In-house network cabling

[stratisphere]

How many of you do your own network cabling?

 

At the moment we use a 3rd party contractor, but given some recent problems with them we're thinking about doing it ourselves.

[FN-GM]

We do some depending on how much we have to do.

 

Z

[ninjabeaver]

We do some depending on how much we have to do.

 

Z

 

Same here. We do use an outside contractor mainly though. Been using them for years and never a problem.

[Guest coquet636]

Check with your county council first before you start any work. We were going to put a network point into a room only 5 meters away from the patch panel and were told we were not allowed for insurance purposes.....

 

They said we had to be NIC Certificated.......

 

In my opinion you dont need to be a fully certified electrician to do a network cable, its not as if its gonna electrocute someone.. . .

[yabbadabba]

If I have the time I will do cable runs, but only working part time at the school covering 10 hours a week I very rarely get the time to do it.

Daft as getting an external contracter in is a lot more expensive but ho hum.

[Guest Guest]

We do most cabling ourselves. Due to the fact we generally go for the cheapest quote, which means we get incompitent monkeys doing the job, i would rather just do it myself and get it right first time every time.

[plexer]

They said we had to be NIC Certificated.......

 

What would NIC certfication be then? if they meant NICEIC then they are wrong anyway as that deals with electrical installations and not structured cabling.

 

We have used a local cabling company for the last 5 - 6 years Advantage Technologies and I have no fault with any of their work.

 

If I had the test gear and time I'd install it myself

 

Ben

[apeo]

Dont do our own networking here, apart from 1 or 2 here and there that wouldnt be cost effective to get the contractor in. We have a long standing relationship with the contractor we use.

[localzuk]

We've spent a small fortune on cabling over the last couple of years, enough that we could've hired a person as a technician in the school who could've helped out outside of cabling times...

 

I'd love to do it in house, but it just isn't going to happen.

[e_g_r]

Check with your county council first before you start any work. We were going to put a network point into a room only 5 meters away from the patch panel and were told we were not allowed for insurance purposes.....

 

They said we had to be NIC Certificated.......

 

In my opinion you dont need to be a fully certified electrician to do a network cable, its not as if its gonna electrocute someone.. . .

 

It is in fact possible to electrocute someone through a badly installed Cat 5 cable. Your cable will pass through many different zones wired with different electrical phases and has the potential to give 415 Volts if betwen phase. In any one phase before earth you have the potential 215 Volt

 

not probable though.

 

The thing you have to bear in mind is the testing of you cable to ensure it is complient to standards. Otherwise you may not be getting the through put that you think.

 

Have you a calibrated Fluke tester to test your cable?

 

And don't forget your cable has to be low smoke zero haligon, the purple stuff but watch out for fakes.

Edited November 25, 2008 by e_g_r
old age!!!!

[dgsmith]

We generally have a contractor in to do the work. We had a major refurb over summer with in excess of 140 points needed.

We have just done an Art room ourself though with 14 network points.. just a stone throw from the nearest patch so wasn't too bad, just a box of cabling, some trunking and a drill!

 

As most here I guess, we do it ourself if it's 1 or 2 or very close proximity to the patch, else it isn't cost effective considering we're being paid to do another job!

[plexer]

It is in fact possible to electrocute someone through a badly installed Cat 5 cable. Your cable will pass through many different zones wired with different electrical phases and has the potential to give 415 Volts if betwen phase. In any one phase before earth you have the potential 215 Volt

 

not probable though.

 

The thing you have to bear in mind is the testing of you cable to ensure it is complient to standards. Otherwise you may not be getting the through put that you think.

 

Have you a calibrated Fluke tester to test your cable?

 

And don't forget your cable has to be low smoke zero haligon, the purple stuff but watch out for fakes.

 

Yes it may go through various zones however I bet my cabling contractors install teams aren't niceic qualled either.

 

Ben

[maniac]

We do small bits of cabling ourselves, where it's only a couple of network points of simelar in house. Anything where it's long runs of cable, or more than a few new points we get an outside company to come in and do it for us.

 

The problem we have with this building is it's a PITA to run cable round, and as a result we have a lot of local wiring cabinets in rooms, where it's easier to run a single wire as an uplink then cable the rest of the room to the local cabinet. Often works out cheaper on the installation as well.

 

Mike.

[laserblazer]

When they built schools in the 50s and 60s they had the foresight to make cabling a PITA. I did one ICT suite on my own over Xmas with no heating and I vowed never again. We get the County Infrastructure Team in now.

 

As I'm not even supposed to go up a ladder!

[Guest coquet636]

What would NIC certfication be then? if they meant NICEIC then they are wrong anyway as that deals with electrical installations and not structured cabling.

 

We have used a local cabling company for the last 5 - 6 years Advantage Technologies and I have no fault with any of their work.

 

If I had the test gear and time I'd install it myself

 

Ben

 

Yes, thats the correct certification. Our county Council stated that they needed that level of certification as it comes with a high level of public insurance in case of an accident.

 

I tried the same reasoning as you, but they deem the cable to be carrying a current. . .

[Ric_]

It may be cheaper for me to cable myself but by the time I've messed about doing it, it isn't worth it. I even have a tester capable of certifying the cabling.

 

We use a company called Ampec who are excellent. They are used to cabling so fier cables out in no time and Fluke test everything, providing full reports from the Fluke testing! Ampec aren't expensive and it means that I am free to do my job rather than smashing my way through a million walls to run a couple of cables!

[stratisphere]

It may be cheaper for me to cable myself but by the time I've messed about doing it, it isn't worth it. I even have a tester capable of certifying the cabling.

 

We use a company called Ampec who are excellent. They are used to cabling so fier cables out in no time and Fluke test everything, providing full reports from the Fluke testing! Ampec aren't expensive and it means that I am free to do my job rather than smashing my way through a million walls to run a couple of cables!

 

But smashing through walls is fun?

[Pete10141748]

We have all out cabling done by an external company here, we're not allowed to do it ourselves (save for the odd 1 or 2 that we have run from one side of the room to the other through the ceiling with an RJ45 connector on both ends, so no termination required).

 

something to do with a mixture of insurance on our safety (working in roofs etc.), electrical safety, cable quality/guarantee and warranty should something go wrong at a later date.

 

Can't say I'm fussed much, saves me a lot of work sometimes!

[BaccyNet]

We have an external contractor who installs the vast majority of our cabling. I do however install the odd netwoirk socket thats not far from a cabinet, I cant say we use the low smoke purple cable though. In fact, we're nearly through a build project and non of the cabling seems to be low smoke purple stuff. Am I missing something here???

 

As mentioned though, its great fun trying to run a cable. Still trying to get the school to buy a Fluke DTX tester though:D

[linkazoid]

We used to pay a fortune for contractors to do cabling work, but most of it was shoddy - different size trunking, no cornering pieces, not straight etc.. so we told the school we would do it ourselves... got a £5000 pay increase each, and now plan to do the works during holidays and other periods when we have spare time during work hours....

 

We bought a TestUm Validator, which gives us proper speed tests and results and now the only thing we have to purchase is the trunking and cable. In during this we've accumelated a bigger toolbox than the site staff..

 

Mike

[plexer]

LSZH or LS0H doesn't have to be purple.

 

Ben

[Sirbendy]

We used to have to rely on external contractors for our "25 year guarantee" bit - but the preferred LEA contractor was expensive, and a relative of the guy who's in charge of LEA ICT.

 

We demanded a "course" and they provided us with a 20 minute "prove you can terminate a cat5 box and plug" session with one of their techs, followed by "well done, you passed. You can do your own now".

 

So we do.

 

[AngryTechnician]

We sort of do it ourselves... we do the installation, but not as employees of the school.

 

My boss got so fed up with external contractors doing a bad job that he set up his own contracting company, complete with a huge amount of public liability insurance (which the school doesn't have). During the holidays we book ourselves as on leave from the school (with agreement from SMT, and using our normal holiday allowance), and contract ourselves back to the school. Works out a lot cheaper for the school as we're not out to make an obscene profit, we do a job we know we'll be happy with, plus we know all the buildings inside out so get the work done more quickly.

 

It also means my boss can buy all the Fluke gear he needs (including an outrageously expensive fiber testing kit) and claim the VAT back, as it's a business expense.

 

The only downside is that we each have to file a tax return as the contract work isn't PAYE.

[elsiegee40]

External contractors here for everything but the most minor network cabling job.

 

It's worth it just for NOT having to go up in the roof of our Victorian building... there's 150 years of yuk up there...

[dirtydog]

we tend to do most of it TBH but the last job was contracted out to someone we have used for years. I dont mind it in the newer builds but some can be a bit horrible. All depends if we have any time or not!