Old Fibre install

I have a technical question.

A commercial building I am looking at renting has an old version of fibre.

Image here showing a BT branded install.

Clearly the install cabling is labelled as 'blown fibre' - see image above.

It looks to me as an amateur that this is two separate fibre connections, with one that has some kind of vintage fibre to coax ONT (see orange BNC connectors).

None of this is shown up on the Openreach checker. There are three hits on the database for lines into the building and all show FTTP on demand being available.

Any ideas about how to get Openreach to identify this on their database, or what steps I can take to get an ISP to light this with a new install?

We may need an ethernet product with plenty of bandwidth.

Any suggestions would be very appreciated

thanks

Looks like an early leased line / private circuit install. Not FTTP.

Bit hard to tell but the orange leads look like they have ST fibre connectors. I think I can see the white ferrule in the photo and the black caps should be over the ends as protective caps. Orange usually indicates multimode rather than singlemode fibre.

What does the yellow label say?

Whilst I can't say for definite this looks a lot like a fibre delivered ISDN 30 installation. Thoise are not BNS ends but rather ST Fibre https://www.canford.co.uk/Images/ItemImages/600C/46-...

Not FTTP, but this infrastructure could be used for a Leased Line / Ethernet / EAD circuit to be installed

Edited by connormill (Thu 17-Feb-22 09:34:31)

Definitely all fibre - the two BNC connectors are ST simplex fibre connections (they will have been the TX and RX legs of a single fibre circuit). They're single mode (all BT provided circuits have always been single mode).

No use at all for you for FTTP but if you order an ethernet circuit you're pretty much guaranteed no Excess Construction Charges.

It looks like the copper infrastructure above has been attacked with some snips!

In reply to a post by connormill:

Not FTTP, but this infrastructure could be used for a Leased Line / Ethernet / EAD circuit to be installed

I didn’t think of the ISDN possibility, but given the age it could be…

If there’s a spare microduct they could blown in a new (singlemode) fibre bundle for an EAD type service.

I’m not sure if they’d bother pulling back the existing multimode if it’s redundant, but that would free up a duct back to the external node. They could end up just running another micro duct.

As I say I can't be 100% sure because openreach operates in weird and wonderful ways but I've dealt with a few business installs that used exactly this setup (or sometimes via a 1U Splice tray) for ISDN30 circuits, there is almost always a spare core in there which can be used for an EAD

The building has at least 2x 2 blown fibre tubes/bundles as there are two separate BFT cables and two ‘gas seals’ …one of which has chopped internal tubing , that presumably once served a different part of the same building , the other is pretty much underneath the DCB ( dual circuit box )
The orange pigtails have FC connectors, and as stated would have been used by a two fibre ASDH/ISDN30 circuit or similar …the tails and ‘fibre bundle are single mode fibres.
If a leased line were ordered and the building still shows an existing Y code on OR records , then an order can be issued immediately , if no Y code exists for the building an OR survey would spot the existing kit, which would almost certainly be reused…simply converting the FC tail to a SC one , or if the equipment were not to be located next to this lineplant , an internal cable ran to the appropriate location etc.

Edited by Iniltous (Thu 17-Feb-22 11:07:49)

Any idea why they used orange leads back in the day?

They use (more or less industry standard) yellow leads now. Whenever I see orange fibre cabling (or light blue) i automatically think multimode 🤣

FDDI was commonly orange

Edit: In case it wasn't clear to the OP by now, this infrastructure is irrelevant for FTTP service.

Edited by jpm (Thu 17-Feb-22 11:59:56)

Not sure , it could be the same reason they use a different allocation of the fibre number to the individual fibre colour to others , with OR , fibre 4 of an element ( 8 or 12 fibre ) is red , yet many alternative suppliers use the red as fibre 7, this can cause some confusion when other companies can interconnect with OR cables.
It possibly because they had sufficient clout with suppliers they could dictate the jacket colour they wanted , or perhaps it just predated any industry standard of Orange is MM , Yellow SM.
Latterly, OR has changed to yellow jackets for single mode ‘internal’ cables , same as everyone else.

It won't be multimode; you're right about orange patch cabled usually meaning multimode but BT used orange for years for single mode.

Multimode fibre doesn't have the reach required for Wide Area services.

In reply to a post by JonRennie:

It won't be multimode; you're right about orange patch cabled usually meaning multimode but BT used orange for years for single mode.

Multimode fibre doesn't have the reach required for Wide Area services.

Yes indeed Jon, be lucky to get more than 3-500 metres on old OM1/OM2 multimode. Doh 😆

Good thing BT/Openreach have moved with the times now and use yellow sheathed leads to avoid confusion in the cabinet.

Yes the copper has been savaged. That's fine as it is an empty warehouse.

We just need plenty of bandwidth for our infrastructure! Definitely no need for copper.

I'm chasing quotes down for a new leased line. Hoping that 10gb might be available.

Do you know if EAD provision is on a database like FTTP somewhere?

What I mean by that - if I go to a provider, should they be able to look up and tell me what provisioning is like?

I'm fingers x'd for your no Excess Construction Charges, but I'm sceptical...

thanks again

In reply to a post by robert_fl:

Do you know if EAD provision is on a database like FTTP somewhere?

What I mean by that - if I go to a provider, should they be able to look up and tell me what provisioning is like?

Yes. Depending on the provider/wholesaler, they should be able to access various ordering portals where the various fibre T-nodes and fibre routes are located and have a ‘red, amber, green’ view of available capacity.

Once a survey is complete you will know definitively if there are any ECCs. The fact that you already have Openreach infrastructure there bodes very well (at least for Openreach tails) and it’s highly unlikely you will have any ECCs even on a short term contract.

In theory, all leased services are available anywhere...it just depends how much you want to spend on ECCs...the most I have spent is just over £500k for one site - but that's an exception!

The fact that you have a fibre presentation already means you should be able to order 10Gbps and provided that it's not damaged or destroyed like the copper I'll stand by my no ECCs...that won't get confirmed until it's surveyed though.

Good luck and keep us informed on progress.