Cat5e FTP Outdoor Direct Burial Patch Cord, LLDPE

Overview

A cat5e ftp outdoor direct burial patch cord has to survive things an indoor cord never meets: standing water, sunlight, frost heave, and somebody with a shovel. The jacket does most of that work, the foil shield handles the electrical noise that comes with long outdoor runs, and the connector is where it usually fails first. We build it to the length and jacket your route needs.

Key Specifications

Cable type	Cat5e FTP (F/UTP), 4-pair
Jacket	LLDPE, UV resistant, direct-burial rated
Conductor	24 AWG solid bare copper
Shield	Aluminum foil over all four pairs
Connector	RJ45 8P8C, long-body, 50 micro-inch gold plating
Ingress protection	IP67 shrouds available, mated
Installation	Above ground, in conduit, or direct burial
Length	OEM build, stated per order
Category reference	ANSI/TIA-568 and ISO/IEC 11801 Class D, industry-general definition

What direct-burial asks of a jacket

Indoor jacket compounds are chosen for flame behavior and cost. An outdoor burial jacket is chosen for a completely different list of problems.

Property	Why it matters	What it means for the build
Water absorption	Water in the cable changes the dielectric and kills the link	A compound formulated for low water uptake, not standard PVC
UV resistance	Sunlight cracks and chalks an unprotected jacket in a season or two	Carbon-black-stabilized polyethylene, or a jacket rated for exposure
Crush and impact	Backfill and traffic load the cable continuously	Wall thickness and jacket hardness chosen for the burial method
Temperature range	A buried cable sees frost and a hot surface on the same run	A compound that stays flexible at both ends of the range
Rodent and termite	Buried cable is a target in some regions	Ask for the rodent-resistant option where it is a known problem

Sunlight is the one people underestimate: ultraviolet exposure breaks down a jacket that would last twenty years indoors, and it does it from the outside in, so the visual damage you see is well behind the electrical damage you do not. These are industry-general considerations; what your jacket is built and verified to is stated per order.

Above ground, in conduit, or buried

Three installation methods, three different sets of requirements. Tell us which and we will build to it.

	Above ground	In conduit	Direct burial
Sun exposure	Direct	None	None
Standing water	Possible	Likely	Continuous
Mechanical load	Wind and ice	Pulling tension	Soil load and backfill
Jacket priority	UV resistance	Low friction, water blocking	Crush and water resistance
Shielding	Helpful	Recommended	Recommended, and grounded at one end

Shielded outdoors: the grounding question

FTP means an overall aluminum foil over all four pairs. Outdoors it earns its place because the run is long and often parallel to power. Two rules make it work. Drain the shield at the building end, where the ground is. And do not let the shield become the path for a lightning-induced surge — a long outdoor run is exactly the case where surge protection belongs at the point of entry, and no cable choice removes that requirement.

Typical applications for this cat5e ftp outdoor direct burial patch cord

Between buildings on a campus or industrial site
Outdoor cameras, gate controls and intercoms
Buried runs to outbuildings, pumps and irrigation controllers
Above-ground runs on poles and fence lines
Temporary outdoor event and site networks — compare our Cat6A Outdoor Direct-Burial Patch Cord for 10G runs
Signage and display feeds across a site

How to specify your build

Installation method — above ground, in conduit, or direct burial.
Length, measured along the route with slack at both ends.
Conductor — solid for buried runs that are terminated once.
Shielding — foil as standard, and how you plan to drain it.
Connector protection — IP67 shrouds, or a sealed bulkhead at the building.
Regional conditions — temperature extremes, rodents, standing water.

Workmanship and testing

Assembly and inspection follow IPC/WHMA-A-620 Class 3 workmanship criteria under our ISO 9001 quality management system, and every unit is 100% continuity and pinout tested before it is packed. Conductor range is 32 to 12 AWG. Jacket thickness and shield coverage are checked on the first article of the batch. Where a standard sets a limit for the category, the connector interface or the jacket, that is the industry-general definition of the rating. The values your assembly is built and verified to are the ones stated on your drawing, per order.

Material declarations against RoHS and REACH are issued per project, alongside the dimensional and electrical reports agreed at quotation; see certifications, compliance and material declarations. Where your drawing names a UL style or another approval, the build follows your drawing and ships with the supporting document rather than a claim of our own. The ingress rating is built into the joint, following the sealing structures set out in waterproof sealing design and validation and validated against IEC 60529 before release. More background: cable assemblies for industrial automation and robotics. Tooling for this build is cut in our own tool room and belongs to your program, so a repeat run years later starts from the same tool.

Custom builds and ordering

On Cat5e FTP Outdoor / builds, prototype lots run from 1 to 50 pcs and leave in 3 working days. Production runs of 500 pcs and up ship 14 working days after approval. Cat5e OEM and ODM shipments carry your part number and labeling, and material certificates with first-article reports are available. New tooling adds about 10 working days, and we hold 100 sets of mold tooling in house.