sundance-communications.com/forum Forums TDM Business Telephone Systems Nortel Telephones & Systems Compact ICS bad line port

I am in a remote area of Montana and have been asked to troubleshoot a Norstar Compact ICS V4.0 at a grain elevator. They have 3 extensions and 2 loop start lines. Line 2 has gone dead at the phones but is good going into the system. I wired tip and ring to another single line phone, but can not get dial tone unless I pull the T&R from the system feed cable. I have been installing Panasonic and Avaya systems for over 30 years, but this is the first Nortel product that I have encountered in this area. IF the system is able to handle 4 CO's, I would expect that I could enable the 3rd CO port and program that Line appearance at each of the 3 extension and enable ringing on that line port at each extension.
I downloaded the manual and am smart enough to not waste my time learning a system that I am unlikely to encounter again. There isn't a Nortel tech within several hundred miles of this business and I am not the kind of guy that says that they NEED to buy a new system to get such a small operation working on two lines again.
Looking for help and willing to pay.
thanks,

What happens when you read the resistance on pairs 2,5 and 6 on the block? It seems unlikely that all 3 pairs are shorted. You might look to a mechanical failure (tail, bad bridge clip, water, corrosion, etc.) on pair 2.

Carl

If you have the manual I would move the CO line to CO port 3 and reprogram 1 extension for the line 3 to ring and appear. If it works you could program the remainder of the sets.

Do what "Rather be Fishing" told you.
Keep in mind that On the cable - you have Pairs 1 & 2 are Lines 1 & 2.
Then you have 2 Blank pairs. Then pairs 5 & 6 are lines 3 & 4.

If that works - You can program the phone that showed Line 1 and then 2 to show line 1 and then 3 .
The customer will still think he has 2 lines in the same spot.

To do that - Remove line 2 from the phones and then Add line 3. That will put line 3 right below line 1.

Done that many times to get things going.

You can rename the 3rd co port to "Line 2" if you want, but that's the last of your worries. Hopefully the password is known or default so you can get in. If you're new to nortel, use the programming overlay in the manual to help with the keys to use while programming.

Jim

And finally in case you do not want to do all the above you could just order another line card, power down, replace, power up.

And hope it doesn't default.....

Not to scare the client but chances of defaulting at this time are pretty rare.

Also check the SP version as this will see if it has the IRAD enabled which would allow a vendor to dial in to make changes and do a backup of programming.

The customer has powered the system down, for about 20 seconds, and restarted without "apparently" loosing any programming. I'm always concerned about what hits the fan after I get involved with a new customer and and unfamiliar system. If the card replacement is straight forward, I would probably recommend that. It seems like one port failure often leads to another.. Where is the card located, as I have had trouble getting the front cover off of the ksu.

Yes, the cover can be tricky. A small screwdriver will help. Probably an LS/DS card. Get cover off, power down and swap them out.