PSTN Local Subcriber POTS Metallic Loop testing, Measurement and Standards

[Sigint]

Hi All,
I have discovered many of the issues I have with my Telkom DSL service are related to the physical telephone line on which the ADSL signal is carried.
As such, I thought a discussion focusing on the physical, metallic twisted-pair would be good.
My research so far has discovered the following technical standards which form a good reference.

ITU-T Rec. G.992.1 (07-1999)
ITU-T L9

I have made myself a basic POTS loop diagnostic kit comprising;
1) POTS Telephone (old Telkom model)
2) RG45 leads, (some with crocodile clips)
3) RG45 splitter, and female-female adaptor
4) Tone & Probe kit
5) Telephone Multimeter (SA 9083), probe leads and earth lead.
6) Spare ADSL filter box
7) Spare ADSL router configured to the (Telkom Guest account)
8) Routersats software (By Eric Chapman)

My fault-diagnosis process with regard to the ADSL is basically as follows;

1) Observe LED indicators on the Router
2) login to the Router webpage and inspect the status page.
3) Connect a POTS telephone to the line to check for ring-tone, then I leave off-hook for 2 minutes until I get "quite line", and check for line line noise.
4) Then if needed I start with the electrical characteristics tests with the meter.

I recommend doing your own copper test at the NTP and in-house cabling. every now and then and recording the results, they can often reveal trouble ahead.

Basic examples of these test (using a multimeter) are:

1) AC voltage across the pair = <3Vac
2) AC voltage A wire to Earth = <3Vac
3) AC Voltage B wire to Earth = <3Vac
4) DC voltage A wire to B wire (your POTS telephone on-hook) = -50Vdc.
5) DC voltage A wire to Earth = 0Vdc
6) DC voltage Earth wire A wire = 0Vdc
7) DC Voltage B wire to Earth = 0Vdc
8) DC voltage Earth wire B wire = 0Vdc

I would be very interested in what figures you are finding.