Installing / activating additonal phone points

setanta

Hi,

I wonder can any of the telecoms gurus on this board help me ?

I have finally had my telephone connected in my new house (new house / new development / was waiting four months !!)

The house is wired internally for a total of 4 telephone sockets - eircom have come and activated one socket (ie put in box, tested and ok'd) but engineer would not install any others.

Engineer did say to my better half "sure your husband would be able to connect up the rest of the sockets no bother" and wifey now assumes that all husbands are able to do this sort of thing.

So, I'm willing to give this a bash even though I am a complete muppet when it comes to DIY (I can install lights / change light switches / hang shelves but that is the extent of it !!)

I am assuming there are two parts to this install -
1. Correct installation of telephone sockets in rooms
2. Correct wiring of incoming wires at eircom box at side of house
(you will note the lack of the correct technical nomenclature !)

Is there any advice that you can give ? Is there appropriate kit I should get ? Is there anywhere on the net I can get a "Telephone socket installation for Dummies" book ?

Or should I bite the bullet and have an eircon engineer come out and charge me a fortune for 10 mins work ?

I have searched for similar questions on the boards but the answers get too technical too quickly

Any suggestions greatly appreciated

Setanta

Redshift

It's a really simple job M8, firstly are the sockets already installed? If so check if they are wired at the back. If not strip out a pair from the cable behind the socket if it's a new house it's probably a cat5 cable so make sure you get a correct pair like blue with white stripe and white with blue stripe. Wire the pair into the back of the socket there will probably be four or six terminals check which wires are going to the centre pins on the jack it will probably be the green and red ones connect you pair from the cat5 to those two terminals. Next down in the eircom box outside you should find the other ends of those cables strip out the same pairs you used in the sockets and then open up the junction box it will probably be the new white one with the eircom logo on it. To open it put a screwdriver under the eircom logo and lever it off it should come out with a plastic tab attached to the back of it. You should be now able to open the junction box, the new type has push terminals instead of screws you should see a flat plastic tab beside each terminal to open them put a push them them down and out they are hinged and should open easily. Now simply insert your pairs into the same terminals as the cable going to your hall socket and push them closed and that should be that.
If you have a monitored alarm don't do this post here and I will tell you what to do also if there are no additional cables in the outside box check behind the master socket as they may be there.

setanta

Redshift,

Many thanks for such a quick and detailed reply - I appreciate you taking the time !

I hopefully will try this over the weekend, however, in answer to your question - no the sockets are not installed, there is only the blank face plate for the wiring from the eircom box outside to each room. So I need to buy sockets for each of the rooms - are there standard ones I should get or are they all the same ?

Also, I don't have an "eircom phonewatch" monitored alarm but the alarm will ring my mobile if tripped - this has been connected when the alarm was fitted but has not yet been activated by the alarm installer - now that I have a working telephone line he needs to come back and set up with telephone numbers etc. - I'm not sure if this qualifies as a "monitored" alarm ?

Regardless thanks again for the advice - I will let you know how I get on

Cheers

Setanta