On Jun 13, 1:19*pm, "james" wrote:
Worsening static and now completely dead. *The phones test OK on the
network interface device box attached to the exterior siding of the
house, which suggests that the problem is inside the house. *We have a
maintainance policy for inside the house. *Could this problem be due
to mice chewing wires? *If so is there a danger? -- Worried

You can easily determine if it is a short or an open circuit with a
multi-meter. Remove all phones and detach the house phone wiring from the
network inferface device. Now measure the resistance across the two middle
contacts (red/green wires) of any phone jack. If the resistance is close to
zero then you have a short.

If there is indeed a short, it would be interesting to see how the telco
technician locate and fix it -- there is no simple tool to locate short
circuit.

If you have miniature sockets (phone jacks) especially if they are
mounted in a cool outside wall they could have moisture from condensed
humidity from warm house air on them.
That can cause corrosion to build up between those thin wire contacts.
In a typical six contact jack the telephone line is often on the two
closest together centre contacts. (Red/Green wires).
When the phone is 'on hook' (not in use), there is some 48 volts DC
across those two possibly humid contacts all the time. When the phone
rings there can be some 100 volts AC across the contacts.
So we have the ideal set-up for what is called 'tracking' whereby
minute amounts of metal 'migrate' onto the insulation between the two
contacts and make an intermittent and noisy connection across the
phone line.
Some years back the telephone utility I worked with had some
considerable trouble with noisy phone jacks which by then had been in
use for some 5 to 10 years.
Cleaning the area between the contacts in each jack is often not
successful and a better solution is to replace the corroded and
'crackly' ones.
All the jacks should be wired back to a central point. And if a noisy
jack/s is suspected each jack can be disconnected one at a time until
the faulty one is found. And as suggested replaced.
Unfortunately the much used design is a poor one; the centre contacts
being no more than one millimetre apart!
Permanent wiring of each phone or use of those 'old fashioned' four
pin plugs was/is more reliable.
Maybe this suggestion helps.
I haven't heard of anyone blanking off telephone jacks that are in
cool locations and as to whether this would prevent/slow down the
corrosion/tracking/noise!