Client Background
Newcastle University is a higher education establishment providing courses including but not limited to science, business and media. The creation of the 24 -acre Helix Campus meant there was plenty of new space for the university to develop and expand their teaching and learning resources. The Catalyst building was a result of the £350 million development plan of the Newcastle Helix. The building was to provide research and professional spaces to further relationships between various sectors and students.
The Challenge
The building featured 5 floors each with their own dedicated comms room. Each resource provided needed to be supported by the solution including office space, meeting rooms, collaborative learning spaces and board rooms.
What UCS Technologies Did
UCS Technologies were able to engage with the M&E Contractor and deliver a fast paced project installing on multiple work faces. To meet the tight timescales that where required by the university
The Technical Solution
A total of 6 comms rooms were created in the building, one dedicated to each floor. Each comms room is linked with dual single-mode and multi-mode fibre optic backbone cables diversely routed in a star topology.
External single-mode fibre optic cables are installed from two existing campus buildings to the lower ground floor comms room. Each comms room is linked with a 50 pr telephone cable from the lower ground floor building distribution panel in a star topology.
Individual cat6a cables were installed to the relevant comms room on each floor for distribution services. Cat6a cables were installed as defined by the client's wi-fi survey design. UCS Technologies undertook the installation of the client issued access points.
Key Features
- Cat 6a F/UTP Cabling (with B2CA cable)
- 48 core OS2 single-mode internal fibre optic backbone
- 48 core OS2 single-mode external fibre optic backbone
- 50 pr internal telephone backbone cables
- 100 pr external telephone backbone cables
- Eaton access range comms cabinet
- 25-year Connectix warranty
The Outcome
“Liaison between Connectix and the installation partner UCS Technologies was seamless and helped to enable successful building completion and opening date commitments. The installation itself was of a very high standard and Connectix conducted a post site installation survey to confirm the quality of the install and that it was in accordance with their installation guidelines.”
Andrew Fisher, Newcastle University, Telecoms & Cabling Manager.
