An armoured cable is an outdoor cable with a layer of metal wires under the outer jacket. The armour does not improve the signal. It stops the cable being crushed, cut, chewed or pulled apart, which on a compound job is the difference between a cable that lasts ten years and one dug up in the second monsoon.
When armour is needed
Direct burial without conduit. Any trench shared with power cables or shared with rodents. Road or driveway crossings. Pole-to-building runs where the cable can be hit. Industrial yards with forklifts and trolleys. If the specification says "armoured", the choice is only which armour.
WC-2274K — aluminium wire armour
Gold Series CAT6A with Wi-Barrier Tape, LDPE jacket, armoured with aluminium wires. Lighter, easier to bend and strip, non-magnetic. The usual choice for conduit-less burial in a compound, pole runs and most society and campus jobs.
WC-2284K — ECCS steel armour
The same Gold Series core, armoured with electrolytic chrome-coated steel. Tougher against crushing and chewing, for road crossings, industrial sites and trenches with heavy traffic above. It is heavier and needs a larger bend radius; plan the route with fewer tight turns.
Terminating armoured cable
Strip the outer jacket, fold back the armour wires and clamp them to the earthed gland or box — the armour is earthed for safety, like any armoured cable. The data pairs inside are still U/UTP: terminate them on standard jacks and patch panels with no shielded hardware. Keep the armoured run in one piece from the outdoor box to the indoor box, and change to indoor cable at a junction, not with a coupler in the ground.
Both armoured cables are Gold Series, so they carry Wi-Barrier Tape and the 23 AWG solid copper of the rest of the range. Datasheets for both are on the Downloads page.