In the telecommunications cabling industry, it is a common task to route voice and data telecommunication wires, such as twisted pair cables, between various termination points throughout a building or area, wherein the cables connect one terminal to another. Standard commercially-available Insulation Displacement Connector (IDC) type bifurcated terminals, also called terminal blocks, such as the commonly used 110-style block, are typically used to provide an interconnection between electronic equipment and work area outlets for electrically conductive data transfer media (hereinafter also referred to as “cable”), such as unshielded twisted pair cable (“UTP”). UTP is a popular and widely used type of data transfer media for either voice or data communications, and is commonly used for Local Area Networks (“LANs”) and other in-building voice and data communications applications.
The terminal block provides an electrical joining or connection of a cable to other devices, hardware, or cables, wherein the terminal block acts as a transfer point. The terminal block comprises a dielectric block having a plurality of electrical termination locations defined therein (hereinafter referred to as “terminals”), wherein the terminals have engagements for securing individual signal-carrying elements (hereinafter referred to as “wires”) of one or more cables. Conventional terminal blocks are often integrated into a what is known as a “patch panel”, wherein the terminal block facilitates an electrical connection between the terminated cable and another device or piece of hardware connected to the patch panel by a second cable or “patch cord”. Once a cable is terminated or electrically connected to the patch panel via the electrical connection of the wires to the terminal block, the patch panel generally permits interchangeable interconnection of various devices and cables, thus simplifying cabling to the individual devices.
Conventionally, the individual wires of the cable are placed by hand in individual terminals or blades of a terminal block, and an impact tool or “punch-down” tool is subsequently utilized to cut and seat the individual wires in the terminal blocks. A variety of impact tools are available to installers within the telecommunications industry, wherein the impact tools are configured for seating and cutting the individual wires in the termination blocks. A typical impact tool comprises a handle and a head utilized in cutting and seating individual wires positioned in a terminal. An axially translatable hammer is provided within the handle, wherein the hammer is typically biased by a compression spring to strike the head. As an installer grips the handle and pushes it against a wire already individually positioned in the terminal, a hammer release element within the handle is moved into alignment with the hammer travel path, such that the compression spring releases its energy, thus causing the hammer to rapidly impact the cutting head, therein cutting the end of the wire and seating the wire in the terminal.
Such use of the aforementioned impact tools is common; however, the individual wires need to be already placed in the terminals into which they are to be seated. In a typical cable having multiple twisted-pair wires, for example, the installer will manually place the individual wires in their respective terminals by hand, and then follow the placement with the cutting and seating provided by the impact tool. Often times, however, the terminals are located in a terminal block that is difficult to reach due to other equipment (e.g., routers, switches, etc.) being in the way, or the terminal block is not the line of sight from the viewpoint of the installer. As a consequence, it is often time-consuming and labor-intensive for the installer to properly position the individual wires in such a limited environment, thereby increasing the cost of installation of telecommunications or network equipment. Further, it is often cumbersome to manually position more than one wire at a time prior to cutting and seating.
USPTO Backgrounds
USPTO Backgrounds