How to wire the inside of your home

This article provides guidance to help you prewire your new home for Northwestel phone service. You’ll also get helpful hints for how to find and repair phone wiring issues in your home.

The information in this article applies to single-family homes.

What’s prewiring?

Prewiring is the method of installing communications wiring so that it’s concealed within the walls of your home. Prewiring is done during the framing stage, at the same time as the electrical wiring, and before the insulation, drywall, and the vapour barrier are applied.

We recommend you use conduit for wiring so that it can be moved or replaced without disturbing the wall. Otherwise, after the walls are surfaced, you’ll have to either install surface wiring or disrupt the walls if additional wiring work is needed.

Before you begin

• If you haven't already, read Inside wiring installation and repair to get an overview of inside wiring (also known as house wiring).
• Review the following to understand what you're responsible and liable for when you install or maintain your house wiring.
  • You’re responsible for correcting any service issues that result from wiring work you do that harms the Northwestel network.
  • You assume all risk of personal injury or injury to your contractor, damage to property, and loss of service.
  • If a repair visit by a Northwestel technician is needed to remedy issues caused by defective house wiring, you must pay a service charge.
• Check to make sure you have the right type of wire. To learn more about standards for wire and other materials you'll need, see Wire standards for inside wiring.

Make sure that the proper standards are met. Installing house wiring should be done according to the Canadian Electrical Code.

Prewire your house

Here's what you need to do to prewire your house.

Determine locations for jacks

Decide where you want to install jacks. Be sure to consider both your present and future telecommunications needs. For example, consider putting in jacks for additional phone lines, and other equipment such as modems and fax machines.

We suggest a minimum of one jack in each of the following rooms:

• Each bedroom
• Living room
• Kitchen
• Family room
• Study
• Basement

Keep in mind that you don’t need to connect a phone to every jack location. Setting up a flexible system at the prewiring stage means that you won’t have to add surface wiring if you need more jacks for telecommunications services in the future. Planning for future needs can save you both time and money for as long as you own your home.

Provide a route for the phone wiring

You’re responsible for providing a route on your property. The route can be either an underground trench or a clear path for aerial construction.

Underground

We supply 60 metres of drop wire and rope in duct. If the route is longer than 60 metres, the cost of additional drop wire and rope in duct will be charged to your account. The trench should be 46 cm (18 inches) deep.

Aerial

We supply 60 metres of drop wire. You must provide the service attachment device. It’s recommended that you provide a suitable 5 cm (2 inch) entrance Electro Metallic Tubing (EMT) mast, subject to CEC requirements.

If we can’t connect to a power mast or use an existing building attachment, you’ll need to provide a 5 cm (2 inch) rigid steel conduit with a weatherhead.

Provide ground wire

For both underground and aerial routes, supply a minimum of #10 AWG green insulated ground wire (wire conductor) to the distribution backboard for acceptable grounding.

Make sure that the ground wire is long enough to reach from the NID on the side of your house to the electrical company’s ground electrode.

The pathway from the NID to the electrode must be separated by at least 30.5 cm (12 inches).

Install a backboard

The backboard is for the NID and demarcation block that Northwestel installs. In new homes, we'll terminate the phone entrance wire in the NID on the backboard.

Provide and install a backboard as follows:

• If the NID is placed on the outside of your house:

  Install a backboard to the side of your house where we can mount the NID. The backboard must be a 9 inch wide by 9 inch long by 3/4 inch deep piece of plywood that’s attached to the outside of your house next to the electrical meter.
   

• If the NID is placed inside your house:

  Install a backboard to a wall inside your house. The backboard must be a 9 inch wide by 9 inch long by 3/4 inch deep piece of plywood that's attached to the wall of your house near the electrical panel and entrance conduit.

Whether the NID is placed on the inside or outside of your house, you must run the conduit through the backboard and house wall. Doing this allows your house wiring access to the terminal block.

Plan the wire route in your home

Carefully plan the route for the wiring within your home. Planning helps to avoid possible damage from future construction, rubbing, overheating, dampness, or contact with power wires.

Use the following requirements and guidelines to help you plan the route:

• The route should follow a path through the floor joists, over ceilings, through wall studs, and behind baseboards.
• The route should conceal the wiring.
• Use a separate phone wire from the main terminal location to each jack outlet. Phone wiring should never loop through outlets.
  Using separate wire runs allows for ease of movement and arrangement of your phone lines. It also creates sufficient cable pairs for future maintenance purposes.

Here’s some tips for where not to put the wire:

• Don’t run wires parallel to power cables within the same stud or joist space. Otherwise, you may experience transmission problems.
• Don’t pull phone wires through holes occupied by electrical cables.
• Don’t put phone outlets between the same studs as power outlets.

Install a terminal block

We recommend that you terminate all wire from the demarcation block on a terminal block. The terminal block should be located on the backboard in your mechanical or electrical room so the house wiring can be easily attached to the demarcation block.

Install house wiring and jacks

Install a Type 1104 electrical outlet box to a stud at each location where a jack may be required. When you install these boxes, affix them at least 30.5 cm (12 inches) above the floor.

Run an individual phone wire to your terminal block. Be sure to keep wire runs unbroken between jack locations and the terminal block. If you splice two short lengths together, it can cause interference on your phone line either now or in the future.

When using a terminal block, only one wire can be run from the terminal block to the NID for each separate line (phone number).

Leave at least 30.5 cm (12 inches) of excess wire at the jack and the terminal block for ease of connection.

Connect the house wiring to the demarcation block

The demarcation block is located inside the NID that's mounted on your backboard. To access the NID and the demarcation block, loosen the screw in the middle of the NID.

The standard demarcation block consists of one universal jack and two termination screws for house wiring.

The screw terminals on the demarcation block are marked in one of the following ways:

• Colours:
  • Green (tip side of line)
  • Red (ring side of line)
• Notations:
  • T1 (tip side of line)
  • R1 (ring side of line)

It's your responsibility to connect the house wiring to the demarcation block.

For each phone number that's being connected, do the following:

1. Run one pair of wires from your terminal block into the demarcation block.
2. Terminate one pair (two wires) on the demarcation jack.

Here's what the jack looks like from the back.

Test your installed house wiring

After we provide service to the demarcation point, check each jack as follows:

1. Plug in a phone and listen for a dial tone.
   • If you hear a dial tone, go to step 4.
   • If you don't hear a dial tone, go to the next step.
2. Make sure the phone cord is connected properly to the phone and to the jack.
   • If you hear a dial tone, go to step 4.
   • If you don't hear a dial tone, go to the next step.
3. Plug in a different phone to check whether the issue is with the first phone.
   • If you hear a dial tone, there's likely there's an issue with the first phone you tried. Go to step 4.
   • If you still don’t hear a dial tone or you hear excessive noise on the line, test the line at the demarcation jack in the NID. Remove the plug at the demarcation jack, and then connect a phone.

     If you don't hear a dial tone or the excessive noise continues, call us at 1 888 423-2333.

4. Plug in the phone (if it's not already plugged in).

   Dial a digit and listen. The tone should stop and the line should be quiet. If you hear excessive noise after dialing, go back to step 2.

Troubleshooting

If you're having issues with your phone, use these troubleshooting tips to help identify whether it's a problem with your phone, your house wiring, or the Northwestel network.

For more help with phone issues, see Troubleshooting phone problems.

General troubleshooting tips

• Make sure all connections are correctly set up and all wire contacts are secure.
• Make sure the wire isn't broken, split, or stretched.
• Make sure the wire isn't pierced by staples, nails, screws, or other objects.
• If you have two or more phones connected to jacks, test your phones at each location. Don't unplug all your phones at the same time because if there's an issue with one of your phones, you won't be able to identify the faulty phone.

If you're not getting a dial tone

1. Plug in a different phone to the jack to check whether the issue is with the phone itself.
2. Plug in the phone to other jacks in your home. If it works in another jack, the issue is with the house wiring to the first jack and you're responsible for the repair work.
3. If your home has a new NID, try your phone in the jack that's in the NID. If you get a dial tone at the NID, the issue is with your house wiring and you're responsible for the repair work.
4. See Troubleshooting when you have no dial tone for additional troubleshooting tips.
5. If you've verified that the issue isn't with the phone itself and you still don't get a dial tone when it's connected to the jack, call us at 1 888 423-2333.

If you hear static

Static can occur if:

• The wire is wet or pierced by a staple, nail, or other object. Investigate and make sure no part of the wire is pierced by an object.
• Connections are loose at a jack or connecting point. Check the connections to make sure they're correctly set up and wire contacts are secure.

For more troubleshooting tips, see
Troubleshooting noise on your phone line.

If you hear buzzing

Buzzing might occur if a piece of wire is in contact with metal somewhere. Try the following:

• Check where jacks are secured to make sure that the wires inside the jack aren't touching any metal around the jack.
• Check all connecting points to make sure all colours are correctly matched.

For more troubleshooting tips, see
Troubleshooting noise on your phone line.

Need help?

If you have questions about any of the information in this article or Northwestel's policy on NID installation, call us at 1 888 423-2333.

Glossary

Conduit: A protective pathway for inside wiring (also known as house wiring). Conduit is usually made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC) or metal.

Demarcation block: A terminating block that's used for inside wiring (also known as house wiring). The demarcation block is located inside the network interface device (NID).

Demarcation jack: The jack on the demarcation block that's inside the NID.

Demarcation point: The point at which Northwestel's responsibility for installation, repair, and maintenance of phone wiring ends. In most cases, this point is the demarcation block.

Network interface device (NID): The protector box that contains the demarcation block and demarcation jack. It's the termination point for service drop and house wire. In other words, it defines the point between your inside wiring (also known as house wiring), which you're responsible for, and the outside wiring, which Northwestel is responsible for. It's also known as the Telephone Network Interface.

Protector: An older type of demarcation block, which may be on the outside or inside wall of a house. In older homes, we terminate the entrance phone cable at the protector if a demarcation block wasn't installed. We're replacing protectors with NIDs on a next-in time basis.

Terminal block: Connects common wires from each wire run.