I'd still go with telect-style blocks. Wire-wrap on the front and amphenol on the back/bottom depending you application. Way less space than 66 or 110. -----Original Message----- From: "Dave Phelps" <tippenring@gmail.com> Sent: Thursday, April 14, 2022 4:27pm To: "Mike Hammett" <nanog@ics-il.net> Cc: "NANOG" <nanog@nanog.org> Subject: Re: Copper Termination Blocks Hi Mike. I used Krone blocks back in the mid 90s. I really liked them. I'm afraid now your long-term options now are probably straight old 66 or 110 blocks. 66 blocks give some added flexibility. 110s are more efficient as far as space consumed compared to 66 blocks. Krone and 110s have a very similar profile. Depending on how much copper you're terminating, you may want to plan the frame layout for cross-connect field space before building the frame. You don't want to end up with too much cross-connect wire volume in too small an area. That can get troublesome. Happy to discuss specifics. Just ping me off-list. On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 3:13 PM Mike Hammett <[ nanog@ics-il.net ]( mailto:nanog@ics-il.net )> wrote:I know I'm discussing what some consider ancient technology. I counter that it meets or exceeds the needs of many, many people. Currently, we use 100-pr Telect-style termination blocks. They don't offer much in terms of ease of use for testing and don't organize well on a 19" or 23" rack. I was recommended to look at Krone blocks. They look just great. Easy to break into for testing with their "look both ways" plug as well as their preterminated blocks looked much easier to rack-mount. Well, Krone was bought by ADC. ADC was bought by Tyco Electronics. TE was bought by Commscope. Commscope discontinued everything I found interesting with no replacements. Some of the stuff is on eBay (even NIB), some not. Any recommendations for places to get old telco blocks, testers, mounts, etc.? Any recommendations for alternatives that are easier to source? ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions [ http://www.ics-il.com ]( http://www.ics-il.com ) Midwest-IX [ http://www.midwest-ix.com ]( http://www.midwest-ix.com )

*nods* We're just a CLEC in Frontier space, so they do the heavy lifting. We just need to interface the open-ended 100-pair cables Frontier gives us with our Occam\Calix gear. Given the "thoroughness" of the Frontier testing and troubleshooting process, we've taken up testing the customer pairs ourselves. Distance to fault, what kind of fault, etc. Telling them that info helps actually get things fixed more quickly. The most we have in any CO is 400 pair. ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Dave Phelps" <tippenring@gmail.com> To: "Mike Hammett" <nanog@ics-il.net> Cc: "NANOG" <nanog@nanog.org> Sent: Thursday, April 14, 2022 3:27:59 PM Subject: Re: Copper Termination Blocks Hi Mike. I used Krone blocks back in the mid 90s. I really liked them. I'm afraid now your long-term options now are probably straight old 66 or 110 blocks. 66 blocks give some added flexibility. 110s are more efficient as far as space consumed compared to 66 blocks. Krone and 110s have a very similar profile. Depending on how much copper you're terminating, you may want to plan the frame layout for cross-connect field space before building the frame. You don't want to end up with too much cross-connect wire volume in too small an area. That can get troublesome. Happy to discuss specifics. Just ping me off-list. On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 3:13 PM Mike Hammett < nanog@ics-il.net > wrote: I know I'm discussing what some consider ancient technology. I counter that it meets or exceeds the needs of many, many people. Currently, we use 100-pr Telect-style termination blocks. They don't offer much in terms of ease of use for testing and don't organize well on a 19" or 23" rack. I was recommended to look at Krone blocks. They look just great. Easy to break into for testing with their "look both ways" plug as well as their preterminated blocks looked much easier to rack-mount. Well, Krone was bought by ADC. ADC was bought by Tyco Electronics. TE was bought by Commscope. Commscope discontinued everything I found interesting with no replacements. Some of the stuff is on eBay (even NIB), some not. Any recommendations for places to get old telco blocks, testers, mounts, etc.? Any recommendations for alternatives that are easier to source? ----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com

I think you'd be very surprised if you walked into the central offices of MANY of the large LECs. The majority of the wire frames are gone, replaced with fiber, even where the service is delivered as copper to the end user, it's usually served from something fiber fed much closer to the end user. I can tell you that one MAJOR LEC has a major push going on to retire ALL copper. Shane On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 6:54 PM Martin Hannigan <hannigan@gmail.com> wrote:

Its not ancient. While cooper based products are slowly fading they still matter. Im using 66 blocks to accommodate gauge/voltage for dial tone in all facilities. Lots of OOB still happens via copper dial tone or DSL. Show me one LEC that has torn down their wire frame?

We bought new. Im seeing this product on the intertubes new at $18 per block. We didn’t mount distribution from LEC in rack. Instead we placed the standard 5/8’s plywood backboard and mounted there. We transition to a 110 block in a rack over ladder tray via ABAM cable to deliver to the back of a 110 block and patch from front. Not perfect, but cost effective, easy to manage and simple. It works.

Warm regards,

-M<

On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 16:14 Mike Hammett <nanog@ics-il.net> wrote:

...

I know I'm discussing what some consider ancient technology. I counter that it meets or exceeds the needs of many, many people.

Currently, we use 100-pr Telect-style termination blocks. They don't offer much in terms of ease of use for testing and don't organize well on a 19" or 23" rack.

I was recommended to look at Krone blocks. They look just great. Easy to break into for testing with their "look both ways" plug as well as their preterminated blocks looked much easier to rack-mount.

Well, Krone was bought by ADC. ADC was bought by Tyco Electronics. TE was bought by Commscope. Commscope discontinued everything I found interesting with no replacements.

Some of the stuff is on eBay (even NIB), some not.

Any recommendations for places to get old telco blocks, testers, mounts, etc.?

Any recommendations for alternatives that are easier to source?

----- Mike Hammett Intelligent Computing Solutions http://www.ics-il.com

Midwest-IX http://www.midwest-ix.com

On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 8:57 PM Shane Ronan <shane@ronan-online.com> wrote:

I think you'd be very surprised if you walked into the central offices of MANY of the large LECs.

The majority of the wire frames are gone, replaced with fiber, even where the service is delivered as copper to the end user, it's usually served from something fiber fed much closer to the end user.

I'm in LEC CO's a lot. I'm not seeing this.

I can tell you that one MAJOR LEC has a major push going on to retire ALL copper.

I'm sure they are. TDM has been on the target list for years and LEC's still pay cross connect fees on TDM services. They're getting out of the network, but not quickly and not if they are printing money. Warm regards, -M<

I always found the spades (?) of the 66 block to be convenient to clip a test set (with an angled bed of nails) onto. I've also used slip on jack more than a few times, especially for testing. E.g.

I agree that 66 blocks were always simpler for testing and troubleshooting, but I always liked Krones and 110s better. 66 blocks were too easy for someone to double punch or do otherwise derpy things on. Not that such things couldn't be done on Krone/110, but I always felt it at least required a little more dedication. :) That and all the forearm burns from me being stupid and leaning on the wall to discover not everything in there was low voltage like I was told it was... On Thu, Apr 14, 2022 at 8:43 PM Grant Taylor via NANOG <nanog@nanog.org> wrote:

On 4/14/22 2:05 PM, Mike Hammett wrote:

...

I know I'm discussing what some consider ancient technology. I counter that it meets or exceeds the needs of many, many people.

As people say, "if it isn't broken, don't fix it". -- That being said, I believe the third stanza is missing; "Optimize it."

...

Currently, we use 100-pr Telect-style termination blocks. They don't offer much in terms of ease of use for testing and don't organize well on a 19" or 23" rack.

I always found the spades (?) of the 66 block to be convenient to clip a test set (with an angled bed of nails) onto. I've also used slip on jack more than a few times, especially for testing. E.g.

Link - 66 block to RJ-45 - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00F3W7NL4

...

I was recommended to look at Krone blocks. They look just great. Easy to break into for testing with their "look both ways" plug as well as their preterminated blocks looked much easier to rack-mount.

I've never run into Krone myself.

I found that using the two sides of a 66 block with bridge clips to be convenient for testing. Especially for building and / or floor entrance points. E.g. incoming network on the left side, outgoing station on the right side, and bridge clips connecting the two. Any time I need to test, pull the bridge clips to split the circuit in a way that's equally as easy to put back.

Sure, this technique burns more 66 block / wall space. But I found it to be worth while in some use cases, like building entry.

...

Any recommendations for places to get old telco blocks, testers, mounts, etc.?

Any recommendations for alternatives that are easier to source?

I look forward to learning from recommendations on this thread.

-- Grant. . . . unix || die