what are prerequisites and possible snags for a full fibre installation

[basingDave]

I’m trying to get this addressed by Sky, but they just keep saying the openreach engineer will deal with it – very unhelpful.

So what prerequisites are required for fibre broadband? i.e. how spare mains sockets are really required, who is responsible to connecting the current house telephone into the sky router. The current telephone is hard wired into the back of open reach master socket via an extension. This means the house telephone is not physically near the router, an it end in wires which will be replacing or extending.

We are concerned about the aesthetics of the finished "cable" run and the ONT and any additional wiring which we will be deemed responsible for.

Does anyone have images of bend radius of the internal fibre cable as it goes round a 90 degrees edge.

It's the little things, We have a double socket, 1 for the router and 1 for us, i.e. phone charger or hoover.

If we have to plug our house phone into the router we will need another socket for the cordless base station.

Plus a socket for the ONT, so now we're up 4 sockets.

And as it's in the hallway so it has to look nice.

[JimM1]

@basingDave Take a look at the Openreach on the day video!

https://www.openreach.com/help-and-support/full-fibre-broadband-installation-checklist

And you can forget about running Fibre in the home, Bending it not allowed so OR will tell you NO way it's happening!

Single Ethernet cable RJ45 Cat5e or better, run from the present Hub position to the New OR ONT position is by way the best and for you to look at and do!

[basingDave]

This where I'm getting confused. The 1st Openreach guy said no going round corners. The second guy said yes we can but it will not be tight like the current "replacement" of the copper wire telephone wire. So it’s likely to get banged, as the wall “sticks” out into the hallway.

The original telephone cable was inside a wall and the replacement HAD to be visible and was tacked to the skirting board. As this equipment is on the hallway and will be permanent it is very obvious, so we what it to look nice. The ONT box looks like a master socket, but it can’t be fitted where the original master socket was located – again bad design, it was probably created to for quick and simple insertion into people’s houses – which mean we’re left with a hole in the wall were the master socket was. Again, prerequisites we could have filled and smooth and painted the hole so the new ONT could go over it. From the description of the ONT it is not designed to “mount” using the 2 screw holes like a master socket or a light swich.

A Cat5 cable is significantly fatter that the 2 / 4 core telephone cable, but if can be made to follow the contours of the wall.

The whole retro-fit of cabling has not been thought out. They don’t care that it looks ugly. They don’t care if we decide to have laminate floor put in and the skirting lifted / removed for that, then the fibre cable will be in the way.

[TimmyBGood]

---

@basingDave wrote:

They don’t care that it looks ugly. They don’t care if we decide to have laminate floor put in and the skirting lifted / removed for that, then the fibre cable will be in the way.

---

Very true: it's a £15 billion pound project to move a total of 25 million properties to a 21st rather than a 19th century communication network without an up-front cost to households and a target end date that's now just 12 months away.

Unfortunately that does really rule out some installation options, and the physical characteristics of optical fibre are inescapable 

[JimM1]

@basingDave The ONT does mount via two sliding screw holes and there are two different types with two different fixing positions, and would cover a master socket position, BUT Fibre cable does not bend, light does not go round corners very well, min bend radius about the size of a fist to be safe, that is why it can be easier to plonk the ONT Direct and the shortest Fibre cable possible, then take care off the rest with Ethernet cable, and the hiding and neatness is always going to be an issue, the OR Installation team will want to be in/out within a 2hour period and onto the next job, running late and some other poor sod is getting dropped off the list and pushed back 21 day's possibly!

[TimmyBGood]

---

@basingDave wrote:

The ONT box looks like a master socket, but it can’t be fitted where the original master socket was located – again bad design, it was probably created to for quick and simple insertion into people’s houses – which mean we’re left with a hole in the wall were the master socket was. Again, prerequisites we could have filled and smooth and painted the hole so the new ONT could go over it. From the description of the ONT it is not designed to “mount” using the 2 screw holes like a master socket or a light swich.

---

An ONT is doing a completely different job to either of those devices: it simply could not be made to fit a back box with any reasonable practicality or cost (and in many cases will be nowhere near one anyway)

And yes, when tens of millions of installations are required over a few years, 'quick and simple' is very definitely a factor: the original copper network took half a century to deploy.

[Chrisee]

@basingDave you have to remember that Openreach and their contractors install something around 80K fibre lines each week and each job has a time limit. It is therefore a very streamlined operation. Engineers normally try to meet customers requirements BUT they are the arbitors of what can be done not the ISP although these days whereever possible Sky's own engineers do the internal work for Openreach.

The standard install is to mount the ONT close to the point the fibre pigtial cable enters the home although internal runs are possible if definitely revquired. If that entry point  is some way from the external connection box where the fibre from the street is terminated the fibre pigtail is pinned externally. The ONT requires mains power as does the Sky hub which by default needs to be placed under 2m from the ONT however you can buy and use a longer Ethernet cable if you want but the installation engineer normally wont run that for you. 

As to the aesthetics the ONT is quite neat unit but has lights on it. The cables are what are required to move data so for example ethernetvcable has 4 twisted pairs within the sheath. Assume you are aware your current phone points become redundant and tge voice line only works with a phone plugged into the hub.

[jamesn123]

@basingDave 

Given your requirements and huge concern for a few cables I would suggest you instruct Openreach to install the fibre cable & ONT into another area of your home, perhaps an attached Garage or Utility room. Then once thats done pay a contractor to come in and run proper CAT6 cabling from the ONT, through your walls and terminate it at a neat ethernet port on your wall for your Sky router to connect to in its current location.

This is the only solution I can think of given your worry for neatness. You cant expect Openreach to have the attention detail that you require when they are upgrading the whole country and doing so without any upfront costs to yourself, just your monthly fee for the broadband access.