basic phone jacks

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billdozier

Senior Member
Location
gulf coast
hey guys im an electrician who is forced by my boss to pull cat5e throughout a house. WE also have to terminate these wires. I can never remember if its blue/red and bluewhite/green or vice versa. we also hook up the orange orangewhite. How imperative is it to hook the blue bluewhite to the same coresponding color or if I cross red and green but keep blue bluewhite on those primary colors will the line still work? Is there an acronym you guys use to remember the proper colors? thanks
 

walkerj

Senior Member
Location
Baton Rouge
I remember by :
Blue and red are primary colors so they go together.
Orange and black are halloween colors so they go together.
 

hbiss

EC, Westchester, New York NEC: 2014
Location
Hawthorne, New York NEC: 2014
Occupation
EC
Tip= white/blue= green
Ring= blue/white= red

Tip= white/orange= black
Ring= orange/white= yellow

Tip= white/green
Ring=green/white

Tip= white/brown
Ring= brown/white

So there you have it for four lines. You should maintain T/R polarity per this throughout your wiring just as white is always neutral and black is hot. But with phones polarity does not matter any more because the modular cords and adapters will reverse the polarity anyway. The telco will often get the polarity reversed at the NID too so there is little reason to worry or use a tester as long as your wiring carries through with the correct colors from the NID to the jacks.

-Hal
 

hillbilly

Senior Member
Around here it's "Red and Green will make it ring".
or....................."Blue and White makes it right".

This is a "Pat and a Prayer" phone company that we have, so that may not make any sense at all to someone else.:smile:

steve
 

480sparky

Senior Member
Location
Iowegia
telcocat5colors.jpg
 

infinity

Moderator
Staff member
Location
New Jersey
Occupation
Journeyman Electrician
After pulling CAT5e I wouldn't be installing jacks that used the old red/grn etc. connections. A jack with 110 style punchdown terminations is IMO a better option and will have the color code right on the jack.
 

Rockyd

Senior Member
Location
Nevada
Occupation
Retired after 40 years as an electrician.
While we are on Cat5 installs,can we get a tech to go over 568A and 568B? Like which is the common one, and importantance of keeping the config common through out.
 

480sparky

Senior Member
Location
Iowegia
480 Sparky:

Can you post the website for this so I can download and print it.

My guys have lost the previous cheat sheet I had.

Thanks


You have to wade through the P&S site's catalog. There's not a distinct URL for it.

But you can copy it from here. Right click on the image, then choose "Save Picture As...." and put it wherever you want on your hard drive.
 
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While we are on Cat5 installs,can we get a tech to go over 568A and 568B? Like which is the common one, and importantance of keeping the config common through out.

B is the common one for a new install. For older installs, it could be A or B, the important thing is to keep them the same on both ends. If not, you have built a crossover cable. Most network hardware built these days will work with crossover cables, so you could have it swapped on an end and you'd never know you screwed up.
 

KentAT

Senior Member
Location
Northeastern PA
A place for a little more info on cat5e.

Scroll down for some Do's and Dont's

kent

http://www.lanshack.com/cat5e-tutorial.aspx

Here is a pic from this link on how to make cat5e patchcords.

http://www.lanshack.com/make-cat5E.aspx

Notice that the green and blue pairs are not kept together. It is my experience while making these that the solid green, at pin 6, tends to become "short" after snipping the wires to the length needed before inserting into the plastic connector. This is because it has has to reach father away than it's natural position in the order of things. This wire will cause more than it's share of cable failures when tested.



568-B.gif


kent
 
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LarryFine

Master Electrician Electric Contractor Richmond VA
Location
Henrico County, VA
Occupation
Electrical Contractor
Notice that the green and blue pairs are not kept together.
Actually, it's only the green (for 568B) or orange (for 568A) pair that get's split, whichever is on pins 3 and 6.

I trim the wires to length after fanning and positioning them for the plug, so I don't get the short-wire issue.

568A is modeled after phone wiring, so if you equate A with older, and B with newer, it's easy to remember.
 

grich

Senior Member
Location
MP89.5, Mason City Subdivision
Occupation
Broadcast Engineer
I trim the wires to length after fanning and positioning them for the plug, so I don't get the short-wire issue.

Exactly what I do. I'll untwist an inch and a half or so, fan it out the way I need, and trim it to the right length. When I assemble it, if I can't see all eight wire ends bottomed out at the ends of the wire cavities, I won't crimp it.
 

KentAT

Senior Member
Location
Northeastern PA
Having some troubles quoting Larryfine's message.....

That's true about the green, but when you cut the sheath, separate the pairs, put them in Brown, green, blue, orange order, you then have to split and swap the green and blue. Just my way of looking at it.

...I trim the wires to length after fanning and positioning them for the plug, so I don't get the short-wire issue...

I also trim and fan like you mentioned, but unless you hold tension on your wires to make sure they are bottomed out on the connector while crimping, most likely the green one will end up a little short - most times still long enough, but not always. I see it all the time when I come across a homemade cable that doesn't work.

Now, I've never seen that little "lock" used in the link. That might help.

kent
 

hbiss

EC, Westchester, New York NEC: 2014
Location
Hawthorne, New York NEC: 2014
Occupation
EC
I also trim and fan like you mentioned, but unless you hold tension on your wires to make sure they are bottomed out on the connector while crimping, most likely the green one will end up a little short

Well yeah, you can't let them go after you positioned them and cut them to length. You have to hold them as you slide them into the plug as long as you can till they are bottomed out.

I also wouldn't get too worked up about putting plugs on cables. You really shouldn't be making patch cords and you should be using patch panels. So the need for plugs is going to be infrequent, only maybe on small jobs where you only have a few cables and want to plug them directly into a router or switch.

-Hal
 
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