Telecommunications Engineering - Central-office Engineer

Central-office Engineer

A central-office engineer is responsible for designing and overseeing the implementation of telecommunications equipment in a central office (CO for short), also referred to as a wire center or telephone exchange. A CO engineer is responsible for integrating new technology into the existing network, assigning the equipments location in the wire center and providing power, clocking (for digital equipment) and alarm monitoring facilities for the new equipment. The CO engineer is also responsible for providing more power, clocking, and alarm monitoring facilities if there isn't currently enough available to support the new equipment being installed. Finally, the CO Engineer is responsible for designing how the massive amounts of cable will be distributed to various equipment and wiring frames throughout the wire center and overseeing the installation and turn up of all new equipment.

As structural engineers, CO engineers are responsible for the structural design and placement of racking and bays for the equipment to be installed in as well as for the plant to be placed on.

As electrical engineers, CO engineers are responsible for the resistance, capacitance, and inductance (RCL) design of all new plant to ensure telephone service is clear and crisp and data service is clean as well as reliable. Attenuation and loop loss calculations are required to determine cable length and size required to provide the service called for. In addition, power requirements have to be calculated and provided to power any electronic equipment being placed in the wire center.

Overall, CO engineers have seen new challenges emerging in the CO environment. With the advent of Data Centers, Internet Protocol (IP) facilities, cellular radio sites, and other emerging-technology equipment environments within telecommunication networks, it is important that a consistent set of established practices or requirements be implemented.

Installation suppliers or their sub-contractors are expected to provide requirements with their products, features, or services. These services might be associated with the installation of new or expanded equipment, as well as the removal of existing equipment.

Several other factors must be considered such as:

• Regulations and safety in installation
• Removal of hazardous material
• Commonly used tools to perform installation and removal of equipment

Telcordia provides over 1,000 requirements for the CO detail engineer. Developed with service provider input, GR-1275 covers new information on federal asbestos regulations, safety in the use of tools, wire-wrap uniformity, grounding conductor placement, protection of both metallic and optical conductors, and cabling under raised floors.

GR-1502, Central Office/Network Environment Detail Engineering Generic Requirements, is a companion document to GR-1275 and provides proposed engineering generic requirements that Detail Engineering Service Providers (DESPs) are expected to provide with their services. Adherence to these generic requirements helps ensure that newly installed equipment operates in accordance with design parameters in owned or leased telecommunications equipment buildings of the Telecommunications Carrier (TC), and to ensure that equipment is installed safely and efficiently. These proposed engineering and documentation generic requirements are the criteria to which DESPs may be compared for job acceptance purposes.

The proposed generic engineering requirements contained in this document are intended to be applicable to all types of engineered telecommunications equipment, i.e., switching, transmission, and common systems; and include frame, circuit-protection devices, and power, etc. However, this document is not all-inclusive; additional engineering guidance may be required to engineer a specific piece of equipment, or to meet additional regional practices or requirements.