment's comms cabinet I would run 2 cables back to a main cabinet for the building. One for voice one for data. Both can be cat 6 and dont have to be exclusively voice and data. Really you can get away with one but my philosophy is if you are pulling one cable through then why not just pull 2. Probably where the existing telecom demarc is a there will be ducting in the foundation making it so much easier when fibre is bought in. We have been bringing fibre in to a alot of commercial buildings lately and it is amazing how many of the demarcs arent actually in the comms room making it very hard for us to do a neat job as trunking/piping the fibre around the place is the only way to go.
Anyway, the cabling, in short it would be a fairly major job but if you are pulling linings anyway then it is too much of an issue. There are guys on here that can tell you what gear to put in each apartment's cabinet I can remember the brands/product codes. We generally just use pdl/dynamix gear for residential jobs as it is cheap and caters better for low numbers of cables. Dynamix do a nice 12-port mini panel that would work nicely but that is a waste when you might only have 3/4 outlets in the apartments. Hills do a good range of termination gear too. Oh and signet.

My 2c. Hope it helps.

Sam

edit for missed words

Good post. The only alteration I would put in there is that is Chorus' intention AFAIK to provide an ONT to each apartment which convertes a fibre connection into a standard copper Ethernet one. Ideally these could all be located in the central wiring for the apartment block (ie Chorus will install 16 ONTs in one place) and that could run back from each individual ONT to the corresponding apartment via cat6.

However I think they will probably want the ONT's in each apartment. Does the buildign have a central utility chute for piping, electricity etc.? If so then probably put in a cable conduit with pull wires from the comms cabinet in each apartment to this chute. If the apartment building doesn't have this then install cable conduit with pulling wire to wherever the cables will come in.

I suggest you call Chorus about this TBH.

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Regs

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Snowflake

#557846 14-Dec-2011 12:42

oh, perhaps you can change the subject on this = "leaky building reclad - UFB structured cabling advice" ro similar might attract more of the right sort of attention

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#557973 14-Dec-2011 16:49

yea thats a good point actually. The problem with putting in ducting to be used by Chorus is it has to be to there exact standards. We have been bringing Chorus fibre in to lots of buildings for about 6 month now and we still dont have an exact spec to follow. For commercial places external ducting must be galvanized steel pipe (vandal proofing) and internal (roof space/underfloor) must be in 20mm telecom duct with 'Caution' stickers every few meters. But then we had a bunch of schools to do and they change their mind about everything. We put a galv'd pipe up and got told to take it down and put up 20mm pvc pipe. Backwards step huh. Then went to do some more commercial stuff and instead of using 20mm pipe in the ceiling got told to thread the fibre through flexi conduit. Another backwards step. My point is yes good thinking putting ducting in, just make sure it is the right kind. So call Chorus.

edit:
Another way of thinking is with cat6 to each apartment you are setting it up for 10gig Ethernet essentially. I assume most fibre plans are not going to break 100mb so there is plenty of 'bandwidth' to each apartment with just copper cabling.

wired

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#557980 14-Dec-2011 17:16

The TCF has produced a document that talks about how to wire both residential units and apartments. There are several ways to do this including the ones mentioned earlier in this thread.

The document can be found athttp://www.tcf.org.nz/content/dc07abcd-21f8-4288-b55b-6f861bdd4d02.html and it is the 2011 Endorsed version

chevrolux

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#557984 14-Dec-2011 17:24

The TCF give good guidelines on how to run cables but there amounts are seriously optimistic. Whats the point in running 4 cables to every single outlet. Serious overkill.

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#557986 14-Dec-2011 17:28

Cable is cheap, running cable is not. It's better to run 4 now and only need 2 than to run 1 and have to run another one in 12 months

Most problems are the result of previous solutions...

All comment's I make are my own personal opinion and do not in any way, shape or form reflect the views of current or former employers unless specifically stated

Zeon

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#558004 14-Dec-2011 18:13

chevrolux: The TCF give good guidelines on how to run cables but there amounts are seriously optimistic. Whats the point in running 4 cables to every single outlet. Serious overkill.

For example lets say I have a TV, home theatre PC and Playstation with central Sky HD. I need 2x cat5e to feed the HDMI to the tv, 1 for the home theatre PC and one for the playstation.

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mattwnz

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#558018 14-Dec-2011 19:01

Zeon:
chevrolux: The TCF give good guidelines on how to run cables but there amounts are seriously optimistic. Whats the point in running 4 cables to every single outlet. Serious overkill.

For example lets say I have a TV, home theatre PC and Playstation with central Sky HD. I need 2x cat5e to feed the HDMI to the tv, 1 for the home theatre PC and one for the playstation.

Couldn't you use some form of hub or connect them adhock. It does seem a bit inefficent duplicating the cabling, when many of the services may not be using the cable to it's full capacity anyway.

chevrolux

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#558089 14-Dec-2011 22:37

Yes in that situation you need 4 data cables. Not two data and two coaxial. I guess what im trying to say is just cable for what you need. Not to the book that the TCF write.

pjamieson

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Chorus

#564177 4-Jan-2012 00:33

Yes, Chorus want to terminate separate Fibre ONT's into each individual apartment. So +1 for laying conduit with pull strings. Alternatively you could create crawl spaces or enough room for the Chorus techs to install whatever conduit/fibre cabling they need.

Read the Chorus Website and if you have any further questions and are in the Current/Y1 Fibre zone contact a service provider to enquire further.

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#565492 6-Jan-2012 19:58

chevrolux: Another way of thinking is with cat6 to each apartment you are setting it up for 10gig Ethernet essentially. I assume most fibre plans are not going to break 100mb so there is plenty of 'bandwidth' to each apartment with just copper cabling.

That would be 1gig. 10Ggig Ethernet requires Cat6A or Cat7 for more than 30 to 55 metres (ie LAN cabling only), I think its 55m for latest standard but probably brand-name cable and lots of testing. Anyone who needs residential 10G Ethernet should budget to connect singlemode fibre to the dwelling, and copper horizontal runs only within apartments.

chevrolux: The TCF give good guidelines on how to run cables but there amounts are seriously optimistic. Whats the point in running 4 cables to every single outlet. Serious overkill.

Because the builder or even the owner can't necessarily predict what a future user might want to plug in at a particular location. Even without HDMI, you still have IPTV/media boxes, phones/ATAs, PCs, IR remote controllers, access points, intercoms, NAS, and potentially building control equipment. TCF only recommends 4 jacks at locations likely to have a TV as far as I know, but does recommend extra outlets to allow for alternative furniture layout. Personally I would run lots of cable to potential office locations, plus ceiling level outlets everywhere for IP cameras or wifi. I previously thought more than 2 outlets was total overkill as well, but I've changed my mind — after having to run trunking around walls!

mattwnz: Couldn't you use some form of hub or connect them adhock. It does seem a bit inefficent duplicating the cabling, when many of the services may not be using the cable to it's full capacity anyway.

The hub is more expensive than some extra cable, and users should have to have devices floating around just to overcome a shortage of ports. But yes the whole idea is that each cable can be plugged in ad-hoc at a patch panel. The down side is that you might not want granny trying to decypher the patch panel and getting the UFB laser beam in her eye by mistake, and easy-to-follow labeling needs to be well planned.

Time to find a new industry!

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#574334 28-Jan-2012 10:18

I have 4 used at the TV with just the HDMI going both ways from there, shoulda pulled 8 I recon now.. Or I will have to get the expensive HDMI over one cat6 boxes which need power too :(

Richard rich.ms

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#574335 28-Jan-2012 10:24

UFB will require fibre pulls to each individual apartment. Having fibre go into the building but then cat5/6 to each apartment isn't going to work. CFH has said without fibre, you won't get UFB service. (This is important for TV as the plan is to use a different wavelength over the same fibre)

No one really knows how UFB + apartment buildings is going to work..
(There were presentations at NZNOG on this)

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