Several  methods exist for joining PILC cables such as heat shrink tubing, vacuum cast or cold shrink tubingor silica sand contained thermal setting resin transition units. There are advantages and drawbacks to each of these jointing methods. It is necessary to understand each of them before using a particular method.

Heat shrink products offer ease of installation but in most cases this method is hampered by lack of sufficient space needed to reach the heat source around the tubing. This causes occurrence of uneven shrinkage resulting in improper sealing. Cold shrink products can offer convenience but again, here too there is no guarantee of availability of space to place the tubes properly for core removal and it may be tough to apply the restricting tapes in the required fashion. Greater reliability is comparatively offered by the other alternatives namely silica sand filled thermal setting resin transition units or vacuum cast. However, for the success of this method it is very essential to obtain a skilled cable jointer. If you do obtain such a technician to perform the job of soldering, taping, compound pouring and wiping then there is nothing to beat the dependability and ease of a vacuum cast resin transition splice.

The transition module design contains the junction and barrier bar in a single device and this allows for connecting the separable insulated connector elbows dead-on at the splice. This advantage is not obtained in case of shrink tubing splices wherein the joined cross-linked ethylene propylene rubber or polyethylene cables have to be run at a separate location for making junction bar connections. This is because of lack of space at the vaults or manholes to accept an added splice and all other required cable connections.

Terminating PILC cables has to be done with care to prevent the draining of oil from the termination chamber and ultimately causing an internal flashover. Replacing a PILC cable with EPR or XLPE cable may pose a problem while connecting to the oil-filled connection box. At such times, it is the silica sand contained thermal setting resin or vacuum cast components designed especially for such transitional connection that prove useful.

Replacing the entire lot of the PILC cable network with the new age systems is not so easily possible. Possibilities of the original ducts being crushed and moved and the cables trapped inside are high. The bends occurring to the cables inside the ducting cannot be leveled so easily. Sometimes, the size of the replacement cables is just too large to be fitted within the older ducts. Now, though there are specialized methods used for this purpose it requires huge sums of money and a large labor force to get it done. Moreover, it will also necessitate long and vast interruptions to the flow of traffic and large scale renovations to be done to the current electrical installations. With a large section of the PILC cables showing no signs of deterioration being within the ducting, the oil and lead is for the time being contained.  Though most of the utilities are focused on eliminating lead cables from usage it will be a long time before they succeed in doing it.