atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Cabling Telephones Systems Wiring Can you identify this terminal?

Thanks, Hal! This is very helpful. 66 blocks would be wayyyyy easier, but it isn't my equipment. Unfortunately, I just have to deal with it.

It's always the customer's equipment. If I encountered something like that I would tell them that for whatever reason improper and non standard terminal blocks were used and no one in this business has the tools to work with it. I'm giving you a price to replace them with the correct equipment.

I'll be dammed if I had to go out and buy special tools just because some installer used those to create "job security" for himself.

-Hal

Plenty of independent telcos used the 3M MS2 cross connect system back in the 80s. They might be unusual in former Bell areas, but here in a state with about 75% coverage by independents, they show up pretty regularly. As I said before, they are/were a terrible design, but I don't think they were installed a matter of job security. It was just the local telco following their standard practice. I do agree that it's probably easier to try to eliminate them than to service a known failure of a product. If it was so great, the tool wouldn't be difficult to find.

I had to splice bunch of 900 pair cables that were being extended. I asked for Scotch or B connectors and was given the MS2. I never liked it for a variety of reasons.

ED, BTW - NY Tel in one or more of it's incarnations (NYNEX, I think) used MS2. So did AT&T.

I thought it made a splice that you needed a garbage pail to cover.

It's selling point was that you spliced 25 pair at a time...


Sam

I saw a contractor using an MS2 just last fall.

Yes Sam, they made for a very large splice. Fast but you needed a larger splice case and than wrap them about as tight as you could with muslin to make it fit. When they were used in terminals it made for quite a mess in a very short time as people would go in to test a pair, cut it out of the connector and bean it back.

Yeah, probably not. But I can see some interconnect buying a bunch of them on Ebay thinking nobody else is going to know what to do with these...

-Hal

3M's MS2 and AT&T's 710 modular splicing systems are both owned by 3M now. Both take up the same amount of space with regard to splice modules, but I've always found the 710 system to be more goof-proof. Most Bell companies standardized with the 710 system, however some used 3M post-divestiture when they were told to abandon Western Electric products (or else). I haven't seen any RBOCs in my travels that are still using MS2, but that's not to say that they aren't. At the same time, most independents weren't using any Western Electric products either (710) because they were more expensive, so I can say with certainty that I haven't encountered this system in use in their territories.

Keep in mind that I've only seen territories in the mid-Atlantic region. I can't speak for all of them.

The inside wiring termination system that the OP questioned was definitely 3M's MS2. It was never popular, but for independent telcos in the US, it was an alternative to AT&T's 110 system. BIX was never widely accepted here. My guess is that this was due to lack of stocking distributors. They tried the MS2 system and quickly found that it was more trouble than it was worth, and reverted back to the original US standard, the 66 block system.

I've used the MS2 a dozen or so times, and never by choice. Always seemed to me that you'd get half to 3/4 the way thru laying down your pairs and the first would start coming loose out of the spring clip.

I have also seen these monsters in NYC installs.