Giganet Category 6A Solid F/FTP LSOH Cable

Giganet Category 6A Solid F/FTP LSOH Cable — 305m Reel

The Giganet Category 6A Solid F/FTP LSOH Cable is a fully shielded augmented Category 6 structured cabling solution rated to 500 MHz and designed for 10 Gigabit Ethernet infrastructure in environments where both maximum signal integrity and fire safety compliance are required. It is manufactured to exceed the performance requirements of ISO/IEC 11801-1:2017, ISO/IEC 11801-2:2017, IEC 61156-5:2012, EN 50173-1:2018, EN 50173-2:2018, EN 50288-10-1:2012, and TIA-568.2-D:2018.

The F/FTP shield architecture — individual aluminium foil per pair plus an overall aluminium foil with drain wire — is the most comprehensive shielding configuration available in twisted-pair horizontal cable. This construction distinguishes the Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP from both unshielded U/UTP and single-shield F/UTP Cat 6A cables, providing layered protection against both internal pair-to-pair crosstalk and external electromagnetic interference simultaneously. Combined with a Low Smoke Zero Halogen (LSOH) outer jacket, the cable is suited to data centres, healthcare facilities, transportation infrastructure, and any installation where fire regulation mandates halogen-free cabling materials.

Performance and Bandwidth

The Giganet Category 6A F/FTP cable is rated to 500 MHz, meeting the augmented Category 6 (Class EA) performance ceiling. This bandwidth supports 10GBASE-T (IEEE 802.3an) at the full 100-metre horizontal channel length — the primary performance requirement that separates Cat 6A from standard Cat 6. The F/FTP shielding construction further elevates electrical performance beyond the minimum Class EA requirement, with the per-pair foil shields providing superior NEXT and PS-NEXT suppression compared to unshielded or single-shield Cat 6A designs.

Alien crosstalk (AXT) — the dominant performance constraint in Cat 6A installations — is addressed comprehensively by the F/FTP construction. The individual pair foil shields isolate each twisted pair from adjacent pairs within the same cable, while the overall foil shield isolates the cable from adjacent cables in the same conduit, cable tray, or bundle run. Consequently, the Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP cable achieves near-zero alien crosstalk contribution, effectively eliminating AXT as a channel design constraint even in very high-density bundle configurations.

Cable Construction — F/FTP Shield Architecture

The Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP cable uses the following layered construction from centre outward:

Conductors — 23 AWG (0.57mm) solid plain bare copper, polyethylene insulated. Solid construction is specified for horizontal fixed runs, providing lower attenuation per metre than stranded cable. Bare copper ensures full TIA-568.2-D conductor compliance — unlike copper-clad aluminium (CCA) or copper-clad steel (CCS), which are non-compliant and introduce elevated resistance that degrades both signal performance and PoE power delivery over longer runs.

Individual pair shields — Each of the four twisted pairs is individually wrapped with aluminium foil tape. This per-pair shielding provides direct suppression of pair-to-pair crosstalk (NEXT) within the cable, which is the primary source of signal interference in high-frequency twisted-pair transmission.

Overall foil shield — An overall aluminium foil shield encloses all four shielded pairs, with a drain wire running the full cable length for grounding continuity. The overall shield provides the external EMI barrier and alien crosstalk isolation between this cable and adjacent cables in the same pathway.

Central X filler — A polyethylene cross-filler maintains consistent pair geometry and physical separation between the four individually shielded pairs throughout the cable run, preventing pair compression and geometry distortion that would degrade high-frequency performance.

LSOH outer jacket — A Low Smoke Zero Halogen outer sheath provides the fire safety performance layer. In the event of combustion, LSOH jackets emit significantly lower volumes of smoke and produce no halogenated acid gases compared to standard PVC. The jacket is flame resistant and coloured purple — a common industry colour convention for Cat 6A F/FTP cable that aids cable type identification in mixed-specification installations.

LSOH Jacket and Fire Safety

The LSOH jacket is a mandatory specification in a range of building and infrastructure environments governed by fire regulations. Standard PVC jackets release hydrogen chloride (HCl) and other toxic halogenated gases during combustion — in enclosed spaces such as data halls, risers, and HVAC plenums, these gases pose a severe risk to personnel during evacuation and cause corrosive secondary damage to adjacent equipment.

LSOH jacket compounds address this through halogen-free polymer formulations. The Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP LSOH cable is flame resistant and meets the fire performance requirements applicable to the following installation environments:

• Data centres and co-location facilities — Where fire suppression systems and raised-floor or overhead cable pathways make halogen-free materials a standard specification requirement
• Healthcare buildings — Hospitals and clinical facilities where patient evacuation scenarios demand low-toxicity materials in ceiling voids and corridors
• Transportation infrastructure — Rail, metro, airport, and port installations governed by EN 45545 and equivalent fire safety standards
• Public assembly buildings — Offices, educational facilities, and commercial buildings subject to building regulations mandating LSOH cabling in plenum and riser pathways
• Government and defence installations — Where fire performance specifications are a procurement requirement

Shielding, Grounding, and Termination

The F/FTP shielding system requires correct grounding to deliver its full EMI and AXT rejection performance. The drain wire must be connected to a clean earth point at the patch panel or equipment rack — typically via a shielded keystone jack or shielded patch panel port that provides a direct path to the rack earth bar. The far end of the shield at the device or work area outlet should be left floating to prevent earth loop currents from conducting interference into the cable rather than away from it.

The F/FTP construction requires fully shielded termination hardware throughout the channel. This includes shielded Cat 6A keystone jacks, shielded patch panels, and shielded RJ45 field plugs where applicable. Mixing F/FTP cable with unshielded termination hardware breaks shield continuity, negates the AXT and EMI protection benefit of the cable construction, and introduces impedance discontinuities that degrade channel performance at high frequencies.

Shield continuity and channel shielding effectiveness must be verified as part of Cat 6A channel certification testing using a Cat 6A-capable field tester with appropriate shielded adapters.

Installation Characteristics

The Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP cable is supplied on a 305-metre pull-box reel. The F/FTP construction results in a slightly larger outer diameter than U/UTP Cat 6A equivalents — a factor that must be accounted for in conduit fill calculations and cable tray capacity planning. Higher cable density in shared pathways is offset by the F/FTP shield’s alien crosstalk rejection, which eliminates the cable spacing requirements that U/UTP Cat 6A designs sometimes impose.

The cable maintains a maximum pulling tension of 110N during installation. Minimum bend radius must be observed during installation and at final dressing — F/FTP cable is less tolerant of tight bends than U/UTP Cat 6A due to the foil shields, which can crack or delaminate if bend radius limits are exceeded, permanently degrading shield effectiveness at that point.

Supported Applications

The Giganet Category 6A F/FTP LSOH cable supports the following applications within a compliant 100-metre channel:

• 10GBASE-T — 10 Gigabit Ethernet at full 100m channel (IEEE 802.3an)
• 1000BASE-T — Gigabit Ethernet (IEEE 802.3ab), fully backward compatible
• 100BASE-TX — Fast Ethernet
• PoE++ — Up to 90W per port (IEEE 802.3bt Type 3/4)
• PoE+ — Up to 30W (IEEE 802.3at)
• Wi-Fi 6 and Wi-Fi 6E Access Points — High-power PoE++ WAP backhaul in EMI-sensitive environments
• Server-to-storage and server-to-switch links — High-bandwidth backbone and data centre fabric cabling
• Distributed backbones and active zone cabling — 10G horizontal infrastructure in enterprise and campus environments
• IP Surveillance in EMI environments — High-bitrate camera infrastructure in electrically noisy buildings

Ideal Users

• Data Centre Designers and Operators — The F/FTP construction delivers near-zero AXT in the very high-density cable environments characteristic of data centre top-of-rack and patch panel installations. LSOH jacket compliance satisfies standard data centre fire specification requirements. The 500 MHz rated bandwidth supports current 10G switching fabric and provides headroom for future 25G and 40G short-run applications.
• Structured Cabling Contractors on Specification-Driven Projects — On projects specifying F/FTP Cat 6A with LSOH jacket — common in healthcare, transport, and government sector work — the Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP LSOH cable meets the complete specification in a single product. The 25-year system warranty supports long-term project handover and maintenance documentation requirements.
• Healthcare and Hospital Facilities Teams — LSOH fire performance and F/FTP EMI rejection address the two primary cabling specification constraints in healthcare environments — fire safety in patient areas and signal integrity in buildings with high densities of medical imaging equipment, motor drives, and electrical plant that generate broadband EMI.
• Network Architects Deploying 10G-to-the-Desktop Infrastructure — Where desktop switching is migrating to 10G and the horizontal cabling layer must support this across the full 100-metre channel, the Giganet Cat 6A F/FTP cable provides the shielded channel performance required in dense open-plan office environments where cable bundles in floor voids and above ceilings are subject to AXT risk.
• Government, Defence, and Critical Infrastructure Projects — F/FTP shielding, LSOH fire performance, and compliance with TIA-568.2-D:2018 and the full EN 50173/50288 European standards suite position this cable for procurement specifications in government and defence projects where both performance certification and material safety documentation are mandatory deliverables.

Cable Specifications

Performance Specifications

Physical Specifications

Installation Parameters

Certifications