Thursday, April 16, 2009

How do I wire a existing phone line to become an extension on my main number?

I have two phone lines. The second line is not in service any more. I want to make the second phone line an extension of the first line. How do I connect the wires?


This answer assumes some things, primarily that your phone system is residential or small commercial, and does not have one of those huge boxes inside which has dozens of wires connected to terminals.

There may be a box outside (attached to ext. wall) your building which is the service entrance to your system. It may have an imprint with the name of a manufacturer (Western Electric, AT7T) or the name of your local telephone carrier. Open the door to that box. Inside you will see a small cable coming in from the street with several small gauge coated wires. You will also see a few sets of two terminals (the things the wires are wrapped around and tightened by screws).

The box will contain at least two sets of two terminals each, to each of which is attached one of those small gauge colored wires from the entrance cable, and another similar wire going into the building. One set of two terminals carries the signal of the phone line that works. The other set is for the line no longer in use.

Being careful to remember which wire is connected to which terminal (draw a diagram), remove the wires from one set of terminals. Then see if your phone works. If not, you know that those terminals control the live phone signal. If so, reconnect the wires and disconnect the wires to another set of terminals. Continue until you locate the controlling terminals.

Then disconnect the wires that lead from the other terminal/s into the building and connect them to the controlling terminals, one wire per terminal. What you will have accomplished is to connect all the phone jacks in the building to the controlling terminals.

This work is not as difficult to perform as it is to explain.

Telephone line current is small, so you don't have to worry about shock. But do not confuse the box with the electric power service entrance.

If in doubt, contact an office supply which sells small commercial multi-line telephone systems, adn ask for a referral to a qualified installer.

I do not think that there is an option to do this. This is simply because the Phone Service Providers do not give the general public the option to use any number they like as their phone extension or something.

If you want you can use the same number on two different phones but this does not still mean that you can use the second line. The one line that you have( the one that works ) can be split at the junction level to give you two separate lines with same phone number.

This would also mean that whenever someone calls your existing valid number , both the phones will ring simultaneously.

Purchase a splitter at an electronics store. is easy peezy, has instructions and everything.

Telephones communicate on a pair of wires. Your primary number will be on one pair of wires, & the 2nd number on a 2nd pair comming into your house. I am going to assume that you are in a single detached dwelling & not in an apartment where it could get a little more complicated.

The simplist way is to find the main connecting block (or demarcation point) in your house. Depending on when the 2nd line was installed in your home you may find a 2nd connecting block. Now since you don't have a lineman's test set (Butt set) you will need to determine the difference between your primary & 2nd phone lines, through trial & error. At the block carefully figure out which wires are comming in from outside, & which ones are going to the phone jack(s) in your house. You can usually do this by simply looking at them & tracing the direction that the wires go in. Another tip off is that the wires comming in from outside are thick & black in colour, while the ones for inside the house are smaller with either a Red, Green, Black, Yellow combination, or a White/Blue, & White/Orange combination.

Once you have identified the difference between the outside & inside wires, loosen the screws & disconnect all of the inside wires from the block. Pay attention as to which side of the block the wires came from, as you might want to get them back on the same terminal. Don't worry if you feel a little shock, it's only 50 volts DC & won't hurt you, especially if you can avoid grounding yourself while handling the wires.

After the wires are disconnected, go to the phone that you know was working, & pick it up. If you hear dialtone, then the wires you disconnected are for the 2nd line. If you don't hear dialtone, then you have just been working on the primary block.

Once you know the difference, you will be able to take all of the inside wires off of the 2nd phone line & connect them (in Parallell) to the primary phone line. Now with all of the inside wires connected to the primary block, you should be able to hear dialtone on both of your telephones instead of just one.

There are many ways to configure telephone wiring in a home or place of business, I have addressed the most common way that I have seen it done in my 35yr of experience. If any of this doesn't jive with your own place then you may have to re-ask your question or do a little more research before you mess up your phone service.

Here's another tip that should help. At phone jacks Red & Green are usually one pair (Often the primary) or the Blue/White pair. The 2nd line is usually on the Black & Yellow pair, or the Orange/White pair.

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