Running cat5 in wet areas

[half_derpy]

Hi there. So, I wanted to really talk about running cat5 outdoor. Sure, there are numerous threads around the old internet about it, but I wanted to talk about my case as it seems slightly different.

So, as some of you know from my other threads, I have been dealing with an incessant network issue of speed drop via wifi.

Long story short, I live in a mother in law type home. There is the main home, and then this house which is about 60 feet away from the other house. We are not wired for internet here, so we just connect to wifi fromt he main house. It's okay, but our down/up speed drop is usually 60-80%! It's pretty outrageous. We get 50 megabit internet here, but I see at MOST 20, but usually around 10.

So, I was looking into a few options and have tried wifi repeaters, better routers and such and nothing worked. So I decided maybe I should just run a long ass cable and hardwire. However, I live in a very rainy/wet area. We are near floodlands and our grounds are usually wet, even in summer. So, I'd have to bury cable from their house in the sopping wet ground, then run it to my house.

I know they make direct burial cable, but it seems like with the location that I live, burying cable is simply not a realistic answer.

So, two questions:

Can I actually bury direct burial cable in sopping wet dirt without anything else (im not worried about cutting into it. This is a somewhat temporary answer. 2 years tops) or should I just get a standard cat5 and run it along the fence where it won't ALWAYS be in wet water, but it would get rained/snowed on/beaten with sun rays?

 

[john-b691]

Burying normal ethernet cable with no conduit is asking for water problems. Since the voltage is so low there are no code requirements so any plastic tubing would work. Cheap sprinkler pipe comes in 20ft sections and can be easily glued. My brother used a garden hose to cross a small pond he didn't want to dig up. Direct bury ethernet tends to be so expensive you end up saving money running pipe.

I have had normal ethernet cable going up the side of a 30ft tower unprotected for almost 5 years. Figured if it fails I can just rerun it so your fence plan will most likely be the simplest even if you need to rerun it every couple years....I hate digging....

 

[half_derpy]

Yeah, I am pretty familiar with PVC piping. I'm not sure if that's the route I'd like to go though.

So, as far as running cabling across the outer fence, how well and safe does standard cat5 hold up to snow/fairly heavy rain? Also, if it does deteriorate badly, what happens? Will it fry my modem/router? Or would it just stop working?

 

[half_derpy]

So, home depot sells this indoor/outdoor cat5 cable (uncrimped) and I dunno if it's worth it though. has anyone tried it and would it be safe as a direct burial? It doesn't have the gel cover on each of the cables though.

 

[half_derpy]

Sorry to trip-post but I just had an idea. What if I wrapped the part of the cat5 that is to be outside in electrical or duct tape to keep it water tight? Would that be a viable solution? It seems like it'd work to me, but I have no knowledge of these things

 

[hometownfl]

Sorry to trip-post but I just had an idea. What if I wrapped the part of the cat5 that is to be outside in electrical or duct tape to keep it water tight? Would that be a viable solution? It seems like it'd work to me, but I have no knowledge of these things

LOL, Cat5 cable is coated in has a plastic jacket, so it's completely waterproof, except for the ends. The real issue with outdoor cable is going to be the sun. UV exposure will deteriorate the plastic on regular indoor cable within weeks if you leave it outside. This is the main reason for using outdoor-rated cable; it is UV protected for long-term outdoor exposure.

Personally, I think conduit is the best solution for such a short cable run. It will protect it from people digging, rodents, etc. Plus you can use indoor cable in the conduit, run multiple lines in one pipe if needed, and can easily pull another cable through if one goes bad for some reason.

Another solution that we use all the time at our resorts is using existing phone lines. Is there a phone line that goes out to the other house? If you can figure out where it starts and where it ends, you can use a couple of VDSL2 modems like these from Panoptic: http://www.panoptictechnology.com/smart-room-network-v2c2/

With a pair of those, you can send both voice and data through a single phone line and get speeds up to 100Mbps.

It may be cheaper overall to run a Cat5 cable, but the VDSL solution will save you the trouble of digging and laying conduit.

 

[half_derpy]

LOL, Cat5 cable is coated in has a plastic jacket, so it's completely waterproof, except for the ends. The real issue with outdoor cable is going to be the sun. UV exposure will deteriorate the plastic on regular indoor cable within weeks if you leave it outside. This is the main reason for using outdoor-rated cable; it is UV protected for long-term outdoor exposure.

Personally, I think conduit is the best solution for such a short cable run. It will protect it from people digging, rodents, etc. Plus you can use indoor cable in the conduit, run multiple lines in one pipe if needed, and can easily pull another cable through if one goes bad for some reason.

Another solution that we use all the time at our resorts is using existing phone lines. Is there a phone line that goes out to the other house? If you can figure out where it starts and where it ends, you can use a couple of VDSL2 modems like these from Panoptic: http://www.panoptictechnology.com/smart-room-network-v2c2/

With a pair of those, you can send both voice and data through a single phone line and get speeds up to 100Mbps.

It may be cheaper overall to run a Cat5 cable, but the VDSL solution will save you the trouble of digging and laying conduit.

Unfortunately no, there is no phone line here, or even at the main house. We just have internet and cable, but even then, the cables are not shared to this home.

I only ask about the waterproof-ness of Cat5 because again, I live in an area where it rains 200+ days of the year and sometimes it will rain for weeks on end and I don't want to fry my router/modem or cause some sort of an electrical issue.

 

[john-b691]

Water will get into the cable eventually. The water itself does not do much to the plastic coatings it is more dirt that has things in it that damage the plastic and can cause a short. Ethernet seems to tolerate complete shorts and cause no damage. Many times I have seen cables damaged or miswired and everything was fine after it was corrected. I would not attempt PoE where you could get a short that is quite high voltage if it shorted to something not designed to take that much voltage