wendylee815 wrote:

-------------------------------------

we just bought this house and want to put a phone in the
kitchen..unfortunatly, the wires are bare....now we bought the jack and
went to install it, and found that there are only three wires coming out
of the hole, red, green and yellow..no black,,,
how can we install this new jack to an old line that has only the three
colored wires?


##-----------------------------------------------##
Delivered via http://www.thestuccocompany.com/
Building Construction and Maintenance Forum
Web and RSS access to your favorite newsgroup -
alt.home.repair - 308527 messages and counting!
##-----------------------------------------------##


First thing to do is make sure the line is hot. Lots of abandoned wiring
in most old houses. Look in the basement, and try to see where the wire
comes out, and see how many colors it has there. 3 color phone wire is
rare, likely the black was clipped off on the kitchen end. Loosely
attach a phone to the kitchen end, red and green, and see if you have
dial tone. Old real (ma bell) phones often used the yellow as a ground
line (IIRC, red went to L1, green went to L2, and yellow to GND). Modern
disposable phones probably don't care. A pair of alligator clip leads,
or better yet a rj11 breakout connector (jack to several alligator
clips) comes in handy, if you don't have a butt sett, aka lineman phone.
Don't be surprised if the line is garbage, and you need to run new wire.
If you do, resist the temptation to disturb the old wire and install a
splice- run it all the way back to where the wires come together on the
terminal block. If you don't have an outside demarc box, call phone
company and hint you want them to install one. That sometimes will get
you a fresh drop from the pole, and gets you a nice fresh connector
block to play with.

You have my sympathy- the inside wiring in this place is garbage, and I
really need to redo it. But since I now have DSL on a separate pair, and
nobody ever calls me, it isn't likely to get tp the top of the list
anytime soon.

--
aem sends...