We went out today to a bed & breakfast up in the mountains to perform cable rehab to their underground distribution. We installed the original outside plant for this place 20 years ago and finally had to go and replace pedestals that were knocked over, covers missing, corroded splices, you name it. While it is technically referred to as a B&B, it is more like a hotel with individual cabins, apartments, etc.

The weather was absolutely perfect for a project like this!

Here's a new cross-connect box for a cluster of cabins that we installed to replace one that had been hit by a car.

Sweet!!!!

Looks like a fun job, in great weather !!

...bob...

How did you get that job in this weather? We used to say that we got all the outdoor work in the winter and all the indoor work in the summer....

Because the engineers looked at the outdoor work in the summer and the indoor work in the winter.

By the time the drawings were done and the work orders made it through the system the seasons had changed :-(

Sam

Looks good Ed. Sometimes I miss those days, but only on nice days.

What's the dial tone, Mitel?

Looks really nice! Wish there was some way to protect it from vehicular damage.

To answer everyone's question in a single (and typical Ed) post:

This place is in the heart of Virginia's horse country and is about 80 miles away, so we had to do it right (again). The property comprises about 500 acres.

This customer has been ours since about 1991. The previous vendor simply threw two-pair buried drop wire on the ground, through the trees, through the pond; whatever it took to get dial tone to their multiple cabins and buildings. They hired us to do the OSP correctly in July of 1992.

The original jacklegs did just about everything that was wrong in order to extend phone service to the out buildings. They even went as far as to steal Bell Atlantic's old drop wires that were in place when this place was a private community. It was nasty to say the least.

We set up multiple feeders to clusters of cabins or buildings with multiple rooms using centralized cross-connect pedestals. Most have survived over the years except for one that kept getting hit by cars backing out from the parking lot. We managed to rotate it's position at the base of the utility pole so that it wouldn't be such an easy target.

We have a 200 pair, 19 gauge cable leaving the main building and through pedestals, it tapers down to cross-connect boxes with feeds as small as 25 pair. With the exception of drop wires to individual buildings, we maintained 19 gauge throughout the facility, including F2 cables. In some areas, we transitioned from buried to aerial to serve the pool, several party pavilions, stables, emergency phones, etc.

We had to provide for two pairs per cabin/room since this was back in the dial-up modem days. Just in case, we buried five-pair BSW to the stand-alone cabins. Other buildings with multiple rooms either got several five-pair drops or a 25 pair F2 cable.

Pedestal damage has been a huge problem. The lawn maintenance people have no problem with knocking them over with their tractors and they just prop them back up. Over the years, this has caused sheath breakage on the cables. We replaced five pedestals, moved them a bit more out of the way and by using a buried splice, we spliced in extra cable so that we had plenty of cable to work with. Lots of digging, but worth it in the long run.

We had a surplus of gas-tube protected terminal blocks, so we elected to use them on the input side of the smaller cross connect pedestals. Being in the mountains and more susceptible to lightning, I figured that a little extra protection couldn't hurt. All are bonded to the utility pole's EGC.

We also got rid of all of the 24 gauge (type F) wire in the cross boxes and changed over to G- wire (white/violet). It seemed as if lightning was causing the type F wire to fail. It wasn't holding up, often breaking at the terminal posts.

The system serving this facility is a Vodavi DVX+4. There is no need for a system with hospitality features since the owner only permits local and toll-free outward dialing. The room phones are pretty much there for room-room calling or to call the main building for dinner reservations, etc.

What a great project this was. Lots of work, lots of extra hands, but the weather made it worth the long day. Thanks to everyone for your interest.

Heck Ed, we were trying to help you bump up the numbers! I will say I'm jealous, the weather around here was beautiful last week, so I'd imagine yours was, too. Seldom helps that way, as Sam said.

For the pedestal getting hit any thoughts of using small wood bollards to protect them?

Manitoba Telecom is using them out here in the rural areas as required to protect the fiber and copper pedestal from damage from large farm equipment and the crews that cut and grade the ditches.

They even band the top of the bollard and pedestal with reflective tape so they can be seen at night. It probably helps protect the snowmobiles from hitting them in the winter too.