Internal ducting for fibre install
Discussion
My son is having a lot of work done on his house at present (involving floors up, ceilings down, etc). Ultimately he’s going to want his broadband router in a location which is roughly central to the house.
It occurs to me that when he moves to full fibre, he’ll need the cable from the external box to the ONT to terminate in the same location, and ideally not surface clipped through the house to achieve this.
If we identify a suitable route from the front of the house to the required location, is it worth running a duct now, with a draw cable (and observing minimum radii) so that the fibre can be installed via that route? Will Openreach be happy to use that duct?
Is there any specific duct which we should use (bearing in mind its internal)? For example, could we run something like HEP20?
And finally, does anyone know what the minimum radius is for fibre? I have it in my house and I know some of the bends are reasonably tight.
TIA.
It occurs to me that when he moves to full fibre, he’ll need the cable from the external box to the ONT to terminate in the same location, and ideally not surface clipped through the house to achieve this.
If we identify a suitable route from the front of the house to the required location, is it worth running a duct now, with a draw cable (and observing minimum radii) so that the fibre can be installed via that route? Will Openreach be happy to use that duct?
Is there any specific duct which we should use (bearing in mind its internal)? For example, could we run something like HEP20?
And finally, does anyone know what the minimum radius is for fibre? I have it in my house and I know some of the bends are reasonably tight.
TIA.
Don't duct for fibre just run a CAT6 Ethernet cable routed behind walls and under floors.
The ONT connects to the router using Ethernet. During major decorating I recently centrally placed my WiFi router upstairs at ceiling height and ran a CAT6 back to the ONT which is where the fibre enters the house.
I built in future flexibility by running 2 cables between the ONT and the WiFi router and I also ran more pairs of cables to various rooms and the garage from the central WiFi position. All wires are hidden.
CAT6 is very cheap.
The ONT connects to the router using Ethernet. During major decorating I recently centrally placed my WiFi router upstairs at ceiling height and ran a CAT6 back to the ONT which is where the fibre enters the house.
I built in future flexibility by running 2 cables between the ONT and the WiFi router and I also ran more pairs of cables to various rooms and the garage from the central WiFi position. All wires are hidden.
CAT6 is very cheap.
Yes definitely! And not just for fibreoptic but put ducts in for everything you can, and it will make any future changes a doddle. My house has everything in ducts and I was able to use the old phone cables that no longer any use to pull pairs of Cat5e through. I would get them put conduit in from where the router will be to anywhere he's likely to want to have wifi access points, computers, TV etc.
No idea on radius for fibreoptic but ducting for electrical installation is already a thing. The original stuff in my house is pretty solid plastic piping, but when I had some building work done recently they used flexible conduit.
No idea on radius for fibreoptic but ducting for electrical installation is already a thing. The original stuff in my house is pretty solid plastic piping, but when I had some building work done recently they used flexible conduit.
pghstochaj said:
Why not just put a Cat6 in from the location that the ONT will go up to where the router is expected to be located? Well, two, just in case.
Assumes you have power and space at the entry point. Mind didn't, so I ducted it to where the original cable terminated instead.Any regular smooth round cable duct would do if its large enough, and the fibre + termination arent exactly fat whichever direction its pulled from. EZ-Bend fibre will take a fair amount of abuse but corners should be swept bends not right angles if only to allow easy feeding.
Don't use Hep2O, use something like 50mm twinwall duct.
If you make it easy for them, with a draw rope, and you ask the lads nicely, Openreach will use it.
Recalling the approx. diameter of the fibre we have, you'd have no issues with a bend radius 100-150mm. You could almost certainly go tighter if clipping, but iirc the fibres are pre-terminated so a bit of extra space helps.
If you make it easy for them, with a draw rope, and you ask the lads nicely, Openreach will use it.
Recalling the approx. diameter of the fibre we have, you'd have no issues with a bend radius 100-150mm. You could almost certainly go tighter if clipping, but iirc the fibres are pre-terminated so a bit of extra space helps.
As others have said, don't duct for fibre, Openreach just won't be that keen to use it. Have a space set up for the ONT on the inside wall of the wall where you want BT to bring the fibre in (and a socket to power the ONT) - then use Cat 6 to bridge the gap from the ONT to the router. That's what we did with our recent build - ONT is hidden behind a TV, then have Cat 6 running in usual way through the walls to the router that is in a void in the ceiling.
LooneyTunes said:
Recalling the approx. diameter of the fibre we have, you'd have no issues with a bend radius 100-150mm. You could almost certainly go tighter if clipping, but iirc the fibres are pre-terminated so a bit of extra space helps.
The minimum bend radius of the fibre they use is 15mm. External Openreach duct is 56mm, internal can be much smaller (regular cable ducting)If you want to know the specs and options and methods there's a ton of Openreach documentation. Including for preinstallation.
The cable comes prepackaged in various lengths with a single end termination.
As long as it pulls through and isn't too far I don't think anyone is likely to care, and it's easier than some of the installations can be. Doesn't hurt to have preinstalled the wall penetrating either to make that tidy, the proper bits and the specs are all out there.
JoshSm said:
LooneyTunes said:
Recalling the approx. diameter of the fibre we have, you'd have no issues with a bend radius 100-150mm. You could almost certainly go tighter if clipping, but iirc the fibres are pre-terminated so a bit of extra space helps.
The minimum bend radius of the fibre they use is 15mm. External Openreach duct is 56mm, internal can be much smaller (regular cable ducting)If you want to know the specs and options and methods there's a ton of Openreach documentation. Including for preinstallation.
The cable comes prepackaged in various lengths with a single end termination.
As long as it pulls through and isn't too far I don't think anyone is likely to care, and it's easier than some of the installations can be. Doesn't hurt to have preinstalled the wall penetrating either to make that tidy, the proper bits and the specs are all out there.
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