Rather than clogging up the random sh!t thread, I thought I'd post this here.

Synopsis so far:

Right, today I decided to tackle this bell wire issue. The orange wire is the wrong wire. If it had been a bomb, we'd have all been blown up by now. Orange wire goes into #2:



Disconnecting it as above caused my internet to bug out. I did not bother to check the phones.

So now I'm stuck. What do all of the other wires do?

Wire layout as I can see it:

1. grey wire with orange stripes
2. two orange wires with white stripes
3. grey wire with green stripes
4. one grey wire with green stripes and one grey wire with orange stripes
5. two blue wires
6. grey wire with blue stripes

Any ideas?

Sounds like it's not wired up using the normal layout. This isn't great news for the broadband, because it means it's not using the twisted pairs correctly.

2 and 5 are the only connections you need you need on any of the sockets, and they should be blue / white. All the others can be disconnected.

I'd be inclined to check the other two sockets first before proceeding, if you need them to keep working. Although that is a "master socket" it doesn't look like it's actually the master socket. Those are internal cables, so I'd guess one goes to the other extension and one to the true master socket in a "daisy chain".

The external cable coming into the building should have a black outer insulation. Additionally, like I say, the colours are wrong. 5 should be connected to White with Blue stripes and not the orange. Look like the extensions were fitted by someone not properly qualified..?

btw - when you say "grey" I'll say "white" - they're just dirty

Wouldn't surprise me re:wiring. I gather the house was fire-damaged at some point and rebuilt. Suspect the wiring would have been dealt with at that point (would have been mid-late 70s).

Will have a look at the other two sockets at some point - both are behind large bits of furniture and hence not very easy to access. How wide is the black wire meant to be? There are lots of wires running everywhere in the garage, fastened to one wall. Is it possible to have a master socket there?

The wire would usually be a 3 or 4 pair about the same size as the white ones. It's very unusual to have a master in the garage. If it comes from a pole then it should be easy to track down. If it's underground then it would usually come through the wall near the floor.

It could be that there is no genuine BT master socket, and the BT cable has been bodged onto some of the white cable where it comes in.

Right, that socket is fed through from the garage (other side of the wall). Following that wire shows it joins up to this:



This is what then seems to go outside. Outside, there's a black plastic cylindrical connectory thing that I now remember OpenReach installed when we were having telephone line problems. The telephone line comes to connect this.

I will double check with the other sockets but I think this is how it's all been wired up. Is it worth me opening that green box up to look for a bell wire in there?

OK so what I'd do:

Open the junction box and identify the wire going inside to the socket. There should only be two wires coming from the street. Pull off the orange and connect the white wire with blue stripes. The blue wire with white stripes is already connected.

On all 3 line boxes in the house, connect the blue/white to 5 and the white/blue to 2.
5 is already connected correctly on the photo.

Leave all other wires disconnected. You only need one pair - the blue pair.

The way it is now will work for phones, but it's split the signal across two pairs. That's not good for broadband. The whole point of twisted pairs is to reduce interference and improve the signal strength by giving a continuous impedance.

Stupid Q but can I get electrocuted?
Also, with junction box, do you mean the black thing or the green thing I posted?

I mean the little thing in the garage. It might be green, not sure from that picture!

You can get a slight nip if someone calls you (90 volts AC) but it's very low current and would just make you jump if you were properly touching both wires. I wouldn't lick the wires if I were you, that might smart a little. Nothing dangerous.

It does - I know this from personal experience

As for the wiring, JJ is correct. For the sake of clarity, you will have a twin conductor bell wire coming from the street. Connect one of these conductors to the blue wire with white stripes and the other to the white wire with blue stripes. Then all the way through your network, make sure that:

• Blue with white stripes is only connected to blue with white stripes
• Blue with white stripes is always connected to terminal 5
• White with blue stripes is only connected to white with blue stripes
• White with blue stripes is always connected to terminal 2
• no other wires are connected

Well, I cracked open the green box and promptly put the cover back on again! This is what I was faced with:




I think I need to save it for another day when I have more time.

Looks about right. You just need to disconnect the orange/white from the top right, then connect the white/blue in it's place.

Then inside, on every socket disconnect all the wires except the blue/white on 5 and the white/blue on 2

If you're close to the exchange then the difference might be marginal, but if the ADSL signal is a little weak then you might see quite a big difference.

Define "close to the exchange". I'm about 2.5-3 miles away.

That's far away