old house grounding - messing up internet/phone?

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malachi constant

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A family member called me with a head-scratcher. They live in an older (~1920s) house, been there over five years. New panel was put in maybe 20 years ago, some of the house has been rewired - all that is properly grounded. However there are still portions of the house that have no grounding. House is one story plus attic bedroom and basement.

Over the summer he switched cable/internet/phone providers. Worked OK for a couple months, but the last month it has been terrible. (I believe he said cable is OK, but phone and internet are bad, but maybe I got cable and phone mixed up.) Got a technician out there this week who said it was the grounding in the building that was messing it up. I am hearing all this second hand, but sounded like the technician got a little nip while working outside the house, and another one inside, put his meter on the line, saw some voltage, and walked away telling the homeowner he needed to have an electrician look at it. Before he left he did try, from both interior and exterior, running a ground wire from the coax sheath to the water main. Didn't seem to do anything.

They had zero issues with the previous cable/internet/phone provider. They have had zero issues with the house electrical system, with the lone exception of their electric blanket having to be replaced at least once each winter. (!?!) I had him check that the panel was bonded to the water main, it was, with bonding across the meter, so I assume the service panel is properly grounded and that the problem is downstream.

He's willing to call in an electrician to do some troubleshooting or updating, but is wondering what kind of investigation he can first do on his own. I suggested shutting off breakers and turning them on one-by-one...but unfortunately don't know what to tell him he should be metering as he turns each of them on. Sometimes the internet works fine, so it's hard to use that as indicator.

Seems plausible enough to me that faulty grounding would be the culprit, though I'm surprised bonding the coax didn't do anything, and it is suspicious that the old provider had no issues at all. It's an annual contract, and while not impossible to get out of it switching back to the old provider isn't his first option.

Wish I could come up with a better troubleshooting scheme. I can teach him a number of tricks for rewiring old homes with minimal damage. I'm looking more for ways to isolate the problem, so he can do this in pieces over the next few months and in the meantime not have to forego having an internet/phone/cable connection. Any suggestions? Thoughts on costs if he does hire an electrician?

Thanks!
 
but sounded like the technician got a little nip while working outside the house, and another one inside, put his meter on the line, saw some voltage, and walked away telling the homeowner he needed to have an electrician look at it.
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If this is the case, I would not recommend anyone not licensed and insured to do electrical work to be touching it.

The difference between 'a little nip' and fatal is a difference of milliamps.
 
Yeah what Mark said....

I'd remove the wire to the water pipe, I'd make sure the bond inside the cable box goes to the ground rod.

My TV cable and internet is combined, Earthlink on Time Warner, the following is what the little tag say's
"Do not remove ground wire". This wire is attached to my ground rod from inside the cable box.

Sounds like one of those cause and effect things that takes 50 questions to clarify why the cause and effect of poor service.

It could also be out on the pole with all the weather that's been passing lately, they need to call up the provider and ask them to QA the service. The provider can also test backwards to the pole, this wire might be toast as well.
 
We have had multiple issues with service problems with our bundled cable/tv/internet. Some have been very hard for Comcast to track down.

All but one were eventually tracked down to problems with critters eating on our cable.

Right now only our cordless phones work because there is a scratching noise that appeared on the inside phone lines. Comcast said it was not their problem. Its on my list of things to look at. i suspect someone chewed on the inside phone lines as well.
 
Old house, easily exposed telephone wiring and telephone hook-up on base boards, animals did a number on the box, or foot traffic, furniture, spilled drinks - kids about anything... disconnect telephone trunks one by one and have a wired phone an listen for the clear tone as each line is released of service.

This is glooved PPE type work, minimum insulated tools, a phone incoming ring will knock someone loopie!
 
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Thanks all. I'm advising him to get the provider to put something in writing as to what they observed, including equipment and cable on the line side, equipment and cable on the house side (if they'll even check it for him), and also to note where and what they observed/measured on the grounding system that they considered to be dangerous or interfering with their equipment. I would think it is their duty to do as much if they saw something that is unsafe and/or causing disruption to their service. I'm advising that he take what they put in writing and give it to an electrician (after doing a visual inspection of cabling to make sure something didn't obviously get pinched at a baseboard or chewed through or whatever).

As far as the electrician goes, at this point I would ask the EC to put a meter on the grounding system, and test out the internal telecom cabling if it hasn't already been done, and let them use their professional judgement from there.

Anything else I should throw out there for him / the provider / the EC?
 
It seems that grounding is blamed for all the problems of TV/Cable/Internet problems. At our municipal building, the radio provider stated that a grounding issue is causing problems with our VHF and 800 frequency radios. Would not say any more than that and offered no suggestions for corrective measures. Just said "hire and electrician". Seems funny that nothing else show any problems. Even had the utility put a meter on the service for 2 weeks looking for abnormal conditions and found nothing.
 
From a Telecom standpoint all wiring in a house that is over 20 years old is suspect due to homeowners monkeying around, animals munching and kiddo's. that is one of the reasons they test to the demarc point and anything past that is the homeowners baby. So if the Tech tests it at the demarc and its fine then my humble suggestion is to run new coax or RG6 to the rooms you want service in. I say humble because I know that can get costly and is easier said than done. As for grounding if it is suspect then have him place a new ground rod at the demarc and have the Tech rebond to it and not the main panel (main panel is usually best). If it was just phone company then the ground wouldn't make a hoot of difference unless there is a short to ground, cable TV though is a different animal.
But all in all I'm just shooting in the dark till we get more info to trouble shoot from.
 
malachi constant said:
Anything else I should throw out there for him . . . the EC?
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I'd ask questions of the homeowners with respect to the behavior of the lights throughout the house. Do any get brighter or dimmer "on their own". What's happening in the home at those moments, are people doing anything that is associated with the change in the lights, or, has anyone noted a certain appliance starting or stopping.

The "nip" reported by the low voltage technician may be related to the voltage swings on a multi wire branch circuit or feeder caused by an open neutral.

Over the decades of working in the Twin Cities, numerous times I have seen the effects of a failed Xcel neutral that happened some time ago that was brought to light (poor pun) when the continuity of the grounding electrode system started failing (or, more commonly, when the plumber was in the middle of replacing a valve).
 
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