Sample Photos—Wiring Closet, Before and After
Many facilities have one or more auxiliary “wiring closets” in addition to the central hub, the computer/communications Room. Each of these auxiliary connection points serves as a “sub-hub” for an area or floor of the building that is at some distance (typically 100 meters or more) from the primary hub. A typical sub-hub is configured as follows:
- Each closet has one or more Ethernet patch panels, each panel having a capacity of 12, 24, 48, or 96 RJ-45 Ethernet jacks.
- Each connected office or other location in the area has one or more wallplates, each wallplate having a capacity of 1,2, or 4 RJ-45 Ethernet jacks.
- Each patch panel jack is connected to a wallplate jack with a Category ("Cat") 5, 5e, or 6 copper cable consisting of four twisted pairs (i.e., 8 conductors). The jacket of this cable may be coated with fire resistant Teflon, referred to as plenum cable, as required by fire regulations to avoid the poisonous fumes of standard polyvinyl chloride (PVC) cable in event of fire.
- Each closet also has one or more Ethernet switches (preferred over Ethernet hubs for superior throughput speeds) that aggregates all of the data and forwards it on a single "backbone" connection to the central switch in the computer/communications room.
In the example shown the auxiliary patch bay is located in a factory room, not a closet, referred to as the “maintenance room.“ This is the critical central connection point for all of the factory's computer-controlled presses, which churn out plastic product parts in three shifts around the clock. Any faults must be quickly isolated to avoid costly production downtime.
