Tech Forum

We have multiple buildings that are about to be wired and I am helping FM put together the list of hardware that will be needed. Does anybody have any specific brands or sources that they like/don't like? My first draft is below, if anybody has any suggestions it would be greatly appreciated.

From rackmountsolutions.net:
WM12-13 12u black wallmount relay rack
RS-UP24CAT6 Cat 6 1u 24 port patch panel
CO-19-0u Cable organizer wire harness
34-199952 2u Swing out rack or cabinet hinged brackets.
RMS815 15 amp, 8 outlet power strip with surge (outlets to rear)
U2-12-LD, 2u, 12"d shelf
(10-24 screws w/cagenuts)

For the switch I have found that 1U Intellinet 524162 Ethernet Switch (24 port) sell for around $150.

Can the 881 be mounted on the rack (with or without rails) or will it need a shelf?

1000' of Cat6 plenum cable, RJ45 keystones, boxes and plates, patch cables, cagenut insertion tool and punch tool - any good sources? Some of this is already on hand, but may need a few extras.

Am I missing anything?

Process to be repeated at 5 buildings, with a smaller setup destined for three other single-ward locations.

Since you are looking at an open-frame relay rack, you should consider putting these in areas that are locked and not easily accessible.

aclawson wrote:Can the 881 be mounted on the rack (with or without rails) or will it need a shelf?

Looking at the docs, it does not appear to have a rack kit available for it (only the 890 series has that).

aclawson wrote:1000' of Cat6 plenum cable, RJ45 keystones, boxes and plates, patch cables, cagenut insertion tool and punch tool - any good sources?

I've used Monoprice for years for these types of things. Hard to beat their pricing, even after shipping charges.

aclawson wrote:Am I missing anything?

We added a small to mid-sized UPS to each of our installations. Depending on your ISP, you might still have Internet access, even without utility power. Nice to have in an emergency, if only for a limited time.

Mikerowaved wrote:Since you are looking at an open-frame relay rack, you should consider putting these in areas that are locked and not easily accessible.

As luck would have it the demarc is going to be in the closet along with the satellite receiver and all of the TVs - very limited access.

For the other buildings I'm thinking that the libraries are relatively secure locations with controlled access so we can save a few hundred with open racks vs the cabinets.

Attached are specifications that my local FM group provided

aclawson,

Are you in the Ann Arbor FM group?

If so it looks like we're working on neighboring projects. I like the idea of the racks but in the Westland Stake we are putting the equipment near the demarks to keep all of our telco and network equipment together.

We are for the most part, due to space constrictions, wall mounting our hardware in the phone rooms. Typically we will use a 16 port Netgear gigabit prosafe switch (lifetime equip repair/replace warranty) for most jobs with the Cisco 881w, AP power injectors, and surge strip mounted together. Our cabling leaves the phone room in PVC conduit to the basement and attic. APs are ceiling mounted in the spots designated by the wireless signal testing.

The Cisco 881 is wall mountable and acts as an access point for your wireless setup. The only thing I noticed though is that it appears as though the APs have stronger wireless signals than the 881 provides.

The AP antenna runs around the outer edge of the AP, meaning you will get better coverage mounting it parallel to the floor than vertical on a wall. The reset switch on the AP is mounted on the back. Place the unit in a location that you can get to if you ever need to reset it. If you plan to lay it on top of a ceiling tile make sure you consider that the metal ceiling grid will probably act as a ground plane hurting your range and coverage.

When we power up our system for the first time we 1st power the firewall router, program it with a laptop, then power up an AP in one of the corners of the building and let it program, then power up another AP close to the first AP and let it program, we do this in sequence all the way around the building firing up APs and letting it program and get an assignment. We go in sequence to let the APs assign wireless spectrum channels while hopefully preventing any overlapping signals. Channels 1,6,11 are the best non-overlapping channels. So we're hoping to prevent two APs in close proximity to each other be on overlapping channels. The router will pick the best channel based based on what other channels have already subsequently been assigned.

Once your system is up and running you will be able to walk around the building and your wireless phone/device will see 1 network. As you walk away from an AP and get closer to the next the 881w hands you off to the next AP without you ever knowing.

Per the Ann Arbor FM group they authorized us to have hardwired drops to:
1) Bishop Offices
2) Clerk Offices
3) Library
4) Relief Society
5) Family History
6) Chapel Pulpit Control (for broadcasts)
7) Chapel Front Rostrum (for teacher)
8) Chapel Rear (for future camera)
9) Satellite Equip
Of course the APs are hardwired connections

Wireless Coverage: (signal sufficient to allow continued streaming of church video content)
- Good signal required in all classrooms 70%+
- Good signal required in all offices 70%+
- Good signal required in cultural hall 70%+
- Good signal required in chapel (rostrum & general seating) 70%+

The 881w wireless router/firewall has 4 ports on the back of it that you can use in addition to the ports you have on the switch. Basically with one 16 port switch we have 18 ports to work with. Our biggest network installation so far only needed 15 ports.

During planning, while conducting our wireless transmission test surveys, we have found that a building with solid unfishable walls really weakened the signal strength. Our Livonia building needed 6 APs for 70%+ coverage throughout. Whereas our Dearborn building, with wet plaster walls, only needed 3 APs for awesome coverage.

For times when we fished conduit to share the single gang box with the phone connection (bishop/clerk offices), we choose the QuickPort 2-port plates in the color to match the existing plates. Be sure to buy the cat3 plugs for your phone connections when using the same wall plate for phone and Internet connections. I prefer the tele plug on the plate to match the plate color and the Internet plug to be blue so it is obviously not a phone jack.

I found on-line prices to be much better than what the FM group was paying at the local Home Depot for cat3 and cat6 wall plates and jacks. However, the FM group gets an awesome price on the Netgear switches with their corporate discount. Much better than I've been able to find.

We also used the power injectors for each of the APs instead of buying the switch that can power the APs without the injector. The reason I stayed away from the switch powering the APs is because being a building rep I know we sometimes get roof leaks. Just my luck to have the water follow my network cable into my AP and knock out my entire network. With each AP on its own power feed it should isolate and drop out just that supply while the rest of the system stays active. I've spend too many hours on various job sites for an employer, tracking grounds on networked equipment, to want to do it at church too.

If you and a group are doing the work make sure:
1) Someone can do a wireless signal plan with live equipment before you assign placement of the APs (we had some people guesstimate before and are forced to go back and redo these installations)
2) Position the APs to pass through the smallest amount of direct line concrete from AP to area of use
3) Get up in the attic or basement and check out your wire run options

I was amazed to see the wireless interference and obstructions in some of these buildings. Those folding curtains for instance, in the chapel and multi-purpose rooms, are a killer on wireless signal reception. At one job I lost 20db from one side of the curtain to the other. Also, a 1 foot thick concrete wall may turn into a 3 foot concrete wall if the signal is forced to pass though at an angle.

Helpful Tools:
- Cable Tester with remote (I prefer the one with the red leds at the sending unit and receiver: easier to see at a glance if you have a short/open/incorrectly wired end than the lcd display style)
- Walkie talkies (much better than screaming to your partner in the crawl or attic trusses over the gym or at the other end of the cable you are testing)
- Coax stripper (adjust the blade to barely cut the cat6 cable)
- Great lighting & Good Eyes (terminating the ends on your cables may drive you crazy especially since we don't connect them in direct pairs on the ends following the B-setup)
- Patch cables (for network room to make as few terminations as possible)
- Termination ends (get the ones with the internal ramp and wire channels: easier to make flawless ends)


These are fun projects but they must be planned accurately. The planning phase is the most difficult. The fun begins when you and your crew are actually running the lines and terminating the connections. Glad to see that you are spending the time to do it right the first time.

Take Care,
Jeff

Yep, just north of you in the Bloomfield Hills stake. We're wiring the stake center which is an absolute beast of a building. This is what we've encountered so far:

1. Even though the building is in Bloomfield Hills on Woodward Avenue it is in a broadband backwater. DSL was available almost as an afterthought with speedtest.net once setting a record of 1.02 down and 0.46 up, though not on the same day. The 1.02 down was coupled with a 0.19 up and the 0.46 up was coupled with 0.96 down. Too far away from the CO for decent bandwidth and no incentive for AT&T to improve the service we are going with Comcast, but they didn't have any cable within at least 1,000 feet of the building so they were unwilling to provide service. For the past several years we were stuck without any viable options, but finally thanks to the national account they are going to bring in a new cable just for us.

2. Our stake center is about 250' from end to end, and 150' side to side. There is a 50'x60' open air courtyard in the middle that was formed by adding a 4th wall to the original U-Shaped building which presents a solid, exterior masonry wall that runs floor to roof and eliminates the possibility of convenience in running cable from end to end. Originally on baseboard/radiator heat several years ago there was a conversion to forced air HVAC. The plenums are absolutely and completely filled with ductwork, not even room for even a Sunbeam to get up above the hallways.

3. There is only one section of basement that is about the size of the kitchen that is just through the concrete floor above it. Above the kitchen is another concrete floor and the room with all of the new furnaces. There is another 2nd floor alcove across the cultural hall and foyer from that and I have heard that there is a way to get into the ceiling of the cultural hall if you bring out the scissor lift but other than that, no attic and no basement.

4. The interior walls that form the cultural hall all appear to be filled cinder block. I think that several other interior walls are similarly built.

5. The automatic partition doors between chapel and overflow were just replaced by the manual accordion fire doors (20 feet high maybe?) I can confirm that between these and the masonry signal penetration is pretty effectively gone by the time you get up to the wonderful tangle of metal that is our pipe organ.

Wired drops are going to three clerk's offices, stake president's office, two bishop's offices, High Council room, Relief Society room, family history center, library, satellite room, three APs (maybe a 4th), and at least one (maybe more) in the chapel - but I still have no idea how that room is going to be run. Maybe a 2nd drop up the wall for an ethernet-enabled camera? So we have 15 hardwired drops at a minimum (I'd also like to see drops in a couple of other places as well). The 881 is going to have to be in one of the rooms on an exterior wall so at least 180 degrees of coverage is wasted, the rest of the building will be covered in three, maybe four APs. The rack for the equipment goes into the satellite room which is also where all of the TVs, VCRs, A/V equipment is stored and is also where the 5" (?) water main enters the building.

All in all this is going to be fun

Then we go back to update the other buildings one by one - most of which are wired only through the magic of the ECB350s which are just the most amazing APs I have ever used.

But the Palmer Park building could be even more interesting. As far as I know it is the only LDS buildin with a dome (it is a repurposed Greek Orthodox church) that has even more unusual construction techniques than the stake center.

aclawson wrote:Yep, just north of you in the Bloomfield Hills stake. We're wiring the stake center which is an absolute beast of a building. This is what we've encountered so far:

1. Even though the building is in Bloomfield Hills on Woodward Avenue it is in a broadband backwater. DSL was available almost as an afterthought with speedtest.net once setting a record of 1.02 down and 0.46 up, though not on the same day. The 1.02 down was coupled with a 0.19 up and the 0.46 up was coupled with 0.96 down. Too far away from the CO for decent bandwidth and no incentive for AT&T to improve the service we are going with Comcast, but they didn't have any cable within at least 1,000 feet of the building so they were unwilling to provide service. For the past several years we were stuck without any viable options, but finally thanks to the national account they are going to bring in a new cable just for us.

2. Our stake center is about 250' from end to end, and 150' side to side. There is a 50'x60' open air courtyard in the middle that was formed by adding a 4th wall to the original U-Shaped building which presents a solid, exterior masonry wall that runs floor to roof and eliminates the possibility of convenience in running cable from end to end. Originally on baseboard/radiator heat several years ago there was a conversion to forced air HVAC. The plenums are absolutely and completely filled with ductwork, not even room for even a Sunbeam to get up above the hallways.

3. There is only one section of basement that is about the size of the kitchen that is just through the concrete floor above it. Above the kitchen is another concrete floor and the room with all of the new furnaces. There is another 2nd floor alcove across the cultural hall and foyer from that and I have heard that there is a way to get into the ceiling of the cultural hall if you bring out the scissor lift but other than that, no attic and no basement.

4. The interior walls that form the cultural hall all appear to be filled cinder block. I think that several other interior walls are similarly built.

5. The automatic partition doors between chapel and overflow were just replaced by the manual accordion fire doors (20 feet high maybe?) I can confirm that between these and the masonry signal penetration is pretty effectively gone by the time you get up to the wonderful tangle of metal that is our pipe organ.

Wired drops are going to three clerk's offices, stake president's office, two bishop's offices, High Council room, Relief Society room, family history center, library, satellite room, three APs (maybe a 4th), and at least one (maybe more) in the chapel - but I still have no idea how that room is going to be run. Maybe a 2nd drop up the wall for an ethernet-enabled camera? So we have 15 hardwired drops at a minimum (I'd also like to see drops in a couple of other places as well). The 881 is going to have to be in one of the rooms on an exterior wall so at least 180 degrees of coverage is wasted, the rest of the building will be covered in three, maybe four APs. The rack for the equipment goes into the satellite room which is also where all of the TVs, VCRs, A/V equipment is stored and is also where the 5" (?) water main enters the building.

All in all this is going to be fun

Then we go back to update the other buildings one by one - most of which are wired only through the magic of the ECB350s which are just the most amazing APs I have ever used.

But the Palmer Park building could be even more interesting. As far as I know it is the only LDS buildin with a dome (it is a repurposed Greek Orthodox church) that has even more unusual construction techniques than the stake center.

I'm impressed that you are able to actually talk to someone in FM. I can't even get a call back in our stake. I am new to the STS calling, and there is a ton of work that needs done in our stake center also.

jkentner wrote:I'm impressed that you are able to actually talk to someone in FM. I can't even get a call back in our stake. I am new to the STS calling, and there is a ton of work that needs done in our stake center also.

Normally the communications between the stake and FM is done through the physical facilities representative - a high council member. Due to the large number of buildings an FM Group deals with they want to have only one point of contact for each stake.

If you do it right and develop a relationship with the FM manager through your physical facilities representative you may be able to get the FM manager to realize that you are the one to deal with in regards to technology. Then he may soften the need to go through the PF rep. As a former STS I developed this relationship but always kept the PF rep in the loop by including him as well as the stake president as a Cc addressee for all my e-mails to the FM manager.

Just as a followup, the hard part of the wiring is done - in the end it proved not reasonably possible to get the wires where they needed to go through the plenum so the FM group drilled a few holes, ran conduit on the outside of the building and painted it to match the brick. Will be pretty simple to finish it up as soon as I can get back up there with a hundred feet of fish tape (the conduit is just slightly too bendy to be able to push the cable through without using tape and string and my tape was short by just a few feet to get all the way through.

aclawson wrote:Just as a followup, the hard part of the wiring is done - in the end it proved not reasonably possible to get the wires where they needed to go through the plenum so the FM group drilled a few holes, ran conduit on the outside of the building and painted it to match the brick. Will be pretty simple to finish it up as soon as I can get back up there with a hundred feet of fish tape (the conduit is just slightly too bendy to be able to push the cable through without using tape and string and my tape was short by just a few feet to get all the way through.

Thanks for the followup. When you're done fishing and pulling, be sure to leave a pull line in the conduit. It seems like such a simple thing, but I can't tell you how many times I wished the fellow before me had thought to do that.