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Seeking advice on a new FTTP installation

sbaggs

Pro Member
After a Gigabit Voucher Scheme campaign, Openreach are in the process of making FTTP available in our village (digging up roads, pulling fibre through ducts etc). Now it's time to think about how the fibre installation might be done in our home. I've come up with a solution, and would welcome comments on whether Openreach are likely to go with it.

We're in a detached bungalow, with an overhead telephone line from a pole on the other side of the road (no ducts to our property). The telephone line is attached to the house near the top of the gable end, and that's the only part of the building which offers the height to get a line across the road. Below the gable end is a one-piece fibreglass flat roof to the utility room (was once a garage), and I doubt if OR would want to cut a hole in that - and I wouldn't want them to, either. Because of the utility room roof, getting the fibre down to ground level outside and then and going into the house would be awkward and involve quite a bit of work.

The attic is boarded and lit, with access via a normal stairway - plenty of room to walk about up there. If the fibre is brought into the attic through the gable end, it can then drop down through the ceiling below into the living room. I'm happy to put mini-trunking down the corner of the room which is below the highest point of the gable. There are power sockets at skirting level in that corner, so I thought the ONT could go there. That corner is where the existing BT socket and my router sit, I know get satisfactory WiFi coverage from there and I already have ethernet running from there to my "office" - so all very convenient.

Does that sound like an idea that OR would run with?
 
Probably. But it depends a bit on the engineer on the day. I had a similar question when I had my install and someone on here who knew the OpenReach regs said that loft work is possible but the area needs to be safe, no fibre glass, etc. If you loft is all boarded out and it's safe access to/from the loft then it should be an easy ask.

OpenReach usually have a box where they transition from external to internal cable, if you didn't want this on the gable, you could ask for this to go in the loft.
 
Thanks - good to hear from someone who has been there! There is loft insulation but it is under the boarding, so the OR people wouldn't be exposed to loose fibreglass by bringing the fibre in as I'm suggesting. If I'm confident they would agree to the plan, I'd put the trunking up through the ceiling into the loft in advance so they could drop the fibre straight into it. Do they do an initial visit to agree how the work will be done then come back later to do it, or is it all done in one visit?

As to the box where they switch from external to internal fibre - I don't mind it going outside, but it would probably be easier for everyone if it was inside. It would be easier (and safer - no ladder required) to fit it, and for future maintenance should it be necessary.
 
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Assume you have looked at these Openreach site and this BT sites
The external box is where they fuse the fibre optic cable together (the incomming overhead external cable and the cable that runs into your house.) My understanding is that they can't do the fusing (optical cable joint) at height (up a ladder) and like the box to be at a low level on the outside of your house so it's easily accessible.
I believe they can bring the external cable into the house and joint it in an internal box but don't normally like to do this - it will depend on the engineer on the day.
We were lucky and had some good Openreach engineers do the work in our group of houses, after a CFP, and our neighbour has an internal junction box.
I installed some trunking, with draw string, under our floor which our engineer was happy to use as it made things easier and quicker for him.
 
Correct on the external to internal transition box, it can't be high up, so either lower level outside or internal at safe working height. The engineers first ask was for external low level but when I showed them the cable path I prepared in my loft then there was no further debate - mine is internal in my loft.

Apart from anything else this approach improved the security of my broadband as it's now up out of the way and a ne'er-do-well can't come along and easily snip the cable.
 
Assume you have looked at these Openreach site and this BT sites
The external box is where they fuse the fibre optic cable together (the incomming overhead external cable and the cable that runs into your house.) My understanding is that they can't do the fusing (optical cable joint) at height (up a ladder) and like the box to be at a low level on the outside of your house so it's easily accessible.
I believe they can bring the external cable into the house and joint it in an internal box but don't normally like to do this - it will depend on the engineer on the day.
We were lucky and had some good Openreach engineers do the work in our group of houses, after a CFP, and our neighbour has an internal junction box.
I installed some trunking, with draw string, under our floor which our engineer was happy to use as it made things easier and quicker for him.
I might do the same thing - prepare the way from the loft into the living room with a short length of mini-trunking, and have some more cut to length ready to go down the living room wall to where the power is. If they don't use the hole I've made, I'll just have to fill it again.

Getting the external box to ground level from that gable end any other way would require quite a bit of working at height, and I know which way I would rather go - inside the building.
 
Correct on the external to internal transition box, it can't be high up, so either lower level outside or internal at safe working height. The engineers first ask was for external low level but when I showed them the cable path I prepared in my loft then there was no further debate - mine is internal in my loft.

Apart from anything else this approach improved the security of my broadband as it's now up out of the way and a ne'er-do-well can't come along and easily snip the cable.
I'd also prefer to minimise the need to walk on the flat roof - it's sound, but there's always a risk of damaging the roof surface and starting a leak. If they want to get the fibre to ground level outside, they would have to clip it horizontally around the side of the building, then come down at the back. If they go through the gable end wall, it greatly reduces the time they will need to be on the flat roof.
 
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Rather than mini-trunking I would recommend you use PVC conduit as you can buy the elbows to get around corners making it effortless to pull fibre. Personally I would do all the PVC conduit work for them including the hole to the outside wall. Then pull a string and have it ready for them to use to pull the fibre into your desired location. They most likely be extremelly happy with the setup as it will speed up the installation and make it safer. Here is my Community Fibre installation. While it's mostly external you get the point. While in your case you are unlikely to get another FTTP provider it doesn't hurt to have another string pulled just in case you need to pull another cable using the same conduit.
 
Rather than mini-trunking I would recommend you use PVC conduit as you can buy the elbows to get around corners making it effortless to pull fibre. Personally I would do all the PVC conduit work for them including the hole to the outside wall. Then pull a string and have it ready for them to use to pull the fibre into your desired location. They most likely be extremelly happy with the setup as it will speed up the installation and make it safer. Here is my Community Fibre installation. While it's mostly external you get the point. While in your case you are unlikely to get another FTTP provider it doesn't hurt to have another string pulled just in case you need to pull another cable using the same conduit.
Some good points there, thanks - in fact, thanks for all the comments here which have helped me get my thoughts in order.

I've been chatting with a few of the OR people around the village over the last couple of days, I was the one who ran the voucher campaign and that seems to go down well as a conversation-starter. They all seem happy to talk and few are on nodding terms now. When it looks as if the installations are starting, I'll see if I can run my ideas past one or two before the date - even if it turns out to be a non-starter, at least I'll have time to think again and they might have some suggestions I hadn't thought of. Making it easy seems to be the key, though.
 
Apologies for resurrecting an old thread, but I have one more question - how thick is indoor Openreach fibre compared with modern TV aerial coax?

Our fibre installation is happening soon so I'm preparing. In the corner of the living room where I want to put the ONT are two coax sockets which are not used, alongside the existing BT socket. The three cables are chased into the wall, but while burrowing in the loft I found they are all in one sleeve.

I disconnected one coax at the socket, tied string to the end, went up to the loft and pulled gently. The coax came out as sweet as a nut, no force required at all. The second coax is also free to move, but I have left it in for now so I don't disturb the telephone cable. It's a straight vertical run, no corners.

Hence I now have a drawstring from the corner of the living room to within a metre of where the phone line comes into the house in the gable end. The $64k question is - will the fibre fit in the sleeve? I don't mind pulling out the second coax, and of course the telephone cable can go, but if fibre is a lot thicker than coax then I might have to go back to Plan A (hole in ceiling / mini-trunking).
 
Apologies for resurrecting an old thread, but I have one more question - how thick is indoor Openreach fibre compared with modern TV aerial coax?

Our fibre installation is happening soon so I'm preparing. In the corner of the living room where I want to put the ONT are two coax sockets which are not used, alongside the existing BT socket. The three cables are chased into the wall, but while burrowing in the loft I found they are all in one sleeve.

I disconnected one coax at the socket, tied string to the end, went up to the loft and pulled gently. The coax came out as sweet as a nut, no force required at all. The second coax is also free to move, but I have left it in for now so I don't disturb the telephone cable. It's a straight vertical run, no corners.

Hence I now have a drawstring from the corner of the living room to within a metre of where the phone line comes into the house in the gable end. The $64k question is - will the fibre fit in the sleeve? I don't mind pulling out the second coax, and of course the telephone cable can go, but if fibre is a lot thicker than coax then I might have to go back to Plan A (hole in ceiling / mini-trunking).
There are various types of fibre cables but all of them will be thinner than coax so you should be fine.
 
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Final result on this - the installation took place this afternoon and went exactly as planned. Once I had pointed out the drawstring from the inside gable end to the spot where I wanted the ONT, putting the splice box in the loft didn't even raise an eyebrow. Apparently ours was the second installation in the village - the first was done this morning.

Thanks for the advice here. A bit of preparation went a long way.
 
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