case study

225,000 Metres of Blown Fibre
Multi Campus Environment
14 Week Project

Manchester University

About the University of Manchester

The University of Manchester has been created by bringing together The Victoria University of Manchester and UMIST, two of Britain's most distinguished universities, to create a powerful new force in British Higher Education.
The new merged University has been established with an unprecedented £300m investment programme. With some of the highest quality teaching and research and the broadest spread of academic subjects, we will be able to compete with the best universities in the world. The new institution is expected to be the largest single-site university in the UK.

The Project

As part of the development of the University Campus, some of the existing buildings had to be demolished to make way for new buildings. In order for this to be done, all existing data and telecom cables, which either ran into, or directly through the buildings, had to be removed.

The Installation

In order for the cables to be removed without disruption to existing networks, 7core Blown Fibre tubes were installed into new ducts and routed around the perimeter of the area to be demolished and new fibre optic bundles were installed to all areas where the old cables were connected.

At the University of Manchester, the Singlemode fibres are predominately used to link buildings together and the Multimode fibres are used for internal links between active equipment. Also there have been many times at the University where a previously installed fibre which has become surplus to requirements has been blown partly out of its tube and re-blown to another location.

The actual installation work of the 7core Blown Fibre tube, bundles and the jointing closures and the fibre bundles were all carried out by INS Sudlows, utilising Emtelle’s Fibreflow system.

Darren Stephens, from INS Sudlows, who directed the whole project said:

“As Project Manager for the installation of fibre optic cabling on Project Unity, INS installed over 8000 metres of Emtelle Internal / External grade tube, 8500 metres of 12core 50/125 fibre and 14000 metres of 12core Singlemode Fibre. The tube and fibre was installed across a number of buildings throughout the University Campus. Working to a fourteen week timescale, the project was completed on time and to budget.

Thanks to the support of the University staff and project co-ordinators, as well as the service and logistical support from our suppliers, Emtelle, INS Sudlows managed to focus on delivering the essential network backbone cabling to help maintain the University’s reputation as a world leading institution for research and learning “

To Conclude

Tony Jones at Manchester University Computing said the following:-
“Manchester is a world class University where research and teaching require a network that is flexible, future proof and able to meet ever increasing bandwidth requirements. INS Sudlows engineers installed Emtelle’s internal / external cable which enabled us to avoid installing gas and water seals in awkward locations. The use of blown fibre allows us to install an infrastructure that has capacity for the future but defers the decisions on fibre type.”

^top

Site Designed and Hosted by Autus