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help with BT line

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 9:28 am
by ninja
i've just moved house and have paid BT for my phone line, but it doesn't work!

they want £65 for a visit + £75/hour for the engineer to fix the problem.

it seems that the previous owner has butchered the BT line and the master socket is not wired up correctly. there are loads of wires coming in which are to be connected to the back of the box. generally the white and orange wires site in positions A and B. but mine's been connected up with a black wire in A and a blue wire in B! the connections to the slave sockets are equally screwed up. these are supposed to be connected off the user part of the master socket but are actually connected directly off the BT side of the box (which is bad as the surge protector will not be in line for these slave sockets). generally 4 wires are connected from the master socket to the slave sockets but i've only got 2 connected and the others have been cut.

i'm bald but am pulling my hair out here! no phone, no internet, no sky movies!!!

are any of you a BT engineer or electrician or know someone who fancies a bit of cash in hand to help me out?

ninja :drive

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:06 am
by Rich H
Can't you tae the box off the wall, remove all the wring and start again with the incoming line? Should just be 4 wires IIRC.

Pics?

Rich

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:14 am
by ninja
i've taken the box off the wall and undone the wiring.

on the BT side there are actually one two wires used which connect into the A and B connectors. the problem i have is the incomming line has 12 wires! and i'm not sure which two to connect. generally it's the white and the orange, but there are 5 white wires.

ninja :drive

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:16 am
by Rich H
Do you have an orange wire? If so the whites may will all be common. Try it, it's already bollocksed

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:25 am
by Sanjøy
2 wires is fine as I had an old cable box with 2.

connect the fecker to a multi meter then call it. DO NOT HOLD IT while doing it as I did.

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:32 am
by ninja
yes got an orange and 5 whites! i was doing the multimeter thing last night but i wasn't calling it at the time! lol, couldn't figure out why the line was dead all the time!

i'll try that tonight. going to maplins later to buy another master socket too as the one i have is ancient and probably fcuked.

ninja :drive

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:49 am
by ironside
You don't need to call it, you should get ~50v DC with just the dialing tone, enough to give you a fright but not enough to hurt you.

Simon

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:50 am
by tenkfeet
Can you not call your solicitor and get the previous owner to pay for it ?

Just looked at my master plug orange with white stripes and white with orange stripe are the phone line and the blue/white stripe and white blue stripe go to the surge protector .

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:55 am
by ironside
The surge protector isn't a surge protector, it's your ring capacitor for generating the ring on the third wire inside your house.

Simon

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:56 am
by ironside
Oh, and you're not really supposed to be fiddling with stuff from the master socket back - but I suppose you already know that. That's the demarquation point between your stuff and BT's stuff.

Simon

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 10:57 am
by Shug
ironside wrote:The surge protector isn't a surge protector, it's your ring capacitor for generating the ring burn on your third leg inside your trousers.

Simon

/fnarrrr

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 11:00 am
by ironside
Image

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 11:03 am
by Rich H
I got lost at Flux capacitor, what happens at 88mph again?

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 11:20 am
by ninja
someone else has already buggered about with the BT side.

iv'e got 5 white wires, none of them have stripes on them! how do i get the 50v to indicate on my ammeter? i have a red and a black pin on it and was putting one on a white and one on the orange but wasn't getting any voltage reading at all

ninja :drive

Posted: Wed Aug 02, 2006 11:22 am
by Rich H
Time to call BT....