Loss of signal, burned connector

[mcastles]

Hi

new to forum and need some advice for Directv. Recently I have experienced loss of signal message. When checking the signal in setup, every transponder on 101 is either zero, or every other transponder reads zero. Further investigation the RG6 fittings is warm and burned to the point of no connection. I have an H24 receiver and 5 LNB HD dish.

I unplug the receiver and replace the fitting with another compression and it works for a while, then same thing, no signal and compression warm to the touch.

I am out of ideas, thanks

 

[texasbrit]

Looks like you have some sort of grounding problem, and it could be dangerous, if there is enough current flowing through the cable to cause burning. Is the dish grounded?

 

[peds48]

I think this "burning" might actually be corrosion.

 

[Zashel]

at this point your cables and LNB should be replaced, and if the dish isnt already grounded, that needs to be done as well. cables should not be getting hot. something is wrong and its dangerous.

 

[mcastles]

Thanks. The only ground is through a grounding block on the roof. The dish is about 6-7 years old and has been solid, no issues. Interestingly it only seems to happen on the HD receiver. There is a second receiver, non-HD standard, that never has a problem. Is it possible the HD receiver is going bad? Would a bad LNB cause such a sporadic problem?

 

[raoul5788]

I think peds48 is right, it's most likely corrosion, probably from water entering the cable somewhere.

 

[texasbrit]

Which other receiver do you have? My guess is that you just have a cable issue, nothing to do with the LNB.

 

[mcastles]

Which other receiver do you have? My guess is that you just have a cable issue, nothing to do with the LNB.

The other one is D12-700

 

[texasbrit]

swap the cable so the H24 is connected to the dish using the cable that was connected to the D12. I suspect it will work fine.

 

[mcastles]

Yes will do thanks

 

[Claude Greiner]

The burning happens when you get water in the connector. It reacts with the electricity and will rapidly corrode the center conductor.

If you had 100% copper cable then no issue, but when you have copper clad steel cable this tends to be the issue.

 

[Broe67]

Hi

new to forum and need some advice for Directv. Recently I have experienced loss of signal message. When checking the signal in setup, every transponder on 101 is either zero, or every other transponder reads zero. Further investigation the RG6 fittings is warm and burned to the point of no connection. I have an H24 receiver and 5 LNB HD dish.

I unplug the receiver and replace the fitting with another compression and it works for a while, then same thing, no signal and compression warm to the touch.

I am out of ideas, thanks

It would not be a grounding problem, but an issue with the Neutral from the pole or pedestal mounted transformer that connects your house to the Electric Utility. It would not be warm if it was a grounding issue. Keep in mind that the coax is being used by house electric in place of the Neutral. If you remove it, it can fry electronics and could possibly kill you. Call your Electric Utility to pull the meter and see if there is any corrosion, and that the Neutral where it connects inside the meter house is properly tied into the ground rod.

Sometimes the issue can be on the transformer side. Power company responds to these tickets 24/7. Call them now, not later.

 

[Broe67]

This is an example when the Neutral & two hots are corroded and causes the Coax to melt at the connector. First picture on page one is what it looks like when the Coax becomes the Neutral. The twenty-ninth picture on page one is the transformer side of house electric. Notice that the Neutral is so corroded, that both ends have a gap where the ring used to be, that connected the two sides.

http://www.dslreports.com/forum/r29133406-Connectivity-Coax-cable-on-street-box-keeps-MELTING
I think I linked this IEEE guide on proper grounding for cable/satellite, telephone/dsl before. http://www.lightningsafety.com/nlsi_lhm/IEEE_Guide.pdf The Green & Emerald books are too large of files, I just happened to find them by doing some creative web searching.

 

[mcastles]

Thanks for all the info. Will definitely check this out

 

[peds48]

The burning happens when you get water in the connector. It reacts with the electricity and will rapidly corrode the center conductor.

If you had 100% copper cable then no issue, but when you have copper clad steel cable this tends to be the issue.

Hmmm, I see this more with SSC then with CCS

 

[mcastles]

just a follow-up. i switched the cable from the SD box to the HD box last nite. So far, seems fine. No issues. Will watch closely.

From looking at link posted on open neutral, the connector on my system nothing to that extent. Just some dark discoloration inside the connector.

i have to admit the potential of open neutral does make me quite nervous

 

[raoul5788]

It's much more likely that you are getting water into the cable. Check all of your connections to be sure they are water tight.

 

[peds48]

It's much more likely that you are getting water into the cable. Check all of your connections to be sure they are water tight.

Right on! Lots of folks referred to this symptom as "burned" but is no more than just corrosion. If you catch it in time, you will see the copper kinda greenish, then orange and the last is just pure black