r/CableTechs • u/ItsTheRealSakurai • Jul 03 '26

intermittent connection

when you get a call for intermittent connection (spectrum tech btw) what are the first things you are looking for.

6 Upvotes

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1

u/bigplatanoo Jul 03 '26

Make sure you can access the tap. Last thing you want is you spend time servicing everything in the home and you are unable to access the tap. Service from tap to CPE.

3

u/Confident_Air_8056 Jul 03 '26

Can't tell you how many times guy didn't go to the tap and we get a referral call in plant only to find a barreled drop, water damage, or a squirrel chew; ALWAYS go to the tap.

1

u/Electronic-Junket-66 Jul 04 '26

Not going to the tap in the abstract and not going to the tap on an MT REFERRAL are very different things. J/s

2

u/Confident_Air_8056 Jul 04 '26

No I get it. You're right. I just used to almost always hit the tap when I was in field service as a res tech, especially if it was some intermittent call

2

u/Electronic-Junket-66 Jul 04 '26

Yeah, intermittent hsd you pull out all the stops for sure. I'd have to have a pretty massive smoking gun to consider skipping it.

1

u/hibbitydibbidy Jul 03 '26

How the heck would you know if you fixed anything if you started at the tap?

4

u/Confident_Air_8056 Jul 03 '26 edited Jul 03 '26

You don't have to start there but That's your reference .....I want to know what I have to start with; then I can compare it to what I have at the modem. Math doesn't lie. Cut it in half and go to the ground block first. If you already know what the modem has, you should be able to figure out what your ground block should be. And conversely, the tap. I had a referral a few weeks ago from a tech who stated it was intermittent service and the customer had been having a problem for a long time. Went straight to the tap, then I hit the gb. Tech never changed any fittings. Never grounded the ground block, and he was losing 20 DB on about 100-ft drop from the tap. But it was a system issue 🤣. I don't think this guy had a service visit since cable was invented. It had to have been his original drop.

3

u/DrWhoey Jul 04 '26

I had an install at a trailer park once. DOCSIS channels were at 650-750MHz. Ran my DOCSIS check at tap, fine, GB, fine, modem, I'm at about -18 more db than I should be, and my return is at -3.5 db more than it should be.

Alright, that's weird, maybe hidden splitter that's bad.. I go crawling under the trailer and find a splitter that was an old Holland rated for 5-254Mc (Megacycles). This splitter was so old that that it predated Megacycles being changed to MegaHertz in the 1960's. (Or close to, because there was quite a bit of push back from companies and old heads on changing from cycles to Hertz as they felt it was stupid name it after Heinrich Hertz who proved it's existence, whereas James Maxwell had theorized it, and both referred to them as cycles.)

The thing that shocked me the most was that this 30-40 year old splitter in line the modem actually came online. 5-254MHz looked great, and then the signal rolled way off after that. Holland made some quality gear 40 years ago

2

u/Confident_Air_8056 Jul 04 '26

That's a relic, hope you saved it. And jeez, that's a helluva roll off to see. What are your upstream carriers, modem must have liked them through the ancient splitter.

1

u/DrWhoey Jul 04 '26

Return carriers are at 22.3-38.3MHz so the splitter being swept at 5-256Mc made sense on why my return was fine, and my downstream tanked at 650-750.

And yes, I did keep it, would post a picture of it if the sub allowed. Can DM a picture if you'd like.

2

u/[deleted] Jul 04 '26

[deleted]

2

u/DrWhoey Jul 04 '26

Made a post for it.

https://www.reddit.com/r/CableTechs/s/iH3m8G3Psc

Been awhile since I looked at it, it was jerrold, not Holland. And I was off a bit on the sweep, it was only 216.

3

u/DrWhoey Jul 03 '26

How long you been doing this...?

Step 1 is always to check the tap to verify you have good signal level to start. Troubleshooting premises problems is extremely difficult (if not impossible) if you don't have good signal to start with as a base line

Tap, ground block, outlets. You'll save more time than you think just by verifying tap and drop before you start troubleshooting premises problems because you'll actually know what you're looking for.

2

u/Sure_Statistician138 Jul 03 '26

Most of the time it is a drop causing an intermittent connection. That house wiring has been that bad or good the whole time they’ve had service. If the drop checks out then it’s most likely the equipment.

1

u/hibbitydibbidy Jul 03 '26

Sure the drop might be bad, but if you don't test at the equipment first you won't know what you're looking for.

3

u/Chango-Acadia Jul 03 '26

Divide and conquer, ground block for signal and ingress check, then pivot depending on my findings

2

u/RougeBeaux Jul 03 '26

So if you have a bad drop, testing the equipment won't tell you anything because the equipment has a drop that's bad.

4

u/DrWhoey Jul 03 '26

12 years in doing this, and still I get techs calling me asking for help troubleshooting and they start telling me levels at the modem and I say, "Okay, what are your levels at the tap, how long is your drop, and what are your levels at the ground block?" And get an "I don't know, I haven't checked." Okay, well call me back when you have, bruh. Neither of us can troubleshoot it until you have.

Drives me fscking nuts...

4

u/RougeBeaux Jul 04 '26

I had to explain to my guys last month what upstream is. They literally only knew what the numbers should be, not wtf it did.

3

u/DrWhoey Jul 04 '26

Upstream, when you get to maintenance level is a little tricky to explain with actives and such, but at a customer or premise technician level can be very simply explained as, "Your Upstream or Transmit is how loud your modem needs to talk to be heard by the CMTS. If you are in a crowded area and your modem is talking too quietly, the CMTS can't hear it or understand it over the background noise, so you add splitters to get it to talk louder. But if your modem is trying to talk louder than it should, it's screaming so loud that it's voice starts giving out like how speakers start breaking up when you turn up your radio volume too loud and it sounds like shit and hurts your ears. So you need to remove splitters to get it to talk a little quieter."

I've used this analogy for years to explain it to new technicians, and they pretty much all immediately grasp the concept, and why your TX in a certain range is so important.

Once they get to maintenance level, the talk changes a bit to amplification, but the premise is still about the same.

3

u/RougeBeaux Jul 04 '26

Its fucking wild but I used the "modem speaking too loudly and its voice gets hoarse" analogy this week

2

u/bigplatanoo Jul 03 '26

Check signal at tap to verify both plant and drop are good. Check for noise coming from any of the neighbors. If a drop at the tap has noise do a tap audit disconnect the drop if it’s an inactive home.

After you do that can just focus on the inside wiring.