atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Cabling Telephones Systems Wiring Better toning results on certain pins/pairs?

Got home from resetting and setting up the voicmail boxes on the merlin messaging that we bought in replacement of 007mlm that died mid last week. I remembered noticing (from a previous ocasions) that some pins are better traceable when plugged into a switch (especially 1Gbps), I decided to conduct quick and simple experiment by holding several probes say within a few inches of my ideal vdv multemedia tester, and here is what happened:

8p8c has the strongest signal on pin 2, pair of pins 1&2. 6p6c, has the strongest signal on pin 6, pair of pins 1&6.

All three probes ( Progressive BA200, Progressive 200EP, and Harris Master Hunter model 270003) displayed same results.

Any ideas why this is happening and why the other pins and pairs show no to little sign of life?

The other pairs have more twists per inch.

Because they are plugged into active equipment, and the tonable pins are going to vary depending on what they are plugged into.

TTT has it. If you're on a pair, then you have a circuit in that active equipment acting as a load, so there's less energy to radiate out into the air. If you split between two pairs, then you aren't completing a circuit, so you don't have that same loading effect. Depending on the circuitry inside the switch, you may see slightly different results depending on how you mix and match the pairs when you tone.

If you need to ID a cable plugged into a network switch, you can get testers that will blink the port on the switch. Or if you have two people, have one person blink the port by plugging/unplugging repeatedly while you look for the blinking port on the switch.

The part where the cable is plugged into an active switch didn't register with me for some reason.

My Lancaster net tester will blink a switch port.

As was said above, and some other info:

From worst to best, the methods for toning:

Pair with electricity on it

Dry pair

Two halves of two pairs (for instance, the W/Bl and the W/Br wires)

A shorted pair, connected to ground in series with the toner

And if you're toning coax, place one lead on the center conductor and the other on a local ground (or nothing at all). Put it on the shield and you'll quench the tone.

Wouldn't it be kind of hard to trace a with all the blinking going on at the switch end ?

And in my original post I mentioned that strength varied from pin to pin, pair to pair with the toner not being connected to anything , it just just the emiting signal out of the toner jack to probe .

I ran into trying different pins and pairs earlier in time with data. Phone system such as merlin was a whole different story, I really like the fact that tester let's you know if there is an equipment present on the other end, as it displays volts present and it goes into protection mode so that the equipment will not get damaged.

Most switches are going to have a link light and an activity light, or two different colours of LEDs. In any case, the difference between LEDs flickering with activity and a link that is going up and down is usually pretty obvious.

I misunderstood, I thought you were measuring the tone on different pairs on a cable feeding into equipment. I have an Ideal VDV tester that seems pretty consistent between the different pairs. The circuitry it uses to detect voltage and provide protection etc. may have some impact on the strength of tone coming from different pairs.

the toner puts a steady slow timed blink on the switch ,its pretty easy to spot