atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums TDM Business Telephone Systems Mitel Telephones & Systems New Guy with easy question

I have worked on a few phone systems and done wiring work before and have a really dumb question. I have a friend who just bought a small hotel and wants me to get the phone system working, existing system is mitel sx50 and I see how its all laid out and it should work if I can get tone to the trunk card. How the heck can I find out where the trunk card is punched down to, I have traced it back to a 66 block but can't seem to figure out what to do with the telco lines. Which pairs do I punch down the telco lines to that will allow the system to get dial tone and an outside line. I get trunk 65 card 9 busied out errors now when trying to place a call, which makes sense because there is no tone to the trunk card. Or am I just not thinking this through correctly. Please help, any advice would be great. :bang:

Do you have a manual?? Does the company that your friend bought the SX50 from have a good support staff?? You may have bitten off more than you can handle.

This is not the easiest system to set up and program. Years ago we installed 4 of them--but with alot of support help and one of our techs had taken a course on the SX50. We do not support nor maintain them any more. It's for a good reason---believe me.

Maybe one of the Mitel regulars can jump in and offer some help. Perhaps some paid help from a board member/certified tech would be appropriate. Welcome to the board and good luck.

The only thing that I can suggest is that with the system being existing, there must have already been trunks connected to it. If you are lucky, and I say that with a capital "L", you should be able to simply trace the jumpers from the existing network interface for the original trunks to locate their position on the system's blocks. If this is your case, you can simply move the jumpers to the new network interface.

I'd be willing to bet that the original system was set up for ground-start trunks and I'll throw another dollar into my bet that the new lines ordered by the customer are not ground-start trunks (cheaper is better, right?).

If I had only minimal system experience, I'd steer clear of this situation. If you don't truly understand the concept of PBX trunking, ground-start, trunk polarity, etc., you are setting yourself up for a big headache.

Mitel's hotel/motel systems are remarkably simple for people who know them, but they are a daunting task for those who don't.

I absolutely HATE replies where we tell people to "call a professional", but when dealing with the SX-50 and having no experience, I just can't think of anything else to say.

By the way, your question isn't "dumb" at all. At least you had the foresight to ask first before you landed yourself into a den of snakes.

I have some manuals, which aren't very good. This system came out in 87 from what I can see and I was 6 yrs old so I am shooting from the hip at most troubleshooting I have done.

Right now its programmed to call room to room and down to the operator but I can't get dial tone for outgoing calls.

8 trunks on the card, 2 wires a trunk, 16 pair out of 25 should be used, I am thinking I could cross connect the line coming in to the first pair of the trunk card and get out on the system. Sound right?

Now to just get it to work.

Would I have to activate those trunk locations on the card through console programming?

Anyone know anyone in MI who does Mitel system work?

I am not going to screw anything up by guessing anymore. She will just have to get out her checkbook.

Thanks for the help though.

See what you find by clicking on the INSTALLERS link on the left/top part of this page.

One question: Have you ever heard dial tone at the DMarc and verified the lines?

Just curious as to whether you're working with ground start or loop start lines.

Yes, I put my butt set on it and have good dial tone. Which leads me to believe they are loop start lines. Which tells me if the system is configured for GS, then the pbx won't use these lines anyways.

Yes--for sure.

From what I remember when I worked on one of those at a small hotel you can pull the trunk card out and there will be a little toggle switch on the board that switches the card from G to L. Switch it to L for loop start. This may have been a feature on the old sx200. Good luck.

Can anyone verify this. I plan on going over there after work tonight, I have some networking of pc's to do, so I can pull the card and look then.

Pull the card on this system=
1) Power down
2) Disconnect 25 pair
3) Use supplied tool to pull card
4) Switch from G to L
5) Reverse for install and power back on.

I have dealt with the SX50 since it first came out and since it uses "registers" to program it is not fun to deal with. You do not have any switches on the card for LS or GS, it is in programming where you tell it what type of trunk.
The trunks are punched down every other pair starting at the top of the block. You would ony use 8 pairs on an 8 port card. If you have a manual you should have some programming forms. Trunks are programmed in the 5XX forms so your 65 trunk would be under 565.

I will confirm Steves post. There are no switches to flip for loop or ground start on a SX50. That is all done in programming. If you do connect a trunk and it wont work try reverseing the polarity on the trunks. (You have two wires per trunk, just swap positions with them.)

So your trunk card is in slot #9? How many trunks are active on the card?

Yes slot 9 is where the trunk card is, nothing in slot 10.

I am not sure how many are active,I do know there are 8 available. I will be trying to get this figured out this coming week.

Go to the block (SX-50 side) where the CO lines are jumpered and see how many trunks have dial tone. Do you know how to check for ground start/ loop start?

Zero of them should have dial tone, correct? They won't have tone until I cross connect them to the telco lines?

Also, I do not know how to check for ground start/loop start. I have a butt set and can get dial tone on any ext and the telco lines. But cannot get an outside line from sx-50 side at all even with the 9 before number.

You have to have Telco dial tone cross connected to the ports on card slot 9. With your butt set on the telco do you get dial tone when you come off hook? If you do then they are loop start, if you don't then they are ground start and you need to touch a wire that is hooked up to a ground to the ring side of the line. If that brings dial tone then you have to cross the line observing polarity to the system.

Yep, thats what I assumed. They are loop start based on the fact I can get tone when coming off hook.

Thanks, I appreciate all this help you folks have been giving me.

Next item is going to be getting the sys programmed for ls lines as opposed to gs lines. Will be researching that this evening then hopefully getting that fixed tomorrow and her phone sys should come alive when I connect the telco lines to the trunk locations.

command 565 would be your 1st trunk on card in slot 9. registers b,c,d,e, and i should be ones. follow that for the next trunk, 566, and so on. be sure to turn register 1 bit "i" to a 0 for unused trunk ports on the card. 565 register 2 bit "g": 0 is loop start, 1 is ground start. be sure to "save" as you go.

The pocket reference guide only says to exit by pressing the release key on the console, is this the "save" function. I can't find a "save" funciton in this guide.

So these are the steps to get this from GS to LS trunks.

1) Log into the system with hopefully the default access code
2) go to command 565 check register 1 bit i to make sure its turned on first
3) if turned on go to register 2 (not quite sure how to do this) and bit g and change the 1 to a 0 then save.

Will the system need rebooted to make this happen or should the programming take automatically?

No reboot necessary. To get to register 2 type a 2 when in register 1 with the first 1 (bit a) blinking.

Ok, I am here right now, I can get in and get to register 2, how do I get down to the g location, when I hit next it takes me to the next register. I am unable to locate this info anywhere on how to move to different locations.

Its in GS mode and I could change it if I can get to bit g

Thanks

When I try to follow the bits over, ie, 20001101, as soon I put in a 0 after the 2 I am getting an e11 write protected data on the display.

Maybe I am in read only mode, if so the default sec code doesn't work on this console.

Ok, I think I got this figured out, I can get in with the default user security code and view the commands but can't do anything with them. Anyone know how to reset the system security code without reloading the system defaults? I see some reset switches, do they do anything to help out with that?

This systems looks very simplistic once I am into it, maybe I am fooling myself. :toothy: :toothy:

Make sure the bottom switch in the red switchbank on the side of the phone system to the right is set to open hten it will accept data changes.

Private message has been sent.

Thanks for everyone's help, I now have tone on the trunks thanks to this forum and especially westerntelephone.

I think it should be set to closed at least on my system it is. This Forum string helped me out. thanks westerntelephone

DW, 2 things:

1. This thread is almost a year old. Please don't drag up old/dead threads. Start a new one, I start a new one if the subject I want answers/discussion on over a month old.

2. When it's open, no password is required. That's right, the proverbial "Backdoor".