I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.

--
Dan Espen

On Tuesday, July 9, 2013 10:27:53 AM UTC-7, net cop wrote:
I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.



I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.

I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.



My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap

around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit

mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't

reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the

forth wire.



The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire

more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I

cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole

wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend

wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the

second bend.



Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some

searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.



Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff

was ridiculous.



--

Dan Espen

Was it made in China?
Like I don't know.

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.

Dan Espen wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was
the forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the
wire more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of
times I cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the
whole wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the
bend wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off
on the second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.


Phone wire is usually single strand 24 gauge, at least the decent stuff
that I worked with years ago. In recent years I have seen CAT 5
network cables being used in lieu of four conducter phone wire. Not
sure if the price is any better though.

On 7/9/2013 11:22 AM, badgolferman wrote:
Dan Espen wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was
the forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the
wire more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of
times I cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the
whole wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the
bend wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off
on the second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.


Phone wire is usually single strand 24 gauge, at least the decent stuff
that I worked with years ago. In recent years I have seen CAT 5
network cables being used in lieu of four conducter phone wire. Not
sure if the price is any better though.
Made from recycled copper. Unknown purity.

Paul

On 7/9/2013 12:27 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

....

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.
....

Probably was 24 ga which is normal; problem is it wasn't annealed well
so was/is very brittle. W/ stuff that small any nick is likely to cause
a break but especially bad if it's particularly brittle.

As another guessed, likely it's from recycled material and purity and
control not the greatest...

I had a whole roll of Western Electric cable that an installer had left
at the house in TN. When we were packing to leave for the move to KS
there was some reason for a service call; I no longer remember what.
The roll was on the bench in the garage awaiting going in a box w/ other
like stuff--when went back to the task discovered it had walked off w/
the service tech. Easy come, easy go...

--

"Dan Espen" wrote in message
...

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.

--
Dan Espen

Cat 5 cable works just fine for telephone wiring. Yes, it's more expensive;
but you can buy a big reel of the stuff to get the cost/foot down and then
use it for phone, internet, remote speakers, alarms, etc. It's usually
24-26 AWG as I recall. I did find a sale at HD one day such that the
prepared ethernet cable (with connectors) was cheaper than the big reels
though.

I'm one of those people, however, who think there's never enough conductors
to do everything that you might want to do and so pull extra wires as long
as I'm pulling one.

Tomsic

replying to Dan Espen , passerby wrote:
despen wrote:

... If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Contaminated copper, most likely recycled, does that. High quality copper
is usually very pliable and withstands quite a bit of bending, at least if
you didn't nick it when you were stripping the insulation. My guess is
that if you are able to connect it eventually, and the outlet stays put,
you won't see much of a difference in the phone's operation.

--
posted from
http://www.homeownershub.com/mainten...re-755192-.htm
using HomeOwnersHub's Web, RSS and Social Media Interface
to home and garden related groups

Doug Miller writes:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.

Unfortunately, looks like I threw out the package.
I've used phone wire before, this stuff looked more like 1 strand from
stranded wire.

--
Dan Espen

passerby writes:

replying to Dan Espen , passerby wrote:
despen wrote:

... If I bent the wire more than once, the wire just broke right
off. I couple of times I cut the insulation off, went to pull the
plastic off, and the whole wire just broke off. I bent one wire
around a terminal and the bend wasn't quite right so I bent it
again. Wire snapped right off on the second bend.

Contaminated copper, most likely recycled, does that. High quality copper
is usually very pliable and withstands quite a bit of bending, at least if
you didn't nick it when you were stripping the insulation. My guess is
that if you are able to connect it eventually, and the outlet stays put,
you won't see much of a difference in the phone's operation.

I think you may be right.
After my first experience with the wire breaking I was extra careful to
only score the insulation lightly. I still had the wire break.

I figured the phone didn't need the extra thickness, it seems to work
fine, it was just a challenge to work with.

--
Dan Espen

On 07/09/2013 01:27 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.


Really, next time you do this just pull CAT5 or CAT6. works better and
is more future proof (if you decide you want to convert your phone
outlets to ethernet)

nate

--
replace "roosters" with "cox" to reply.
http://members.cox.net/njnagel

Nate Nagel writes:

On 07/09/2013 01:27 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.

Really, next time you do this just pull CAT5 or CAT6. works better
and is more future proof (if you decide you want to convert your phone
outlets to ethernet)

Makes a lot of sense.
In this case, the run was across the attic then drop into a closet and
back into the wall with the cover plate right next to the closet door.
Running a new wire would be pretty easy.

--
Dan Espen

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:27:53 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

Any chance you'll be using it for internet DSL? How many feet of it
did you use. Regardless, if you don't get the proper speeds, you'll
want to replace this thin wire with something thicker.

Even if you get FIOS, doesn't the in-house wiring stay the same, and
this wire might be slower than thicker wire would be.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

Wow. Never heard of that before.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire

Despite what so many posters are saying, not all phone wire is 24
gauge anymore. They probably haven't noticed because they don't buy
the really cheap stuff, but as that story goes, there isn't anything
that can't be made cheaper. etc.

Wire meant for modular plugs comes in different thicknesses too. I
bought 100 feet of something -- I'll see if it's marked on the spool
-- and the wire was so thing that though internet radio was still
working, other parts of the net didn't work. I ended up calling
Verizon, just to check the line from the office, and they ended up
sending someone out. I don't know if they charged me or not. I hope
not since I didn't ask for anyone to come. Nonetheless, he told me
that parts of the net can work while other parts don't, and one reason
is wire that is too thin.

I went back to the wire I had been using, and everything worked again.
But later I compared my download speed (as shown on that webpage) with
what Verizon said it was selling me, and my speed was 1/3 what it
should have been.

First I was mad at them, but I thought about a while and figured out I
might be the cause. Found myself some even thick, round, white
inside-the-wall phone line and used that instead, and my download
speed tripled.



more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 17:25:06 -0400, micky
wrote:

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:27:53 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

Any chance you'll be using it for internet DSL? How many feet of it
did you use. Regardless, if you don't get the proper speeds, you'll
want to replace this thin wire with something thicker.

Even if you get FIOS, doesn't the in-house wiring stay the same, and
this wire might be slower than thicker wire would be.

The others are right. Because of the shielding in CAT5 and 6, you can
run thin wire and still get high computer speeds. At least that's
what they tell me in a ocmputer connectivity ng. I'll know for sure
when I change wires later this summer. (Even though my current wire
is fast, I need thin to get past an obstruction.)

On 07/09/2013 11:50 AM, Dan Espen wrote:
Doug Miller writes:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.

Unfortunately, looks like I threw out the package.
I've used phone wire before, this stuff looked more like 1 strand from
stranded wire.

It should say on the cable housing. I haven't seen anything other than
CAT-3 offered for telephone use in any of the hardware stores around here.

Jon

On 7/9/2013 12:27 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.


One of my suppliers sells copper clad aluminum CAT5 cable which may not
be as workable as all copper. It's possible that you got a similar wire
which costs less than the all copper conductor cable. Back in the 1970's
I worked in the electrical supply business when aluminum ROMEX
appeared on the market and some manufacturers developed copper clad
aluminum ROMEX as a safer wire to use which didn't require special
connectors. I remember getting in a roll of copper clad thermostat
cable and it was so light, I thought something was wrong. I stripped
some of the wire scraped it with a knife and saw the aluminum core.
Needless to say, some of the salesmen were freaked out about it. You
can scrape the wire to see if it has an aluminum core which could
explain you trouble using it. o_O

TDD

On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 17:48:42 +0000 (UTC), Doug Miller
wrote:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.
In my experience 22 guage is normally used for telephone wire - and
on a single line system you only need / use a single pair for a POTS
system

"badgolferman" wrote:
Dan Espen wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was
the forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the
wire more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of
times I cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the
whole wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the
bend wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off
on the second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.


Phone wire is usually single strand 24 gauge, at least the decent stuff
that I worked with years ago. In recent years I have seen CAT 5
network cables being used in lieu of four conducter phone wire. Not
sure if the price is any better though.

I use whatever two conductor I have. I've used cat 3 and 5 I got for free.
Red white twisted pair is all you need. Depends on how your stringing it.

Greg

On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 14:31:55 -0400, "Tomsic" wrote:


"Dan Espen" wrote in message
...

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire
more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.

--
Dan Espen

Cat 5 cable works just fine for telephone wiring. Yes, it's more expensive;
but you can buy a big reel of the stuff to get the cost/foot down and then
use it for phone, internet, remote speakers, alarms, etc. It's usually
24-26 AWG as I recall. I did find a sale at HD one day such that the
prepared ethernet cable (with connectors) was cheaper than the big reels
though.

I'm one of those people, however, who think there's never enough conductors
to do everything that you might want to do and so pull extra wires as long
as I'm pulling one.

Tomsic

Cat 5 is 24/26 - 5e tends towards the 24. Cat 6 is 23 or 22 guage..

For phone wiring I generally use 4 strand 22 guage station wire unless
there is a likelihood of switching up to IP Phones or needing data
connections - but with gigabit you can't share a 4 pair with phone.

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 17:25:06 -0400, micky
wrote:

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:27:53 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

Any chance you'll be using it for internet DSL? How many feet of it
did you use. Regardless, if you don't get the proper speeds, you'll
want to replace this thin wire with something thicker.

Even if you get FIOS, doesn't the in-house wiring stay the same, and
this wire might be slower than thicker wire would be.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.
I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap
around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit
mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't
reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the
forth wire.

Wow. Never heard of that before.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.
I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire

Despite what so many posters are saying, not all phone wire is 24
gauge anymore. They probably haven't noticed because they don't buy
the really cheap stuff, but as that story goes, there isn't anything
that can't be made cheaper. etc.

Wire meant for modular plugs comes in different thicknesses too. I
bought 100 feet of something -- I'll see if it's marked on the spool
-- and the wire was so thing that though internet radio was still
working, other parts of the net didn't work. I ended up calling
Verizon, just to check the line from the office, and they ended up
sending someone out. I don't know if they charged me or not. I hope
not since I didn't ask for anyone to come. Nonetheless, he told me
that parts of the net can work while other parts don't, and one reason
is wire that is too thin.

I went back to the wire I had been using, and everything worked again.
But later I compared my download speed (as shown on that webpage) with
what Verizon said it was selling me, and my speed was 1/3 what it
should have been.

First I was mad at them, but I thought about a while and figured out I
might be the cause. Found myself some even thick, round, white
inside-the-wall phone line and used that instead, and my download
speed tripled.



more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I
cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole
wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend
wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the
second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some
searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff
was ridiculous.
The number of twists per foot is important too for internet speed.
Cat 5 is different than cat3, for instance. Cat 3 is 3-4 twists per
foot. Cat 5 is 4-4 twists per INCH

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 17:28:34 -0400, micky
wrote:

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 17:25:06 -0400, micky
wrote:

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:27:53 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

Any chance you'll be using it for internet DSL? How many feet of it
did you use. Regardless, if you don't get the proper speeds, you'll
want to replace this thin wire with something thicker.

Even if you get FIOS, doesn't the in-house wiring stay the same, and
this wire might be slower than thicker wire would be.

The others are right. Because of the shielding in CAT5 and 6, you can
run thin wire and still get high computer speeds. At least that's
what they tell me in a ocmputer connectivity ng. I'll know for sure
when I change wires later this summer. (Even though my current wire
is fast, I need thin to get past an obstruction.)
Cat 5 and 6 are not sheilded (well, some "six and better" is -but it
is not part of the standard.. Don't know what kind of obstruction you
are looking at - but cat 5 comes in different jacket thicknesses - as
much as 25% difference in diameter. Non Plenum FT4) cable is
GENERALLY thinner than FT6 (plenum). Here in Ontario FT6 is required
if it is run in an air plenum (above suspended ceiling where the air
return is open, for example) and it is almost twice as expensive as
FT4. Some of the pricier FT6 has a thin teflon type covering which is
quite tough, and very easy to pull.

micky writes:

On Tue, 09 Jul 2013 13:27:53 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

Any chance you'll be using it for internet DSL? How many feet of it
did you use. Regardless, if you don't get the proper speeds, you'll
want to replace this thin wire with something thicker.

Even if you get FIOS, doesn't the in-house wiring stay the same, and
this wire might be slower than thicker wire would be.

I have FIOS.

I just moved my office from one room in the house to another.
I first ran a coax line for the FIOS router, then setting up other
things in the room, I realized I needed a phone outlet on a different
wall. The simplest way to do that was to run a new line into the room.

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.

--
Dan Espen

Jon Danniken writes:

On 07/09/2013 11:50 AM, Dan Espen wrote:
Doug Miller writes:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.

Unfortunately, looks like I threw out the package.
I've used phone wire before, this stuff looked more like 1 strand from
stranded wire.

It should say on the cable housing. I haven't seen anything other than
CAT-3 offered for telephone use in any of the hardware stores around here.

I just looked. My coax has markings but the telephone plastic wrap is
plain gray. I just took a close look at the splice I did. The new
telephone wire is easily half the thickness of the older wire.

--
Dan Espen

writes:

On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 17:48:42 +0000 (UTC), Doug Miller
wrote:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.
In my experience 22 guage is normally used for telephone wire - and
on a single line system you only need / use a single pair for a POTS
system

Yep, but when I have 4 wires to connect to 4 wires,
I just can't bring myself to leave 2 wires dangling.

--
Dan Espen

On 07/09/2013 09:25 PM, Dan Espen wrote:
writes:

On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 17:48:42 +0000 (UTC), Doug Miller
wrote:

Dan Espen wrote in :


I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.
[...]

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

24ga is normal for phone wire.
In my experience 22 guage is normally used for telephone wire - and
on a single line system you only need / use a single pair for a POTS
system

Yep, but when I have 4 wires to connect to 4 wires,
I just can't bring myself to leave 2 wires dangling.


Agreed, and who knows, you may want to go two line in the future and you
won't regret having the wiring already in place.

nate


--
replace "roosters" with "cox" to reply.
http://members.cox.net/njnagel

On 7/9/2013 9:18 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.


Is the wire you bought flat like this?

http://www.truevalue.com/product/Pho...ord#activeTab0

I was thinking that, but hadn't yet written. Might be he bought modular four conductor flat wire. Which is a whole different animal.

Is the wire in question four conductors in a line, or four wrapped into a round sheath?
..
Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..
..
"Trisha" wrote in message b.com...
On 7/9/2013 9:18 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.


Is the wire you bought flat like this?

http://www.truevalue.com/product/Pho...ord#activeTab0

On 7/9/2013 7:00 PM, wrote:
On Tue, 9 Jul 2013 14:31:55 -0400, "Tomsic" wrote:


"Dan Espen" wrote in message
...

I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.

I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire. I didn't have
any choices, I got the last one in the store.

My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic
wrap around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a
bit mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires
didn't reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and
there was the forth wire.

The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires
were. I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I
bent the wire more than once, the wire just broke right off. I
couple of times I cut the insulation off, went to pull the
plastic off, and the whole wire just broke off. I bent one wire
around a terminal and the bend wasn't quite right so I bent it
again. Wire snapped right off on the second bend.

Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do
some searches and hopefully find something with a heavier
conductor.

Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this
stuff was ridiculous.

-- Dan Espen

Cat 5 cable works just fine for telephone wiring. Yes, it's more
expensive; but you can buy a big reel of the stuff to get the
cost/foot down and then use it for phone, internet, remote
speakers, alarms, etc. It's usually 24-26 AWG as I recall. I did
find a sale at HD one day such that the prepared ethernet cable
(with connectors) was cheaper than the big reels though.

I'm one of those people, however, who think there's never enough
conductors to do everything that you might want to do and so pull
extra wires as long as I'm pulling one.

Tomsic

Cat 5 is 24/26 - 5e tends towards the 24. Cat 6 is 23 or 22 guage..

For phone wiring I generally use 4 strand 22 guage station wire
unless there is a likelihood of switching up to IP Phones or needing
data connections - but with gigabit you can't share a 4 pair with
phone.


One of the legal things I do for money is servicing and installing
commercial phone systems and computer networks (My other job is being an
international hit man). Me, JH and Stinky just finished another office
and in the last decade or so, we've been running CATxx network
cable for phone systems since the trend, which I saw coming, was a
switch to VoIP phone systems and some of the electronic phone systems
we install may use 2 to 3 pair and most digital systems use 1 pair
but some use 2 pair so we run at least CAT5 for phone systems. We are
installing and servicing more and more VoIP phone systems and now with
Gigabit networks being installed we may pull CAT6 for all the wire runs
now. We have a national service corp we do work for that demands we
install CAT6 for all cable runs. I actually have to use test gear to
check the properties of the installed cable and Email the results of
tests for each cable. The OP could could have 26 AWG or smaller if it's
an import. Manufacturers in Asia will often skimp on materials used to
manufacture their products. The import wire could be a lot smaller than
what is normally supplied by factories in Western countries. ^_^

TDD

On 07/09/2013 06:23 PM, Dan Espen wrote:
Jon Danniken wrote:

It should say on the cable housing. I haven't seen anything other than
CAT-3 offered for telephone use in any of the hardware stores around here.

I just looked. My coax has markings but the telephone plastic wrap is
plain gray. I just took a close look at the splice I did. The new
telephone wire is easily half the thickness of the older wire.

Then it has no standard, which is unfortunate. Who knows what the wire
is, and probably not even the people who stuff it in the package.

I guess the lesson here is that TrueValue seems to be selling crap wire
marketed as "telephone wire", which would suggest someone go elsewhere
and buy something that adheres to a standard (I know the HD and Ace
stores here, locally, sell CAT-3, minimum, as "telephone wire").

Jon

On 07/09/2013 05:16 PM, wrote:

The number of twists per foot is important too for internet speed.
Cat 5 is different than cat3, for instance. Cat 3 is 3-4 twists per
foot. Cat 5 is 4-4 twists per INCH

I've installed scads of CAT-5 and never seen four twists per inch, but
it certainly has more twists than CAT-3.

Jon

Trisha writes:

On 7/9/2013 9:18 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.


Is the wire you bought flat like this?

http://www.truevalue.com/product/Pho...ord#activeTab0

Nope, round, like this:

http://tinyurl.com/pholnq8

But it came in a flat pack and doesn't have printing on the wire.

I looked at all 3 pages, and didn't see the exact item I bought.

--
Dan Espen

Jon Danniken writes:

On 07/09/2013 06:23 PM, Dan Espen wrote:
Jon Danniken wrote:

It should say on the cable housing. I haven't seen anything other than
CAT-3 offered for telephone use in any of the hardware stores around here.

I just looked. My coax has markings but the telephone plastic wrap is
plain gray. I just took a close look at the splice I did. The new
telephone wire is easily half the thickness of the older wire.

Then it has no standard, which is unfortunate. Who knows what the wire
is, and probably not even the people who stuff it in the package.

I guess the lesson here is that TrueValue seems to be selling crap wire
marketed as "telephone wire", which would suggest someone go elsewhere
and buy something that adheres to a standard (I know the HD and Ace
stores here, locally, sell CAT-3, minimum, as "telephone wire").

Oddly enough I go to the local hardware store for quality.
Most of their stuff is pretty good.

--
Dan Espen

On 7/10/2013 8:24 AM, Jon Danniken wrote:
On 07/09/2013 05:16 PM, wrote:

The number of twists per foot is important too for internet speed.
Cat 5 is different than cat3, for instance. Cat 3 is 3-4 twists per
foot. Cat 5 is 4-4 twists per INCH

I've installed scads of CAT-5 and never seen four twists per inch, but
it certainly has more twists than CAT-3.

Jon


The different pairs have an alternating twists in them so they don't
match the twist of the other pairs. The reason for that is to resist
or eliminate crosstalk. ^_^

TDD

Their people smaller, too!
..
Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..
..
"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message ...

The OP could could have 26 AWG or smaller if it's
an import. Manufacturers in Asia will often skimp on
materials used to manufacture their products. The
import wire could be a lot smaller than what is
normally supplied by factories in Western
countries. ^_^

TDD

The different pairs have an alternating twists in them so they don't
match the twist of the other pairs. The reason for that is to resist
or eliminate crosstalk. ^_^

What? Echo in here? I'm not twisted enough.
..
Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
..
..
"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message ...

The different pairs have an alternating twists in them so they don't
match the twist of the other pairs. The reason for that is to resist
or eliminate crosstalk. ^_^

TDD

On Wed, 10 Jul 2013 10:08:28 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

Trisha writes:

On 7/9/2013 9:18 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.


Is the wire you bought flat like this?

http://www.truevalue.com/product/Pho...ord#activeTab0

Nope, round, like this:

http://tinyurl.com/pholnq8

But it came in a flat pack and doesn't have printing on the wire.

Not even embossed, maybe seeable when you hold it up to the light at
different angles?

Anyhow, round also comes in different gauges. I like TrueValue but
still I point out that there is no gauge given for this wire. Even
under the tab called Specifications.

I looked at all 3 pages, and didn't see the exact item I bought.

On Tuesday, July 9, 2013 1:27:53 PM UTC-4, net cop wrote:
I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.



I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.

I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.



My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap

around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit

mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't

reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the

forth wire.


The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire

more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I

cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole

wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend

wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the

second bend.



Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some

searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.



Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff

was ridiculous.



-- lll
Dan Espen

On Tuesday, July 9, 2013 1:27:53 PM UTC-4, net cop wrote:
I just had occasion to put in a new telephone outlet.



I went down to Tru-Value and bought 50 ft of wire.

I didn't have any choices, I got the last one in the store.



My first problem was that I cut off about 4 inches of the plastic wrap

around the wires and only found 3 conductors. After being a bit

mystified for a few hours, I discovered that one of the wires didn't

reach the end of the cable. Cut off another 4 inches and there was the

forth wire.



The thing that really surprised me though is how thin the wires were.

I had real problems working with the hair thin wire. If I bent the wire

more than once, the wire just broke right off. I couple of times I

cut the insulation off, went to pull the plastic off, and the whole

wire just broke off. I bent one wire around a terminal and the bend

wasn't quite right so I bent it again. Wire snapped right off on the

second bend.



Next time I want to work with telephone cable, I'm going to do some

searches and hopefully find something with a heavier conductor.



Just commenting, I know copper has gone up in price but this stuff

was ridiculous.



--

Dan Espen

asdfg

micky writes:

On Wed, 10 Jul 2013 10:08:28 -0400, Dan Espen
wrote:

Trisha writes:

On 7/9/2013 9:18 PM, Dan Espen wrote:

I'm not using the line for data and the voice quality sounds fine.


Is the wire you bought flat like this?

http://www.truevalue.com/product/Pho...ord#activeTab0

Nope, round, like this:

http://tinyurl.com/pholnq8

But it came in a flat pack and doesn't have printing on the wire.

Not even embossed, maybe seeable when you hold it up to the light at
different angles?

Nope, it's up in the attic, I was using a flashlight to look.

This thread is getting so many replies I'm tempted to take a trip
down to the hardware store to check, but I did buy the last one in the
store. No guarantee that they'll restock with the same stuff.

--
Dan Espen

On Wed, 10 Jul 2013 10:57:51 -0400, "Stormin Mormon"
wrote:

The different pairs have an alternating twists in them so they don't
match the twist of the other pairs. The reason for that is to resist
or eliminate crosstalk. ^_^

What? Echo in here? I'm not twisted enough.
.
Christopher A. Young
Learn more about Jesus
www.lds.org
.
.
"The Daring Dufas" wrote in message ...

The different pairs have an alternating twists in them so they don't
match the twist of the other pairs. The reason for that is to resist
or eliminate crosstalk. ^_^

TDD
No danger of EVER having Stormy accused of being "not twisted
enough", is there????/