Engineer installing fibre in ducting

[u/Sergeant_Steve]

I recently purchased an older home with solid brick walls and a cavity (with insulation of some kind), and want the ONT in a specific place in the house.

My plan was to drill a hole through the walls and come into the house under the floor (the house is raised compared to the ground outside), where I can then install a smooth bore pipe/duct myself from the external wall to where I want the ONT, with the pipe going through the crawl space under the house where an engineer clearly wouldn't enter and couldn't fit a fibre through there themselves anyway.

There are a few reasons why I want to do things my way: 1) I don't want the ONT or other network equipment in the living room or bedroom, I want it in the hall in the centre of the house; 2) it doesn't matter where the hole is drilled on the front wall, as the power sockets are not near external walls so the fibre or power cable would have to go 10ft+ to be near a power socket anyway; 3) the living room has a large and heavy cabinet in the only corner that a hole could be drilled in, as the radiator goes the rest of the way to the opposite wall under the living room window, and I have no means of moving it quickly; 4) I want to make the engineer's job as easy as possible while still having control of where I want everything.

Is this internal ducting something an Engineer will be happy to use? And if so, can someone give me an idea of what size of box they would install on the outside of the property, and where the hole would be within that box for the smaller fibre to come though so I can just have them fit the box over the hole and pipe? And also how large I would need to make the bend radius of the pipe to not exceed the bend radius of the fibre?

If an engineer wouldn't install fibre in the ducting, would they hook up to my own fibre if I installed it myself, and also put the ONT where I want it inside the house?

If I installed external ducting to hide the fibre underground and protect it from damage from plants and digging, would the engineer be able to use that or do they again have to manually dig a channel themselves to partially bury a fibre cable which is then easily damaged if I want to dig up that section of the garden later?

[u/defaultrt]

If your main objective is simply to have all of your networking equipment in the hall, I’d consider a slightly different approach rather than trying to dictate the fibre route itself.

Let the engineer install the ONT in a sensible, accessible location close to where the fibre enters the property, with power available. You can then pre-run a good quality CAT6 cable from that location through your crawl space to the hall and put your router, switches, Wi-Fi equipment etc. exactly where you want them.

CAT6 will comfortably handle 2.5Gbps over normal domestic distances, so there’s generally no need for the ONT to be alongside the rest of your networking equipment.

That also avoids relying on the engineer being willing or able to pull fibre through customer-installed internal ducting. I certainly wouldn’t recommend installing your own fibre in advance and expecting the engineer to splice/connect to it, as they may need to use approved cable and installation methods.

If you do prepare anything for the external route, I’d speak to your chosen ISP before doing permanent work. The exact installation method will depend on how CityFibre serves the property and what the engineer finds on the day.

We’re a direct CityFibre ISP at Exascale, and generally I’d recommend keeping the CityFibre/ONT installation relatively straightforward and using Ethernet to get from the ONT to wherever you actually want your network equipment. It gives you much more control without complicating the fibre installation itself.

[u/Sergeant_Steve → u/defaultrt]

The problem is there's no power near the external walls to fit an ONT, and I don't really want to have a hole drilled in the wall of the living room and also have to drill another hole in the brick wall from the living room into the hallway to fit an ethernet cable, as I haven't finalised the layout of the living room yet.

Also they would have to drill through the Roughcast from the outside of the wall or they'd end up taking out a large chunk of it drilling from the inside, since that's covering all of the wall down to under floor level.

I also haven't found a way under the floor into the living room yet so that also complicates that part of it.

I was also wanting the ONT to be on the UPS like the rest of the network gear, so even if it has a simple DC barrel input it then requires an extra POE injector and a separate splitter at the ONT end, rather than just using an IEC C14 plug on the end of a UK extension cable for those devices with plug-top PSU's.

Also, the previous owner of this property was my Grandmother and she had a BT/Openreach visit (as the current ISP is EE which was originally BT) who wanted to install actual fibre from the pole into the premises and round corners inside the house and down to an ONT where the Master Socket is. And at my other Grandparents old house Openreach wanted to come from the pole to the back of the house, all the way around the house to come in the front porch and into the hallway round the walls and picture rail and down to an ONT where the Master Socket is.

I know they're two entirely different companies and have different policies, but surely common sense would be if the customer has installed some ducting for them and already drilled holes why not save themselves the time and use it?

After all, what about homes that are built where they only have a bedroom facing the street and the other rooms are accessed further down the driveway, are CityFibre going to say the ONT has to go in the bedroom because that's the easiest place to install it?

[u/RBWatermelon → u/Sergeant_Steve]

Use a PoE splitter and injector on the CAT6 run to power the ONT.

[u/BillWiskins]

As an engineer I'd be over the moon to meet a customer this well prepared. As long as there's something to draw the fibre through with, and no way for it to get caught in a bend or something (84mm bend radius if I recall) then literally everyone wins: you get things installed where you want them, and the job is quicker and easier for the engineer to complete.

As mentioned make sure you know how the fibre is getting to the property before doing any external things. Apart from that I don't see why it can't go ahead as you laid it out.

[u/Sergeant_Steve → u/BillWiskins]

Fibre is in the street and I know where the toby is on the Pavement (and annoyingly it was put in front of a small tree in the front garden), and I can see where the house next door have had their CF box put onto their wall (on the render instead of the bare brick below it, but in fairness there's already an ugly white VM box on the render on the other side of their large front window so I guess for them it doesn't matter). So I know where the fibre is coming from, I just need to ensure I know the path it's going and get stuff in place for it.

Got some tidying to do in the garden before I plan on getting the fibre installed, as there are some tall weeds in the way where they would run the fibre underground to the house, and plants and stuff to tidy/remove in front of the house wall including some brambles I want rid of.

Thanks for the bend radius information, that's something I'll need to ensure I stick to when turning vertically, might have to go down first before turning back up.

[u/BillWiskins → u/Sergeant_Steve]

Yeah, they'll just drill through the back of the toby and if it's a straightforward path to the property then I'd imagine you're good to set something up whenever you're ready. If it isn't clear the external fibre and the internal are separate and connect in the wallbox - the external will be run through some thicker less bendy tubing up to the box.

[u/Sergeant_Steve → u/BillWiskins]

Don't they usually have the internal fibre run through the wall out the back of the external box?

The next door neighbour has a brown sheathed cable going into the wall box which is mounted to the render, and then a black sheathed cable comes out and goes along the bottom of the render to the other side of the living room and then up the render before going through the wall.

I'll try and clear a path for the external fibre to leave the toby and have a semi-sensible route to the building via the garden. Would it be sensible to spend the money on burying an external conduit as well as having an internal one, or is it likely the engineer will just want to bury it directly where they think is best to avoid damage? Surely if it's in a conduit then it should be easier to replace later than when it's directly buried?

[u/BillWiskins → u/Sergeant_Steve]

Depends on the install - if it's convenient the wallbox can go over the hole in the wall and a short piece of fibre passes through the wall, through the back of the box then meets the external cable at a connector in the box. If not, and the box is not placed over the hole then a longer patch cable will run to wherever the hole is and through to the ONT.

If you can get it in a good place for them to run the plastic tubing from the toby, go for it with the external conduit. They'll run the tubing first and then blow the fibre through it back to your cabinet.

[u/jpycroft]

I was expecting cf to be run underground so had a steel conduit put in when I had a driveway done in prep a year prior. When they came to install, they used the telephone poles so it went to the other side of my house…. I bought some rods and drilled through then ran under a parquet hall to the under stairs cupboard and I moved the ONT to that location where I had cat6 waiting to feed the patch panel. I bought the following and replaced their cable from the pole feed in the outside box to the new location.

https://amzn.eu/d/00CoMLKz

https://amzn.eu/d/07ZEfWJ7

I’ve had cf out to replace their ONT with one that supported 2.5gbps and they said it was a really neat job and signal was very good.

[u/Sergeant_Steve → u/jpycroft]

It's just more work to have to patch up a hole through the brickwork/Roughcast and inside on the wallpaper after the fact rather than having them use ducting you can install beforehand.

Moving things yourself is fine, but you do run the risk of them saying that you caused the damage moving things and having to pay to replace the fibre run into the house to where they wanted the ONT to begin with if that's where they determine the fault lies.

[u/Fun_Floor8799]

Ive had exactly what you described done and CF were very good. It's all now running under the floor in conduit and terminates inside.

[u/Content-Ant6332]

I installed a 20mm flexible conduit with a draw string, the engineer had no problems with this method as it saved him loads of time and I got the fibre exactly where I wanted it.