I’m using the RJ45 pass throughs and am having a problem with water condensation building up inside the pass through and corroding the connector. It will work fine for 4-6 months and then the corrosion builds up to the point that the connector needs to be replaced. I am using anti-oxidant grease on the connectors but it’s not helping. I’ve also found small amounts of condensation on the inside of the enclosure.
I’m thinking it might be good to build some type of shroud to cover the whole enclosure to keep it out of direct rain/sun contact but I’m not sure if that will stop this from happening again. Any thoughts?
I’ve tried a number of different ways to solve that problem. I’ve tried regular silicone on the end after its tightened down (only caused water to collect inside making the problem worse), and various dielectric compounds and I’ve had mixed results. The white pasty ones don’t seem to work as well as this stuff from a company here in Kentucky.
I have my installers literally fill the end of the ECS then put the cat5 cable in and put some more covering the whole cat5 end before they tighten down the end.. I’ve never had a problem since we’ve switched to using this stuff.. I also use it on all of our coax connectors for towers.. I’ll completely fill up the N connectors and when you screw them together it oozes out the sides making a completely waterproof seal.
This stuff is ~$10 a tube and is enough to last for a couple months doing 3 installs a day..
My solution is less elegant, drill small weep holes in the bottom side to let the air pressure equalize and moisture that may collect, drain out. End of problem. It seems that moist air can always find a way in unless perfectly sealed, air escapes, leaving moisture behind. .
Drill a small hole or do not tighten the end and use as a strain relief. The problem is that the enclosure and the connector need to “breath”. The DCE boxes and many others are well sealed so when the air pressure changes the box/connector will literally suck in water along with the air when the pressure rises. If you succeed in sealing the connector with something there is a good chance that water will be sucked in through some other point.
We drill holes for connectors mounted horizontally and just don’t fully tighten the connectors for ones mounted vertically (down that is). As the feed through on the cable is not air tight this also allows the box t breath, so you should never have any corrosion/water problems.
since we build the CPE’s and then have the installer set it up once it’s tested and working, so the pass through cat 5 pigtails are necessary for us. We’ve ran into the same leaking issue before, our solution, while not pretty, is easy and VERY effective. wrap the nut and cable in mastic tape once it’s installed. haven’t had one leak yet.
Yes the dessicant will do the job, but it can only absord a certain amount of moisture before it reaches its saturation point and becomes useless, we use on air driers for elliptical microwave waveguides. The weep hole is the most simple solution to this problem and does not cause a mess and very rarely needs maintenance.
Thanks for all the excellent suggestions. I attempted to order the Di-electric silicone from BOSS products but they have discontinued it. Does anyone know of a similar alternative?
All my outdoor enclosures have 3 drilled holes. One for cables to go thru, the other to breath and the other has small fan which is turned off in the winter. Never had any moisture issues.. Not yet anyways…lol I run P3’s and P4’s in them
In regards to using Mastic Tape, It is always a good idea. However, we have had a few situations where the mastic tape seals perfectly to the rubber part of the cable, and does not seal perfectly to the Connector/Nut. Over the course of a year or so, we had to revisit a tower because of poor performance. Upon inspection, the mastic actually allowed water penetration through the top, causing it to basically cup the water. Because of the climate changes as posted above, it basically sucked water into the enclosure, and then filled the bottom of the enclosure with water. This then caused the connectors on the bottom to take on water.
All in all, as Gerard stated above we now use the Dielectric Compound. Water may be able to penetrate the tape, however it cannot penetrate any further because of the dielectric compound in a sense forms a gel seal with both coax and ethernet connectors. Local phone companies also use it in their connections on the outside (atleast some do) for this very reason.
