BT16A Junction Box

Can someone give me a potted history of how on earth BT ended up using such an awful design junction box ?

I recently moved house, and I noticed the front of the junction box had fallen off. As part of a refurb (I took the whole roof off and put on a new one) I took the drop wire down, and put it back up again, and replaced the BT16A with a new one obtained on ebay.

Last week I noticed the same had happened to my mother's BT16A. I replaced it this morning.

In both cases the plastic hinge had decayed, presumably through UV exposure, and then it's only a matter of time for the lid to fall off.

Googling the matter, there also appears to be some poor soul who noticed theirs had suffered a similar fate, and Openreach charged them 144 quid to replace it ! Eh, isn't it upstream of the master socket, and therefore no concern of the end user ?

Anyway, GPO/BT plant is usually well designed, and bomb proof, so what went wrong with this item ?

Edited by broadbandjockey (Sun 08-Mar-20 17:29:57)

They were rolled out without testing the plastics ability to withstand UV.

They haven�t been in use as new for many (10+) years ...

Not really surprising yours from eBay was pants, its archaic.

An under eaves closure or a BT66 are what is used these days.

In reply to a post by Zarjaz:

They were rolled out without testing the plastics ability to withstand UV.

They haven�t been in use as new for many (10+) years ...

Not really surprising yours from eBay was pants, its archaic.

An under eaves closure or a BT66 are what is used these days.

It's a shame they don't make a white BT66, or a smaller version of it. I toyed with replacing mine with a 66, but it would have been a shade too obtrusive on my facia. Perhaps when the lid falls off again, there'll be something smaller and more suitable. The ebay boxes I bought had the 1980s BT 'T' logo

The �preferred� method is a closure cable tied to the dropwire clamp.

Sorry to say, the best place for a BT16A is a museum.

Can you "see" a BT66 when testing with a reflectometer from the Master Socket? If so, is there any impact on VDSL compared to an unjointed dropwire?

Cheers!

No, the BT66 is just a housing for the joint(s) inside ....

If the crimps are good, and there�s no change in conductor type size, then a TDR shouldn�t see the connection. To that end, there should be no impact.

(yes, I�d prefer a dropwire to be straight from DP to NTE, but that is an ideal, rose tinted view)

Many thanks Zarjaz.

Cheers!

Zarjaz - do you know which junction box this is as it doesn't seem to be a 16 or 66?

How do I upload a pic?!