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Flat modular line cord, 4 white leads

Started by TelePlay, July 15, 2018, 04:33:51 PM

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TelePlay

Opened up a WE 500 from 12/71-1/72 that was original except for the line cord.

This phone had a flat black modular 9' long line cord.

Looking at L1 and L2, I saw two white wires. Splitting some of the covering back, discovered this line cord had 4 white wires, no colors.

Never seen this before. Being a flat line, I know it's easy to find the inside two leads and the outside two leads at the network and the modular plug is not a problem, but why 4 white wires. For polarity sensitive phones, I'd think this would be difficult wire to use.

Anyone seen this before or know where or why these were made or used?

paul-f

Quote from: TelePlay on July 15, 2018, 04:33:51 PM
... Splitting some of the covering back, discovered this line cord had 4 white wires, no colors.

... Anyone seen this before or know where or why these were made or used?

Occasionally when replacing broken plugs on modular cords I have found cordage with no color coding on the wires inside. They have usually been all gray or all clear.

It's probably a cost-saving measure for cordage that's always expected to be terminated by a crimped-on modular plug.

There's usually a rib on one of the flat cord sides, so it's easy to pick the side to line up with the tab on the plug.
Visit: paul-f.com         WE  500  Design_Line

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Key2871

Yea, same here. I took apart a Western quarter modular set that was a 2500 and the leads in the set were silver satin.
No colors, yea it made it hard to define tip, ring, ground.
And the modular plug had the WE on the clip so I knew it was genuine.
KEN

TelePlay

Quote from: paul-f on July 15, 2018, 06:45:33 PM
There's usually a rib on one of the flat cord sides, so it's easy to pick the side to line up with the tab on the plug.

Paul,

I'm confused. When putting modular plugs on both ends of a line cord, should the plug tab be facing the rib on both ends or should one be flipped over so one tab faced the rib side and the other the flat side.

I've looked at cords I have purchased and seen both, some with both tabs down (toward the rib) and some with one tab down and one up (toward the flat side).

Recently had an issue with a polarity sensitive phone and had to cut on plug off and flip it over to get it to work and since then have been doing the tab up and tab down attachments. Never had a problem with rotary phones. So, if a round line cord on a DTMF phone is terminated with a modular adapter with red to red and green to green, should the short adapter-to-wall modular cord be both tab up or one tab up and the other down, flipped?

Which way is "normal" and is that way functional with polarity sensitive phones. The image you attached shows both in the tab down (toward the rib) position.



Please un-confuse me.

Doug Rose

Quote from: paul-f on July 15, 2018, 06:45:33 PM
Occasionally when replacing broken plugs on modular cords I have found cordage with no color coding on the wires inside. They have usually been all gray or all clear.

It's probably a cost-saving measure for cordage that's always expected to be terminated by a crimped-on modular plug.

There's usually a rib on one of the flat cord sides, so it's easy to pick the side to line up with the tab on the plug.

I agree....when the Company that I work for went from RJ 21 Voice cords and ran voice and data via Lan cables five years ago,  I scooped everything I could find. Outside casing was black, inside all were clear. You want the two in the middle and cut the rest. This was a Godsend for me but they are all gone  :'( Black modular cords looked so good on black phones...Doug
Kidphone

twocvbloke

Reminds me of the mini hot-glue gun I got in a tool set recently, opened it up to check it's build quality, and noticed that the power cable had black and black for the conductors, granted being on a non-polarised euro-plug, the colours didn't matter, but, it certainly ain't compliant with British or european electrical standards (Brown for Live, Blue for Neutral)... ???

paul-f

#6
Quote from: TelePlay on July 15, 2018, 07:21:46 PM

Which way is "normal" and is that way functional with polarity sensitive phones. The image you attached shows both in the tab down (toward the rib) position.


Most standard cords have the tabs as shown in the photo -- the tab is on the ribbed side on both ends. This results in reversing the connections, but the jacks are wired accordingly.

This makes it easy for the installer (or collector) to remember which way the tab should be positioned when replacing a plug.


Some applications required one end having the tab on the smooth side, resulting in a "straight through" connection.
Sandman has an interesting description about half way down the page here:   http://www.sandman.com/modcords.html
Visit: paul-f.com         WE  500  Design_Line

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Key2871

Ah, straight through is what I had forgotten about.
What I read was on an electronics supplier web page on their modular base cords. And they termed straight through also as patch cords, and explained the difference.
I had put clips on the ridge side on both ends before and got reverse polarity. So I had to change it.
Don't understand why, because of what I just read on sandman website.
Thanks Paul, I will keep these notes in my cord kit.
KEN

RB

I have not sorted it out completely...yet.
The cord set switchboards reversed the polarity inside the cord unit.
I don't know why.
I believe it was for noise canceling, albeit, in its inf infantsy.
It also, I believe, had something to do with the supervisor lites???
The line cords, plus the jack socket combination, switched it back again.
I too, would like to know the wisdom there...

TelePlay

Quote from: paul-f on July 15, 2018, 08:17:52 PM
Sandman has an interesting description about half way down the page here:   http://www.sandman.com/modcords.html

To complete this discussion, Sandman has a similar interesting description about handset cords near the top of this linked page.

     http://www.sandman.com/modcords.html#ModHandsetCords