atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums TDM Business Telephone Systems Vodavi Telephones & Systems Phone lines randomly dropping

We have a Starplus 96EX phone system and until the boss buys a new system I have to keep this one limping down the road. We have 8 lines coming into the office but when it gets to the phones, only 2 work. I have checked all the outside lines coming into the building, made sure the cards were seated correctly and rebooted the system.What else could I do to fix this?

How many station cards do you have? That's a pretty big system to only have two working phones. Have you tried moving KIB cards around to get more of them working? The one farthest to the left begins with X100 and each card provides service for 12 stations. If you don't have spare KIB's to swap, they are relatively inexpensive on the secondary market, in fact I believe I have a few left if you need to rent one to test. They also aren't expensive to have repaired.

Ed I read that post as he has 8 incoming lines but only 2 lines work at the sets. I think his issue could be a card as you suggest, loose amphenol, missing bridge clips or perhaps even station programming. :shrug:

As "rather be fishing" said, it's not the stations that don't work it is the incoming lines, they have gone in and out 4 times throughout today. But they all worked last Friday.

If it is happening frequently I would test the line at the demarc when it appears dead at the set to eliminate line issues. If good at the Demarc I would hope there is a spare CO line card that you roll into the first position to see if that fixes the issue. You may have to get a spare CO card if you don't have one on site for testing.

Then in that case, we are probably dealing with a failing COB card. Same suggestion stands; if you have a spare to swap the CO line cards, then that should be your first approach. The same offer also stands if you need to rent one for testing purposes, I have a few of them as well. I seriously doubt that the processor card, which is about the only other denominator here, to be the issue. If it was failing, your problems would be much more widespread. It's a pretty predicatable system, but at that age, I suppose that anything can happen.

I'm sorry I am not a phone guy so bare with me. What is a demarc? Also I think we have four cards(in the PBX box), but no extras. Can I swap positions of co cards? Would that help until I get a new card or phone sysytem?

Demarc is the point where the telephone company's responsibility ends for the line and where the customer's begins. This is also referred to as a NID or Network Interface Device. It usually has an orange cover on it for indoor installations but can be pretty much anything if the lines come in and are terminated outside. Yes, you can flip the CO cards (they have white handles) to see if the problem follows. To swap their physical system responsiblity for port assignments, that requires more intense work. This is more of a technician-level requirement.

Thank you EV I will check the lines at the demarc and then try the cards and see what happens. If anyone knows of a tech that is in this area please let me know. That is the reason I am the temp phone guy because I haven't been able to find anyone in this area that knows how to work on Vodavi at all.

I assume you checked the telephone installers link at the top of the page? They may not be listed as Vodavi dealers, but that doesn't mean they can't work on them. You'll just have to ask them.