Installing ducting for Virgin cable.

[PaulS]

The house Jo and I are going to buy can only get services through Sky or BT but I want to look into getting Virgin cable installed along the pathway at the end of the drive our house is on.  I would like to install ducting with some rope in it from the pathway to the house so Virgin can pull the cable through.  

As I have never done this before I was wondering if anyone had some advice Eg: what I would need to cut through the road surface, lay the cable, fill it all back in etc down the drive to get to the house.

[Roadkill]

Quoting: PaulS

what I would need to cut through the road surface

9" Angle grinder and the appropriate disc.  You can do it with a electric one (loads of dust) or rent a petrol one with a bowzer.

Is it tarmac or concrete ?

Quoting: PaulS

fill it all back in etc down the drive to get to the house.

Fill with Concrete or a "fast-mac" kinda of stuff, as appropriate, depending on depth and original material.

[Cunning Plan]

You can do that?

I thought that's something Virgin would have to do?

[art b]

have you got a virgin access point at the boundry of the property ...


when virgin installed ours it was put in plastic duct, around 2'' across, then buried in the edge of the lawn, i dug the slot/trench

you could slot the path etc,
then fill it when they have laid the cable and duct in,

[FUBAR]

Baz? ...

1 piece of advise having watched the builders putting the BT ducting in at my house any and all corners need to be large radius bends to be compatible with Fibre Optic cable which isn't very flexible.

From what i've see here if any bends and smaller than a truck tyre thats not enough.

[art b]

the cable virgin use,from the fibre cabinet, is a coax with a twisted pair for the telephone....it can have a small bending radius...

[Cunning Plan]

Quoting: art b

have you got a virgin access point at the boundry of the property ...

[Roadkill]

Probably best to post a picture of the area and the proposed routing . . . . . . .

[Pod]

Every install I've heard of includes virgin getting the cable into the house somewhere. Can't really see any reason or need for anything else.

[Jo]

(have you got a virgin access point at the boundry of the property ...)


No The access point is at the end of the drive, I would have to dig the trench from the pathway on the main road to the house.

[Cunning Plan]

Quoting: Jo

No The access point is at the end of the drive, I would have to dig the trench from the pathway on the main road to the house.

I don't understand Isn't this part of Virgin's job to connect you to their 'service'?

If everyone had to dig up their property to join Virgin, they wouldn't get any customers??

[Jo]

Virgin told us we had to dig the trench.  Don't know how to add a pdf'd pic

[Jo]

http://www.mkb.cc/gallery/displayimage.php?album=89&pos=3\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://www.mkb.cc/gallery/displayimage.php?album=89&pos=3

[Pod]

You need to put the pdf on a website somewhere. Can't remember if the MKB gallery will work with pdf's or not.

http://help.virginmedia.com/system/selfservice.controller?CMD=VIEW_ARTICLE&ARTICLE_ID=419000\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow\">http://help.virginmedia.com/system/selfservice.controller?CMD=VIEW_ARTICLE&ARTICLE_ID=419000

That says:
What happens during installation?

We run a pencil thin cable from our network, underground through your front garden (where appropriate), to an unobtrusive box which we fix to the outside of your home.

[Roadkill]

I suppose the other, relavent, issue is that, dispite the fact you may own the house and garden, quite often you don't own *all* of the garden.  (There's normally a section within the front garden which has services underneath it - this'll be the bit you DON'T own)

You're not permitted to dig up what's not yours . . . refer to the house deeds and the outline plan of your property and surroundings.

[Jo]

Quoting: Pod

You need to put the pdf on a website somewhere. Can't remember if the MKB gallery will work with pdf's or not.

Tried that just got a white box with a red X in, if you guys can see my Album pics is in Jo's pics, I've drawn a plan of our road and the drive and where we need the trench etc.

[Pod]

Ok, I can see the plan you've drawn. (it's a very big picture!)

Unless you own the whole of the road(?) where the red dotted line goes, I can't see how you'd be allowed to dig it up, as Dean says above.

[Titsy]

It that driveway on the deeds for your property or is it part of a covenant for access and on the deeds of another property in the row? My suspicion would be that it's owned by the last house in the row, although it might be common land that is the responsibility of all the house owners that use it as an access road, in which case you would need written permission from either the single owner, or all those to which it services before starting works. Last thing you want to do is start digging it up and piss off your neighbours days after you move in...

[Incursus]

Or just get Sky...

[PaulS]

I thought that might be the case Steve, I am not going to do anything till we move in anyway but when we do I am going to go and ask if i can dig the trench. The way the deed sounds, I think everyone owns a bit of the drive as its the only way to access any of the houses.

[PaulS]

That's a no to sky Chris, I would rather do the leg / manual work to get what I want.

[Roadkill]

ADMIN - QUOTE BUTTON'S STOPPED WORKING !!!

Quoting: PaulS

The way the deed sounds, I think everyone owns a bit of the drive as its the only way to access any of the houses.

Check that.  Often it's simplier and easier for developers to designate "shared" access points to one household, despite several needing to use it.

Chances are you may not have any claim to it at all !

In order to use it there'll be a covenant within the deeds stating that the "owner" must allow neighbours access.  This'll be in place when the house is first sold.

[Jo]

Quoting: Roadkill

Check that. Often it's simplier and easier for developers to designate "shared" access points to one household, despite several needing to use it.

Chances are you may not have any claim to it at all !

In order to use it there'll be a covenant within the deeds stating that the "owner" must allow neighbours access. This'll be in place when the house is first sold

had a look and cannot see this, so have asked our solicitor to clarify.

[Jamieg285]

Could this be the difference between just doing the job, and doing it properly?

A few years ago our VM phone line died.  They came out to repair and laid a cable in the ground - just that though. A unprotected cable, probably less than a foot down.

Move on a bit and we had BT install a new phone line for us.  They dug a proper trench (about 6" wide, not sure how deep) and put in a conduit and fed the line through it.

It might be that if you want it properly protected you need to do it yourself?

[Incursus]

Quoting: Roadkill

ADMIN - QUOTE BUTTON'S STOPPED WORKING !!!