Does anyone here run their cat5 and other cable through a flexible plastic conduit on the towers? I’ve seen pictures of Canopy tower installs where this is used and it seems like a great idea. I think it’d be a lot easier to add/remove/replace cables through the conduit.
The question I have is, how is that cable supported inside of the tubing? I can’t imagine they just zip-tie it on the top and let it hang all the way down.
Keefe
As a try to eliminate interference on our Network cable from a radio station antenna, we were suggested by an “Engineer” to run our cable in a metal conduit past the antenna. You zip tie at the top and bottom of the conduit. My cables were also zip tied together in the conduit. So yes the cable would just hang.
As long as you zip tie good at the top, it wouldn’t be too bad, because you zip tie to keep it blowing around on the tower, which the conduit would eliminate the wind. But the strain on the cable could be to much at any distance of free hang.
Keefe,
How you suspend it is with a ‘chinese finger’ type rig, which wraps around the cable for about a foot or so at the top, it has a metal hanging piece on top that you can use a couple hose clamps on to part of the tower.
It also makes it real easy to pull the cable up through a long run of cable and one at the base of the tower. Get some cable lube, a strong pulley and pull it up using a winch, a truck, a cathead, a riding lawnmower, a 4-wheeler…OK… You get the picture 8)
paulchops wrote: Keefe,
How you suspend it is with a 'chinese finger' type rig, which wraps around the cable for about a foot or so at the top, it has a metal hanging piece on top that you can use a couple hose clamps on to part of the tower.
It also makes it real easy to pull the cable up through a long run of cable and one at the base of the tower. Get some cable lube, a strong pulley and pull it up using a winch, a truck, a cathead, a riding lawnmower, a 4-wheeler...OK... You get the picture 8)
Where does one get one of these things? Do you have a model number or picture?
Keefe,
You can get them at Hutton or Tessco. Here’s a link to many options from hutton in that category
https://www.huttononline.com/HuttonOnli … spx?cat=18
Paul
paulchops wrote: Keefe,
You can get them at Hutton or Tessco. Here's a link to many options from hutton in that category
https://www.huttononline.com/HuttonOnli ... spx?cat=18
Paul
I noticed the smallest available is for LMR-400 & 3/8" corrugated cable...has this size worked on STP/UTP for you?
Perhaps you should call them to discuss. I know we bought them there. We hoiste UTP no problem.
We were using Comscope outdoor grade Cat5e but have switched eveything over to Best-tronics cable.
Our cable bundles vary from 6 cables in some towers to 14 at the high end. We usually use two inch conduit and always use some device to hoist.
Again, i would give them a call. I know we specify bundle diameter to them and they help us get the right one.
We use Belden 7919A. Great stuff. We use to pull this cable all exposed, since it is outdoor rated. No problems at all. Now we have a new boss that wants everything in conduit. we use the regular stuff you can get at home depot. Once you run it up the tower and if you feed the cable from the top down, it runs very fast and all by itself, no pully needed. However, I prefer to live it out of conduit. That’s why you spend the extra money on outdoor rated cable. installations have become harder because of this conduit thing. Besides that, when you ran the cable exposed, you zip-tie it all the way donw to the tower, thus reducing the tension on the cable, when you are in a 300 ft tower, that is really important. When inside conduit, the weigth of that cable could be a little too much.
Forgot to add. This may be becuase of the type of conduit we use, but in long runs, water builds up inside the conduit and if you are not careful enough, that water will find its way to your equipment, wether by itself, or when you move the conduit during maintenance to the equipment. Not a good thing. We had cases were the water kept dripping from the conduit on top of a 300SS until it finally quit in the midle of a weekend. Wouldn’t had happened if conduit wasn’t there.
How successfull is conduit in reducing or eliminating RF noise, specifically from co-locating with FM? I am about to add a new ePMP 2000 to a tower that has FM very close (tower 10' away). We are only going 60' up and have some 3/4" steel EMT that we are considering attaching to the outside leg of the tower and running our shielded carrier grade Ethernet inside of it.
We have used Ferrite cores on other towers with some success. However, since we have the conduit and it will protect our eventual fiber cable up the tower, is it worth installing for the RF protection of Ethernet? 60' should not cause an issue with the cable "hanging" and we will be careful about allowing water to collect - the bottom should be open anyway so it can drain easily.
Yes, good grounding practices will be implemented!
@Au Wireless wrote:How successfull is conduit in reducing or eliminating RF noise, specifically from co-locating with FM? I am about to add a new ePMP 2000 to a tower that has FM very close (tower 10' away). We are only going 60' up and have some 3/4" steel EMT that we are considering attaching to the outside leg of the tower and running our shielded carrier grade Ethernet inside of it.
We have used Ferrite cores on other towers with some success. However, since we have the conduit and it will protect our eventual fiber cable up the tower, is it worth installing for the RF protection of Ethernet? 60' should not cause an issue with the cable "hanging" and we will be careful about allowing water to collect - the bottom should be open anyway so it can drain easily.
Yes, good grounding practices will be implemented!
we've had mixed experience with conduit up the tower. I avoid when possible.
FM is an entirely differently ballgame. if you can install fiber to switch with the shortest possible run. use copper clad or braided Ethernet cable and if you can get away with 2', do your best lol. FM is tough. the problem is the frequency of Ethernet isn't that far away from FM (100 meg). depending on the power, FM can even both some switches directly. we helped clear up issues at an FM tower one time, the cladded copper ethernet and moving the switch directly behind the radios fixed it. we sent AC up the tower, and fiber back down. ethernet jumpers were maybe 4' long. we had to force 1g FD on the rate as well as it tried to neg 100 and would puke. worked without errors forced at 1g
I found this conduit solution www.pipemein.com is an outdoor split conduit. It is very easy to run your cables and replaced them as needed. You can put your power cables on one side and your data cables on the other side.