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I'm in the middle of remodeling my home and am wondering if there is anything that would be ideal to do now that would make a fiber install later more straightforward.

My main concerns are with the exterior, both aesthetics and pursuing modern practices for preserving the house's air and thermal envelopes (not a building science expert, hopefully I got that right). For example, I want to be able to properly flash and seal penetrations rather than some service tech drilling through my exterior walls later).

isherwood
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Wilco
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2 Answers2

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Run conduit, with nice long sweeps for bends. Depending on your actual fiber provider, some modern fiber intended to connect the end of the line in your house can take much sharper bends than older fiber types, but not all fiber providers use the nice stuff, so if you accommodate things so that no sharp bends are needed it will work with whatever they show up expecting to use.

3/4" diameter is safer than 1/2" if they expect to run terminated fiber, but most installers run unterminated fiber and splice on a connector. Bigger is fine, up to the point that it's pointless overkill (Past 2" for a ballpark figure on the break between mere overkill and utterly pointless overkill for a house.) With the right fiber (but you don't know what they will bring) 1/2" conduit is plenty.

Pack the end of the conduit with duct seal (a non-hardening putty made for the job) and make sure your provider removes & saves it and repacks it around their cable after running it. That deals with air and bugs using the conduit as a highway.

Ecnerwal
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    Blow a string through it too in case you decide to pull the cable. Some companies charge a lot to pull into your house. – JACK Dec 12 '21 at 23:19
  • yeah, they're using miroduct here, for buried fibre here (about 3mm internal diameter) – Jasen Dec 12 '21 at 23:36
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    Yup. This sort of application is exactly what conduit is for. Or for that matter, the Ethernet with the "Cat whatever" cable that seems to change every week. – Harper - Reinstate Monica Dec 12 '21 at 23:41
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    Conduit is the right answer. I got this tip from a builder: when doing new construction, don't use your "future expansion" conduit to run your **initial** ethernet cables. Leave the conduit empty (or with a string) for future expansion, and put the ethernet alongside (not inside) the conduit. As long as the walls are open, it's pointless to put the ethernet inside the conduit and it only makes it **harder** to pull a second cable/fiber later. It's far easier to abandon the ethernet a few years from now, than try to work-around it, in a conduit, when pulling something else later. – whiskeychief Dec 13 '21 at 12:19
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    I'd be shocked if any telcos are installing anything but [ruggedized fibre](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UBt00CVvMBA) in 2021. That stuff is ubiquitous, cheap, and basically invincible - you can staple it to studs, pull it with fish tape, and put hard bends in it with no problems. It's almost tougher than ethernet cable. It was new 15 years ago but it's everywhere today. – J... Dec 13 '21 at 12:20
  • Life can be shocking. The cable TV company (which certainly does fiber in some markets now) ran a "state of the 1960s art" fat-coax-with-pole-amplifier-boxes cable up our road in 201? instead of running fiber. A real head-scratcher for a new line in that time period, as fiber was already far cheaper (and more capable) than cable and does not require nearly the level of (or in most markets, any) pole-mount amplifier boxes, each with a power meter and maintenance to pay for. – Ecnerwal Dec 13 '21 at 15:02
  • @Ecnerwal The companies are often stuck in their ways. Comcast/Xfinity (Maryland) AFAIK is still pretty much coax everywhere. They've got super-fast speeds now, but they do coax and Verizon does fiber. I suspect that even on new buildings/subdivisions/etc. they stick with coax simply because it means everyone in the service area uses the exact same modem/router/etc. boxes, making after-installation support a lot easier. – manassehkatz-Moving 2 Codidact Dec 13 '21 at 15:18
  • @Ecnerwal Yes, but the value proposition to the telco there is obvious. Installing ultra-sensitive lab fiber in residences, though, is just asking for a 10x cost burn on service calls every time a mouse steps on a fibre. There's no logical reason that telcos would want anything in a customer's house that will fail so easily because they'll be the ones on the hook when it all goes wrong. – J... Dec 13 '21 at 15:18
  • I just had fiber installed to replace my Comcra... service, @J... The tech was in and out of our crawlspace in minutes. While there's working room down there, it's not the best place to be. I was _shocked_ at how fast he got that done. My point being that he wasn't being careful with super fragile cable. – FreeMan Dec 13 '21 at 15:30
  • @FreeMan Yep - I pulled my own fibre through my crawlspace, then fished and pulled it about 50ft through two walls, a top plate, and through a wall stud with just keyholes in under an hour. Conduit is, of course, nice, but modern fibre is really tough stuff and doesn't need to be babied at all. – J... Dec 13 '21 at 15:42
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Your bare-minimum is to drill 10-14mm in-line holes through top/bottom plates and any dwangs/studs. Deburr the holes, and add chafe protection on metal framing. Run non-degrading string/cords through the holes, and in the ceiling space tie them off to a rafter or nail.

If you have a concrete floor slab, then consider putting a blanking plate on the wall near the floor for access. For a floor with a crawl space underneath, tie or staple them to something. Consider taking photos and mark on your plans where these draw strings are.

Personally I prefer to pull cables down rather than up, so that gravity can help.

If this is a wall with insulation or noise-suppression inside, then the packing could settle and block the cords from pulling in wires/fibres later.

Also contact your local fibre provider before work starts. Locally to me, they will come and pre-wire the fibre lead-in from the street during the build process. This is easier all-round where suitable. Never hurts to inquire.

Criggie
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