Telkom line drops with bad weather

C

CptNukeEm

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Hey guys, for the past 2 years, everytime when I hear thunder (lightning is quite far away), my internet starts dropping. The weather isn't even close to my home but it still affects me (which leads me to believe that this is a problem at the exchange). I usually just ping www.google.com to see what's going on. It pings fine but then every now and then (+- 30 second intervals) it does 3-10 timeouts. When I see a timeout, I can almost always hear a thunder strike a few seconds later.

My command prompt looks like this:

Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=205ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=207ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=207ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=207ms TTL=46
Reply from 173.194.67.99: bytes=32 time=206ms TTL=46
Request timed out.
Request timed out.
Request timed out.


Just to give you an idea... So I've called Telkom many times over the past 2 years.. They have even sent out techies to my house to check it out and some of them had no idea what was causing it, one replaced the wire connected to my home, and one told me that the wire had to be underground and enclosed in a pvc pipe..

I think the problem is with the exchange, because the problem occurs while the weather is approaching. What do you guys think? This is driving me insane because my internet is pretty much dead almost every night (it rains a lot -.-)

Thanks in advance.
 
The weather cannot influence the exchange except for a lightning strike ,
You are more than likely on a very long aerial cable run and the approaching storm will induce static in to the cable.
When it starts to rain and the lightning is over do the problems still exist ?.
Do the cables leading to your place go through trees ??.
What area more of less are you in ??
 
Problem does not persist when it continues to rain and lightning is over. The thick cable leading to the box goes through some tree branches, but the thinner cable leading to my house does not (it's around 15m long). I'm in Amanzimtoti; Athlone Park area. I live 974m from the exchange.

My friend's friend works at telkom and did tests on my line, here is what he replied:

Here are the results, all seems to be OK

Reference Number 29870949
Directory Number xxxx
Order Number
Tested By *******
TestDate 2012-12-15 18:46:55.401
DSLAM Name Athlone Park 2
Slot Number 2
Port Number 57
Summary of Test Results Pass
Possible Cause xAct syncing and Line test ok
Possible Resolution Confirm service is restored with Customer
xAct Status Modem Syncing
IRTMS Status Vercode 00 - Test OK

Exact shows normal, the ATUR SNR is a little low, possibly a filter missing from a telephone, this could cause disconnections when someone uses the phone or receive a phone call, also, remember that alarms connected to the DSL must also have a filter, but the attenuation is low because he is close to the exchange...
Profile ADSLupto4096af02
ATUC Current Status No defect
ATUC Chan Current Tx Rate 4096
ATUC Chan Config Fast Max Tx Rate 4096
ATUC Chan Config Fast Min Tx Rate 640
ATUC Current SNR 11.8
ATUC Current ATN 4.5
ATUR Current Status No defect
ATUR Chan Current Tx Rate 512
ATUR Chan Config Fast Max Tx Rate 512
ATUR Chan Config Fast Min Tx Rate 256
ATUR Current SNR 11 - Pass
ATUR Current ATN 12.5 - Pass
ATUR Attainable (kbps) 928

Physical copper tests OK, only 974M from the exchange, he is lucky...
Test Type LOOP
DC KOHMS AB 1091
DC KOHMS AE 9999
DC KOHMS BE 9999
DC VOLTS AB 0.00
DC VOLTS AE 0.00
DC VOLTS BE 0.00
AC KOHMS AB 15.3
AC KOHMS AE 1046
AC KOHMS BE 9999
AC VOLTS AB 0.00
AC VOLTS AE .558
AC VOLTS BE .562
CPE AB YES
CAP AB 1.65
CAP AE .072
CAP BE .072
A B C-MESSAGE Noise to Earth 56.1
A E C-MESSAGE Metallic Noise 6.05
RTU Vercode 00
Vercode Description TEST OK
Length .974 KM
Termination TERMINATED
RTU Dispatch Dispatch: NO DISPATCH

For some reason the IPActivator data is invalid or the SP blocks it, but the session shows no data downloaded
Status EasyVPN
LoginTime Sat Dec 15 18:49:15 2012
Class EXX
NetworkNode 196.43.27.129
ISPUsername xxxx
BytesDownLoaded 0
Port 2132
Session 1
Duration 0d 00h 00m 00s
SessionId 031CBD78
LastUpdate Thu Jan 01 02:00:00 1970
LineSpeed 0/0
BytesUploaded 0
IPAddress 10.0.1.10

As for the fact that the line drops with approaching bad weather, I cannot explain this, but what I can tell you is that is rare that the exchange will be the cause of the disconnections seeing as he is only about a Km from the exchange, what he should do is next time when it happens to see if his PPPOE session is lost or if it is the modem sync that falls away, also, Google is not a reliable place to ping, anything international is not a reliable ping, but that's just my opinion...as far as I can tell the problem with the timeouts can only be ISP related in this case...OK, now I'm going home, cheers.
Click to expand...

We do have a filter on the telephone.

I can guarantee that the problem is not ISP related. I have a 4meg uncapped account with openweb, a 1meg uncapped account with mweb, a 20gb capped account with telkom and a 1gb capped account with axxess. They all give the same problem.

As for pinging google, the problem persists when I ping newshost or my own website, which are both hosted locally.

The PPPoE session stays "Connection Established", so the session isn't lost. I don't know how to check if it is the modem sync that falls away though.
 
Last edited:
Water is getting somewhere some cable is exposed to the elements...or there is a small earth/contact on the line...
 
The Metallic Noise 6.05 is the only thing that may slow your line down but nothing in those tests that would account for for the problem that you are having,
when a storm is brewing there is a hell of a lot of static in the air and long aerial cable routs will pick up the static, that is the only thing i can think of that fits your problem as you say when the lightning is over the problem is over.
 
FNfal said:
The Metallic Noise 6.05 is the only thing that may slow your line down but nothing in those tests that would account for for the problem that you are having,
when a storm is brewing there is a hell of a lot of static in the air and long aerial cable routs will pick up the static, that is the only thing i can think of that fits your problem as you say when the lightning is over the problem is over.
Click to expand...

Mhmm do you have any suggestions to fix it then? Would be pretty hard to have the cable go underground..
 
CptNukeEm said:
Mhmm do you have any suggestions to fix it then? Would be pretty hard to have the cable go underground..
Click to expand...
You could try taking the phone of the hook next time see if that helps.
But to be honest when lightning is approaching i disconnect my modem from the telephone line because that is normally what get struck first.
 
Last edited:
FNfal said:
You could try taking the phone of the hook next time see if that helps.
But to be honest when lightning is approaching i disconnect my modem from the telephone line because that is normally what get struck first.
Click to expand...

I remember being on the phone and watching command prompt and it still timed out.. Also, being on the phone doesn't cause a disconnect or anything, everything is still the same.
 
Still having the same problem, it's just getting worse by the day. There was heavy ligtning in the distance tonight, look at the effect.. Telkom sees that everything looks fine on the line and tells me that nothing is wrong. I'm so bloody tired of calling them and complaining just to have the lady on the phone tell me to restart my router every time to no avail.. What do you guys think can be causing this? They are even saying if they send someone out and they don't find a fault that I will have to pay. Any ideas on how can I can about to fix this problem?

**** internet 7.jpg
 
My ADSL used to do the same ... After numerous calls, testing, replacing of joins, cable changes, DSLAM port swaps and being moved to an ADSL2+ enabled DSLAM, our line remains stable in almost every thunder storm. Only when things go nuclear do we get the odd disconnect.

And this is with the worst possible line stats you can get.

What I would suggest is get Telkom to check for faulty joins along the length of the line ... bad oxidisation on copper wont help. Check for a bad connection with the areal cable. If its got a tear / break or an exposed bit of copper it will pick up static and cause the disconnects.

Might not mean much... but here are my terrible line stats which holds a sync even during a full blown gauteng thunderstorm

Downstream Upstream
Line Coding(Trellis): On On
SNR Margin (dB): 47 83
Attenuation (dB): 590 336
Output Power (dBm): 0 128
Attainable Rate (Kbps): 2912 576
Rate (Kbps): 2464 507
D (interleaver depth): 1 1
Delay (msec): 0.25 0.24
 
I have the same issue on my line - whenever there's a lightning strike not far enough for me not to detect (even if it's like 10km away, lol) my line loses sync... Low noise margin plays a big role, as the lightning inevitably induces crackle/pop noise into the line which causes DSL to lose sync if the margins are too low. sucks, especially here on the highveld, and especially for us gamers. Yours looks quite extreme though =o in a typical thunderstorm i'll drop about 4-8 times. you dropped like 20 times lol
 
Same thing here, 4th time in a year and the problem is on the phone pole, yet as always u can tell them what the problem is and tell them to send a technician and all they say is, we found no problem on your line. Just send a ****ing technician please. Last time it took 2 weeks for a tech to come, this time its 4 days and counting, and our line is with afrihost now, so no idea how to escalate.
 
Hey .


First of all I hope someone can assist me in this cause I am really getting depressed.

OK I have this problem... I have had DSL for years > moved into a new house about 2 months ago phoned mweb(yes they manage my line ) to transfer my line > they did do it I only waited 3 weeks.. 2 days after my adsl has been finally moved I am exited to get surfing/gaming again> I hear some thunder in the distance but that doesn't bother me cause at my old house my adsl connection was solid never dropped once only when it seemed the world was about to end did it drop maybe 2 times but except that it never dropped.Now I am surfing and boom can't load the page ?I am like dafaq look towards the router and the DSL light is flashing then followed by the internet light going off then 10 seconds later it syncs again with dsl light coming on then followed by the internet light,and it did that about 20 times until the thunder was gone.
Now I phone Mweb and I tell them "listen my bra this line telkom transferred to my new house is not right..After the telkom techie told me its 100% but this thing is rubbish" after about 5 min the Mweb guy says he will log a fault . I waited about 1.5 weeks then the Telkom tech shows up at my house and is asking me about my problem ,I tell him when there is thunder the line drops continuously (even took a video of when it happened too show him what I mean ). He was at my house a total of 2 mins then he left and I didn't hear from him again.3 days later Mweb phones me and asked if the problem is resolved because he sees Telkom closed the fault?? I was like " I don't know what that guy is smoking but my connection is still rubbish" so he opened the fault again. 2 weeks later Telkom phones me and asked me if my line is still faulty I ask him " is the fault still open?" he replies "yes " then I say " Well that answers your question doesn't it". He tells me he will get back to me..never heard from him again ! I phone mweb about 5 days later and ask him for an update on the fault he tells me Telkom closed it because it was resolved..I am furious now how can they close a fault without asking me if the problem is fixed? and again I ask Mweb to please open the fault again because its not fixed .
Today a mweb guy phoned me and told me telkom will come to fix my line today..never heard from telkom only got a sms that says the problem is resolved if its not I must reply "no" if the line is still dropping..

I dont know what to do anymore..
as I am typing this my line dropped 6 times because of the thunder storm in my area.
I don't know whats wrong and I don't know how to communicate with telkom so they can understand what I am trying to say or explain to them whats wrong.. if there is anyone that can give their opinion about my situation or how to handle it I will greatly appreciate it..

Now I have a telkom 100WR router that never gave me problems in the past . I had a 6mb line but the speed is moved down to 3 but it still drops . I don;t have a landline phone just my Router connected directly into the wall port.
I have done everything I can witch isn't that much except wasting R500+ on phone calls to mweb/telkom Yeah that doesn't sound like allot but to me it is.

My connection overall is slow as **** during the day/night.And even if there isn't any thunder my line starts to drop exactly 6:15PM every evening .. then it only drops about a few times 5 maybe 6 times but when the thunder is brewing it drops alot don't even count anymore.It seems to me now I am not a technician that there is some wicked interference on my line from my house to the exchange maybe an exposed cable or something ?? But the telkom techies clearly don't understand english?

So please help..anyone?
 
angryDSLuser said:
Hey .


First of all I hope someone can assist me in this cause I am really getting depressed.

OK I have this problem... I have had DSL for years > moved into a new house about 2 months ago phoned mweb(yes they manage my line ) to transfer my line > they did do it I only waited 3 weeks.. 2 days after my adsl has been finally moved I am exited to get surfing/gaming again> I hear some thunder in the distance but that doesn't bother me cause at my old house my adsl connection was solid never dropped once only when it seemed the world was about to end did it drop maybe 2 times but except that it never dropped.Now I am surfing and boom can't load the page ?I am like dafaq look towards the router and the DSL light is flashing then followed by the internet light going off then 10 seconds later it syncs again with dsl light coming on then followed by the internet light,and it did that about 20 times until the thunder was gone.
Now I phone Mweb and I tell them "listen my bra this line telkom transferred to my new house is not right..After the telkom techie told me its 100% but this thing is rubbish" after about 5 min the Mweb guy says he will log a fault . I waited about 1.5 weeks then the Telkom tech shows up at my house and is asking me about my problem ,I tell him when there is thunder the line drops continuously (even took a video of when it happened too show him what I mean ). He was at my house a total of 2 mins then he left and I didn't hear from him again.3 days later Mweb phones me and asked if the problem is resolved because he sees Telkom closed the fault?? I was like " I don't know what that guy is smoking but my connection is still rubbish" so he opened the fault again. 2 weeks later Telkom phones me and asked me if my line is still faulty I ask him " is the fault still open?" he replies "yes " then I say " Well that answers your question doesn't it". He tells me he will get back to me..never heard from him again ! I phone mweb about 5 days later and ask him for an update on the fault he tells me Telkom closed it because it was resolved..I am furious now how can they close a fault without asking me if the problem is fixed? and again I ask Mweb to please open the fault again because its not fixed .
Today a mweb guy phoned me and told me telkom will come to fix my line today..never heard from telkom only got a sms that says the problem is resolved if its not I must reply "no" if the line is still dropping..

I dont know what to do anymore..
as I am typing this my line dropped 6 times because of the thunder storm in my area.
I don't know whats wrong and I don't know how to communicate with telkom so they can understand what I am trying to say or explain to them whats wrong.. if there is anyone that can give their opinion about my situation or how to handle it I will greatly appreciate it..

Now I have a telkom 100WR router that never gave me problems in the past . I had a 6mb line but the speed is moved down to 3 but it still drops . I don;t have a landline phone just my Router connected directly into the wall port.
I have done everything I can witch isn't that much except wasting R500+ on phone calls to mweb/telkom Yeah that doesn't sound like allot but to me it is.

My connection overall is slow as **** during the day/night.And even if there isn't any thunder my line starts to drop exactly 6:15PM every evening .. then it only drops about a few times 5 maybe 6 times but when the thunder is brewing it drops alot don't even count anymore.It seems to me now I am not a technician that there is some wicked interference on my line from my house to the exchange maybe an exposed cable or something ?? But the telkom techies clearly don't understand english?

So please help..anyone?
Click to expand...

Telkom doesn't have any problems on their network whatsoever so they close any faults opened ASAP.
 
Yup, same issue, there's only so much charl can do, but if the techies are useless nothing you can do. Plus you need to be lucky for them to come when they can see the issue. Adsl is just too stressfull to deal with all these issues. Time to start looking for wireless altyernatives, cos clearly telkom don't know how to find or resolve issues.
 
But isn't there like a big shot baas somewhere in telkom that customers can complain to? This is unacceptable I mean somewhere in telkom someone must care about **** like this and that can actually do something about it?
 
angryDSLuser said:
But isn't there like a big shot baas somewhere in telkom that customers can complain to? This is unacceptable I mean somewhere in telkom someone must care about **** like this and that can actually do something about it?
Click to expand...

Yes. If you are lucky enough to get your ticket escalated a few times it will get there.
 
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