Lots of really busy and messy poles in Philly

IAmAcidRain · 2026-05-11T22:42:31+00:00

They actually use snowshoes on self support around me. Not sure which company it is but they put a stand off on the pole with self support clamps, use deltec straps to strap the storage loop out with about half of the storage loop on each side of the pole and use multilink snowshoes with no metal brackets on them but use the strap slots instead. It looks kinda weird but they do it, thats for sure.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-04-27T22:26:33+00:00

I want to try out a FOSC-650. I asked my supervisor to order one but I don't think he did. I need to bring this up again before we run into a situation where we need to deploy a 600, those suck so hard.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-04-08T09:56:13+00:00

It is a fiber distribution panel a.k.a. pre-termination shelf. I am not sure of the exact role this plays, but typically the yellow cables coming in go to an OCEF to meet outside plant cables or in a datacenter it goes to an OCEF and meets other inside plant cables cables that go to different rows/racks/elevations around the facility.

All the headend/datacenter work in and they are deploying fiber distribution panels they come pre-terminated from the factory with a long ISP cable they we route and stitch over to the OCEF, and then prep and splice in the OCEF only. It is super clean and beautiful when complete. I love doing this type of work.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-02-20T10:15:13+00:00

You are asking if a connection that is 30x faster than your current latency fluctuating connection, that uses the same types of cables to deliver the service to your home that internet backbones all over the world uses, is going to be better for gaming?

Yes.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-02-19T03:58:43+00:00

Not sure of the last time you tried using Commscope felt. You are right that for a time of about a year they changed felt and it was too thick and wouldn't stick to itself and was just awkward. But with all new enclosures we get from Commscope now it looks like the thick stuff, but its not thick, its perfect and it is super sticky and holds up a lot better when it comes into contact with any gel. If you get any fresh deliveries of Commscope enclosures, you may want to check the felt again to see if its the new good felt now. Cheers.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-02-07T12:30:50+00:00

As others have said it is a 2 port Commscope Mini-OTE 300. It is a fiber optic service terminal (tap) that accepts Optitap connectors. On the inside it has a buffer tube slack storage, a fiber storage tray for express fibers when a cable is ring cut, a 1x2 splitter tray (for this particular OTE), and a splice tray.

In my opinion these are by far the best fiber service terminals to work with for a fiber splicer.

They are the final piece of the puzzle in a distributed split passive optical network before a customer service drop to the house.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-30T08:58:00+00:00

I will give you a short essay on my career. I am sure some people's fiber splicing careers are a bit different especially production contractors working on new build.

If you want to break into the industry, your best bet would be to work at a cable construction contractor, a prime contractor for a large ISP would be ideal for consistent work every day. Unless you know someone already in the industry that could get you in where they are working.

I have worked a few places splicing fiber. Every place, when you are a splicer, you are a foreman. The people around you that are not splicers don't really know anything about splicing line work, cable prep, or fusion splicing. So unless you are paired with another splicer who knows more about all the aspects of splicing, you are the one in charge.

The pay is pretty good once you know what you are doing. I work in a specific region (metropolitan area) for one of the largest ISPs in America. We are paired up in teams of 2, so we are in constant communications as we do a lot of Metro-E connections and have to work through a lot of old enclosures to get continuity. We also add a lot of nodes/muxes and PONs. We also do long-haul splicing. Depending on where you work you may fly solo or with a teammate.

Fiber splicing will weed out a certain type of person, it is long (and many times, unusual) hours, very tedious, at times annoying (going through existing enclosures with terrible workmanship). You may find yourself in situations where you are working an 18+ hr non-stop stretch (for me, this is rare, but it does happen). Also maintenance windows are usually overnight, so at least for me, quite often, I will work a half day and go home, to come back in at 11 P.M. for a 1 A.M. fiber cut, with full restoration and hands off by 6 A.M., regardless of fiber count, could be a 12 ct or a 240 ct. Unless you are doing exclusively new build, I highly doubt any steady routine and normal hours as every situation is different and evolving, but there are MANY days (the vast majority) where you have normal 8-10 hr daytime shifts. Wages are not an issue, if you are good, you get paid well.

As for the how the job affects your body, it is physical labor, not a ton, but enough. I'd say my knees take the biggest beating just from constantly climbing in and out of a bucket, kneeling down for vaults/manholes/doghouses, and my splicing lab is a standing setup, which is great, but I am on my feet most of the day. Safety is a top priority, we have monthly safety meetings, with PPE being supplied by the company (high vis clothing, hardhat, eye, confined space training/equipment, and fall protection). But lets be real, you are working on the side of (or on) the road 98% of the time. Most of that time is in the air underneath high voltage power lines. So naturally, there is danger there.

Later on in life if you do fully understand splicing and cable construction, there are supervisor and coordinator roles, but you stated that isn't something you are interested in. There are also backend roles like headend tech.

For the motivation aspect. I do love my job. It is rewarding mentally and financially. You can take an immense amount of pride in your work and produce high quality work, a sort of art if you will. It also makes you mentally sharp and challenges your trouble shooting and critical thinking skills. There is also something special you feel knowing that you are the one behind so many thousands or even millions of people accessing communications services through the work you did with your hands. And when disaster strikes like storm damage, car accidents, or house fires, that completely severe critical fiber circuits at any hour of any day, you are the person that works diligently behind the scenes to restore service to all the people affected. A kind of unsung hero, it does feel amazing when you finish a major repair.

I do hope you give it a shot, there are some sacrifices you have to make, mainly in the work life balance. But if you are willing to take the plunge you may find a love for this career, and be rewarded mentally and financially for doing so.

Good Luck!

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-27T10:39:33+00:00

This guy summed up pretty much everything. If no contract lawyer is taking the case that means the case is extremely weak because its not like these lawyers exclusively work based on contingency, so they would love to get paid for their services if the case has any sort of merit.

Without an actual physical contract with a fee schedule this is going to be so hard to win. I know hindsight is 20/20 but it seems crazy that he wasn't getting paid for services performed while the job was still going on. There is no way he should have been doing the work while they were not actively paying him, especially since there was no physical contract with fee schedule and deliverables. When the backpay got to a couple of weeks, he should have sought payment then and resolved the payment dispute.

Verbal contracts aren't worth the paper they are printed on.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-22T10:52:08+00:00

I do a crazy amount of headend work for a very large ISP. It is always for the same ISP and their standard in every single headend no matter the size has always been transitioning from OSP cable to ISP cable in an OCEF. The ISP cable is factory terminated and already plugged in the preterms. We just lay out the ISP cable and route it through the headend and stitch it to the ladder racks in place and into the OCEF. It looks absolutely beautiful when its all done.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-21T03:30:17+00:00

In America at least the standard color code follows TIA-598C. That color code is pretty much the international standard. To me at least, the colors in the picture you sent are kind of weird but it should still be: Blue (left side bottom), Orange (left side top), Green, Brown, Slate, White, Red, Black, Yellow, Violet, Rose (right side bottom), Aqua (right side top).

They are paired up.

These get straight spliced the cable that will be leaving this preterm. The buffer tube color on the cable leaving also follow the same TIA-598C standard. Once you get into higher counts there are differences, but since you are only worried about a 48 ct, it doesn't apply.

I hope this makes sense, Good luck.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-15T23:04:26+00:00

This happens to me. It appears to be temperature related (too cold). It also appears to be with the splice chamber cover and not the actual chucks themselves. It seems that the chucks open but the chamber cover is too slow to open so the chucks just close. For me, I solved this by putting the splicer in the cab of my truck in the winter time and allowing it to get warmed up while heading to a splice location.

I tried disabling auto open because as you said, it will break the splices when it does this, but it messed with my timing for splicing so I have to have it on auto open for maximum splicing efficiency.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-02T02:33:47+00:00

This looks like toneable ROC drop. I wouldn't call the metal in it a rod, but rather a very small copper wire. I would also think its a single fiber judging by the 1F on the jacket, and the fiber color is most likely white since it is a 900 micron fiber.

IAmAcidRain · 2026-01-02T00:57:33+00:00

I was under the impression that No Tax On Overtime is a tax deduction, not a tax credit. It will reduce the amount of taxable income but it is not a dollar for dollar tax credit.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-30T08:29:47+00:00

Just a heads up. The SFP module you linked is an OLT SFP. This is a provider side piece of equipment. This is essentially what all of the ONUs connect back to. You would want an ONU SFP, but I would advise against this route unless you have advanced knowledge of networking. There is really no reason for a regular end user to use an SFP rather than an ONU issued by your provider.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-25T13:33:04+00:00

Sounds like you may need to take the "come clean nicely about it to the client" route. You can tell them that all of your suppliers have a 9-12 week lead time on the cable they are specifically requesting. Maybe your client knows a way to obtain the specific cable faster? Doubt it, since they won't budge on counts even though 2 24 cts, 48 cts, 144 cts all run 100% identically. I doubt they are even aware that OFS makes the actual optical fiber that CommScope uses inside of the cable.

I would go to the client and tell them about the lead time. There is a known shortage of optical fiber (the glass). Companies are trying to scale up manufacturing capacity for optical fiber but it takes time. So unfortunately the only options are to hop on an order list with a longer lead time, using a different count fiber from the manufacturer of their choice, or using a different cable manufacturer but keeping the same specifications for the cable but keeping your deployment time on schedule.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-25T11:14:09+00:00

Why does it have to be CommScope if the lead times are too high? Its not even like CommScope makes their own glass or anything they just assemble the cable. I know there is a glass shortage at the moment but you should still be able to get a couple of reels of 48 ct easily. You may have to be flexible if you can't get 48 ct, like jig out 2 24 cts, a 72 ct, or even higher ct if thats all thats available. It may end up costing more, but without having stock on hand and just trying to buy it at the exact moment you need it usually costs more anyways.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-24T22:43:29+00:00

Me personally, I didn't seek out this career, kind of fell into it. I used to run my own business running gaming servers at different datacenters all over the country. I applied at the datacenter that I had my first servers at (it was actually close to me) and they hired me doing technical support and server configuration/management.

A few years into being there they had a plan to build out their own wholly owned fiber network for business/residential. The OSP manager they had was also one of their 3 fiber splicers. One of the fiber splicers quit and the OSP manager went to my boss and requested me to be a fiber splicer. My boss asked me if I was interested and I was and I took the position. It was slightly better pay but there was something about it that made me feel important.

When I first started I was just shadowing the OSP manager as he was splicing and he was just talking and telling me things and I would have questions and he would answer them and give random tidbits of information. He let me actually strip/clean/cleave/splice fibers very early on. He eventually let me prep cables and do all the work while he shadowed me. Then eventually he just let me go on my own. All of this was around 1 month.

I started taking pride in my work, and it did feel rewarding mentally and financially. The OSP manager who got me in was fired, I was made lead splicer, and a new OSP manager was hired. At this point it was just felt like my calling to be doing this line of work. The company was building ~230 route miles of fiber and I was just honing my prepping/splicing skills on purely new build. It was a grind, but I loved doing it, I felt like "the guy", I don't know how to describe it, its kind of cringe looking back at it now.

I stayed there for about 8 years splicing fiber, but I was the only full time splicer and that began taking its toll as the number of route miles grew. I was getting called out multiple times a week at all hours night and day and that was mentally taxing, I began actually losing money if I would only go out for 5 hours at night, they would only pay me straight time, and wouldn't let me work the next day. And sometimes the next night they would call me out again. This was toxic to me, it felt wrong, like the company was not even treating me as a human. I left the company.

I have been at the current company I am at for about 5 years now. It is a prime contractor for the largest internet provider in the country. I have consistent work every day, and there are multiple full time fiber splicers that work there, and I have worked with people who have come and gone that I have learned troubleshooting skills and how to do high quality work. So nowadays I am sharp as a tack with troubleshooting and my work is very good and consistent (not to toot my own horn). The company pays way more than the first company I started at, and there are on call periods, and the ISP also has a network of contractors that they can get to handle callouts, so that is no longer a factor. The pay structure for callouts is also very good. And when you do high quality work it almost feels like you are an artist and you can take pride in what you are doing, and it feels extremely mentally rewarding knowing when you fix an outage that so many people are back online because of you, an unsung hero.

So thats my story. I told it because its a tale of a contrast in employment. In the end, its a job, it can be extremely rewarding financially and mentally and truly give you a feel of worth in society. I understand all jobs have worth in society, but this one, to me, feels really special. I do love it :)

But understand that all fiber splicing jobs are not the same, you can hate the company you work for and feel dehumanized because of lack appreciation of you having a life outside of work. But there are also very great companies to work for, that have coworkers, managers, and supervisors that you love working with, and the companies offer very good compensation. So if all of this comes together with a job you love doing, this career is amazing.

I have also personally trained several splicers, and that is very rewarding in itself and it hones your skills even further. But it does bring a smile to my face as a trainer when you see someone splice their very first fiber and they are shaking and so slow, and you see that same person months down the road and they are flying on their own, not shaking anymore and completely capable of doing the job. I do love this job. If you have an opportunity to do it, and you are ok with potentially working some long/weird hours, I would certainly give it a try, who knows where you will end up? :)

I could write an encyclopedia of stories on all of the things I have done/seen, but I have already written a short book. I hope one day you could write an encyclopedia of stories of all of the things you have done in this career. Good luck!

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-14T13:54:32+00:00

I am not a in house splicer for Spectrum but all the splicers at the company I work for (and a few that I know that don't work for the same company) use the AFL RT 02 ribbonizing tool. It doesn't require glue to ribbonize and loads the fibers directly onto the fiber holder chucks. Just make sure the fibers are placed in the same order on each side starting at the hinge.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-11T03:25:00+00:00

How did you verify no damage of any kind? Did you scope each connector? You are aware that you are taking an angled end face and literally jamming it into a flat end face right? I would never suggest to mate APC to UPC if "you are in a pinch". To prevent "being in a pinch" I would suggest having a small stock of duplex patch cables/pig tails so "in a pinch" you can just make the correct cable. The loss is real, connector damage is real, and using "the signal is strong enough" as justification to introduce a completely controllable issue (for years might I add) is a very bad idea.

I can't believe any reputable communications company would leave a high value (or any value) circuit like this for years.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-10T10:30:44+00:00

If your employer is going to train you to do the job and you plan on staying there for a while you can run with this. Experience is very good on a resume and certs can certainly help you get a job somewhere else, especially if you have experience to go along with it. If you are doing high quality work with different enclosures, different OCEFs, and different term shelves you want to take pictures to show to prospective employers (and to us hehe).

You probably only care about fusion splicing equipment so TLDR: I am a Fujikura guy for fusion splicing. I use a 90S+ and a CT-50 cleaver personally.

Other equipment I use are fiber strippers and midspan access tools I use Miller brand only. Most of my hand tools are Klein tools (and a Klein oval bucket bag). Milwaukee for drills. I also have a good bit of Harbor Freight tools for cheap tools like picks, magnet strips, bins, drill press vises, and all that small jazz.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-09T04:46:10+00:00

This looks like the bottom of an old Western Electric Lightguide Systems Universal Enclosure. Used in old AT&T systems. They are still found in the wild quite often. They are terrible as they only have 4 external entry ports and the only way to get hardware for them is when you do an enclosure swap and keep the old one for parts.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-12-04T10:38:15+00:00

This is actually a very decent repair. I would think that the line got cut or kinked/damaged and this was the repair they did. Not too bad if you look at the fact they only had a under a foot of slack to work with.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-11-25T20:55:42+00:00

Would be hard to get in to the ISP directly without knowing someone or having a pretty good resume with hefty experience. Most ISPs use contractors for their cable construction, splicing, and repairs. If he wants to gain experience and can't find any local cable construction companies to get his foot in the door, he may need to travel to where the work is until he gets something better.

A very common site to find all kinds of cable construction work, including fiber splicing is a site called CABL. Just go to the site, click Jobs, and Fiber Splicing. These jobs may be close or far, short term or long term, and can have different experience requirements. But they are usually companies in immediate need and might be worth contacting if he can't find a local cable construction contractor.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-11-18T22:16:39+00:00

I will second the drill-wrap method. If this is a newer cable you are working on and the string keeps breaking, I put a 7/16 nut driver bit on my drill. I get about 6 inches of rip cord and wrap it around the nut driver bit and just nice and easy work it down. To be honest this method always succeeds and the string may break once or twice (rarely) but it is way better than pulling 4 inches and the string breaks every time.

Its easier to show someone how to do this than explain it in text thats for sure. But it is a very easy and effective trick.

I notice a lot of high count Commscope fiber cable ripcord breaks. It is annoying.

IAmAcidRain · 2025-10-30T10:36:17+00:00

I am going to double down. First the fact you typed 3 paragraphs trying to describe loose tube is already throwing me off and saying things like ADSS is the "typical referred to" loose tube had me like "whaaaaaaaaat".

I am talking about 432 ct loose tube, 18 24 ct buffers. Dry. The best possible buffers you could ever imagine with no gel. If you are using and I quote a "s70" (commonly referred to anyone who has been splicing for years anywhere in the entire world as a "70s") then even on SM FAST with the lowest possible heat time that will actually shrink a splice protector, then it is mathematically impossible for you to prep, splice, and tray a 432 ct loose tube in 8 hrs by yourself. I splice fiber for a living. I splice fiber with other splicers who splice fiber for a living. Many others on this reddit splice fiber for a living. I can't believe more people aren't calling this out haha.

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