I am not certain if this is the group that helped me before but...............
I am doing a new pull in a buried 2" pvc pipe between two metal buildings. approximately 130-150 feet with 3 90 degree elbows. BEcause of the 90's I suppose I should use PLENUM rated cables (of either type) since it's a little tougher and I don't want to knick it up
I am under the impression that the best way to do this is to run CAT5e or CAT 6 and switch to FIBER at both ends.
OR, better just to run the entire run in FIBER. I know the costs are higher for fiber materials and I have never terminated any yet in my "career" as a network installer as I am an Electrical Contractor/ ELECTRICIAN who only does these things on a very limited basis, and only for customers who understand this. In this case, for my Wifes employer who is very limited in the money department and this is mostly as a favor to her.
Awhile back, some may remember my questions about timeclocks on a network for this same company......................
You guys were very helpful then.........maybe again you knowledgeable types will come thru again
That's your best bet. In a lightning strike or other electrical transient, you'll lose the equipment on both sides of the Cat5 that runs between your buildings.
As far as I understand, bulk fiber is about the same cost as bulk UTP, though the connectors are a little more expensive. For a relatively long link the relative cost should be pretty close.
For lightning protection I could imagine terminating a UTP cable in a thick plastic box, converting to fiber, and bringing it out, powering the conversion electronics from the remote end, or using some kind of isolation system. I can't imagine that being cheap, though.
As you may well know - fiber like copper has a minimum bend radius. Those buried pipes often use sweeping 90 degree turns rather than sharp turns to avoid damage to cable - when pulled tight around a 90 degree turn.
Run fiber all the way because fiber will still be usable with new technology communicati> I am pretty well decided that I am doing it entirely in fiber to not
Don't recall your last message, but can imagine it might have been answered best in comp.dcom.cabling Anyways, getting back to the subject:
Fiber is great, but it is not such an easy question as one might think:
#1 Question for applicability of fiber is whether or not phones are involved. Although there are solutions for running phones over fiber, phone guys will jump like crazy on the word "fiber" as those solutions normally cost thousands and thousands of dollars, and may not be easily justifiable, depending on the number of phones that have to run across the link.
#2 Fiber cable and components themselves are not that much more expensive than copper. However, the cost of electronics is in many cases is prohibitive. Most of the time the existing equipment cannot directly receive fiber, and additional equipment must be purchased and therefore considered in the cost of the solution.
#3 There are several types of fiber you may want to use, and it depends on the electronics, too. For a 100Mbit/s Ethernet you will be OK with
62.5/125 multimode fiber. For a Gigabit Ethernet you'd do better with
50/125 multimode and for 10G Ethernet you need singlemode fiber. To pick the right fiber you also need to consider network upgrade plans as they may need at least Gigabit in the (very near) future.
#4 Plenum has nothing to do with stiffness/rigidness of the jacket. As a matter of fact, you cannot use "just" plenum cables in your case as they are normally indoors only. You'd need to use indoor/outdoor rated cable (fiber or copper), and then decide if you need plenum depending on the environment INSIDE the buildings.
#5 If you end up running CAT5E or CAT6 copper cables, you will need to provide high-frequency rated overvoltage protectors on both ends of the link. These are NOT the "digital" protectors plugged into a regular protector panel. The "digitals" are only rated for 64 kHz, and you need
10MHz and up (upwards of 250MHz), so get at least "CAT5" rated protector panels. Note that those will not work with analog phones as they filter out lower frequencies. Complicated, ha?
#6 You need to be extra careful about those three 90 degree bends with both fiber and category copper
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