[DaVinciRemodel]

Customer’s house has a water feature (waterfall and pond) in the back yard that causes pixilation of their Comcast TV signal. Strangely, this only happens between 4pm and 10pm.

More details:
• House was built in 2007. Water feature added in 2012. TV problems start June 9th this year.
• You can leave the water feature running all day (until 4pm) and the TVs are unaffected.
• At 4pm (about – it’s not clockwork) the TVs start to pixilate. If I turn the pump to the water feature off – TVs go to normal.
• All 11 TVs in the house act the same way. They are on 9 different electrical circuits.

What’s happening here?

Paul

 

[tenon0774]

Are the electrical lines from the "water" control device run In the same conduit as the cable line?

Or even in the basement/ utility closet, too close together?


Be my guess.

 

[DaVinciRemodel]

Are the electrical lines from the "water" control device run In the same conduit as the cable line?

Be my guess.

No the cable enters the house on the south side of the house the electric for the water feature enters on the west. I had the cable located and it runs around the perimeter of the lot. The electric for the water feature is a straight shot from center of yard to the house - they don't even cross paths.

 

[Tinstaafl]

The water pump has a DC motor with brushes that are generating electrical noise? Comcast signal is a bit weaker due to everyone coming home about that time and sucking the levels down?

Substitute pump and/or a level meter might make some headway with diagnosis. Good one; hope you find a resolution to post here.

 

[TxElectrician]

Have you checked incoming voltage during this period? Is it possible that the poco is experiencing voltage drop ? 4-10 is the perfect time for people to come home and turn on their a/c, not sure if that's an issue in Co though.

 

[MarkJames]

Customer’s house has a water feature (waterfall and pond) in the back yard that causes pixilation of their Comcast TV signal. Strangely, this only happens between 4pm and 10pm.

More details:
• House was built in 2007. Water feature added in 2012. TV problems start June 9th this year.
• You can leave the water feature running all day (until 4pm) and the TVs are unaffected.
• At 4pm (about – it’s not clockwork) the TVs start to pixilate. If I turn the pump to the water feature off – TVs go to normal.
• All 11 TVs in the house act the same way. They are on 9 different electrical circuits.

What’s happening here?

Paul

Don't know, but I'd just schedule a repair after 4:00 (and not mention the water feature.) We've had plenty of problems with comcast cable over the years. Recently pixilation of just a couple channels late in the evening (HBO, for example).

 

[Inner10]

Chasing a ghost, call comcast too check the signal and make sure the incoming cable is grounded.

 

[jb4211]

I agree, let Comcast handle the issue. Water feature or not, it's their job to provide an acceptable signal.

Maybe Tin is right and they need to add a booster.

 

[tedanderson]

Is it possible that the poco is experiencing voltage drop ? 4-10 is the perfect time for people to come home and turn on their a/c, not sure if that's an issue in Co though.

I'm thinking the same thing but on the other line. When people come home and turn on their TV, it probably makes the cable tv signal weaker. Then the interference from the pump is just enough to push it over the edge.

Even though the electrical and cable might be on different sides of the house, I am thinking that somewhere underground the cables are running side-by-side.. even if its the coax on the cable company side.

 

[DaVinciRemodel]

Thanks for the input :thumbsup: Comcast has been out 3 – 4 times now and has basically washed their hands of this. Their position is that this is an electrical issue not a Comcast problem.

I just want it fixed – the customer is driving me nuts with this.

 

[cwatbay]

Thanks for the input :thumbsup: Comcast has been out 3 – 4 times now and has basically washed their hands of this. Their position is that this is an electrical issue not a Comcast problem.

I just want it fixed – the customer is driving me nuts with this.

My story might help you out. We had the same problem here in my house. The internet went out and we got the TV cable ok, but all the HD channels were out, a lot of pixelization, and cable stations further up the numbering scale...like channels 50-100 were out...these were standard, not HD

I tried everything on my end, but nothing worked. My story is I remodeled the place. We have 12 cable drops and 14 network drops throughout the house (condo). I have two cable expanders in the closet and a 24 port gigabite switch...I almost forgot: 14 phone drops with 3 lines each (personal, business and fax)...so there is a block in the closet too.

Anyway, the Comcast guy shows up. Luckly he has some experience. The cable signal is way, way below what it should be at my main termination (ie: cable from comcast to my expansion boards). He is surprised I am getting any channels at all, and, it explains why I have no internet.

We finally trace down where the Comcast demark is and he finds that some hack had recently rearranged all the cable connections to the condo units....basically had cables going into way too many splitters, thus too much db loss. My unit has a one to two splitter.

On one of my lines(cables)the comcast tech found voltage...how that happened, I have no clue...but something happened....so apparently one of my in house lines is picking up voltage from somewhere...any it's enough to get your attention when you touch it.

Once the hack problem was corrected, we sent up to my place and removed the cable that had voltage (I wasn't using it anyway) and reduced the number of connections to just the three TV's and cable boxes that we had.

That fixed the problem....I am pretty sure he had them boost the signal too, just in case.

As a coincidence, all this crap happened when a new owner moved in and, I suspect he had some hack cable guy (Datsun pickup)do his cable work.

 

[SectorSecurity]

Ask your telco to actually check the demarc around the same time the issue is happening.

 

[DaVinciRemodel]

Comcast sent their bestest… most excellent… senior… head dude to the house yesterday at 3:45. TV starts pixilating at 3:54. By 4:15 he has it diagnosed as a bad signal booster. He’s gone by 5:00 after watching TV for 30 min. – turning the pump on and off 4 – 5 times.

All fixed! At least for the last two days :thumbsup: :clap:

 

[Red Adobe]

Thanks for the input :thumbsup: Comcast has been out 3 – 4 times now and has basically washed their hands of this. Their position is that this is an electrical issue not a Comcast problem.

I just want it fixed – the customer is driving me nuts with this.

So it was on them do you get to bill them and not the HO? NOT

The cable Co's hire some real winners, I recently got cable internet and the jackhole wanted to attach the arial right next to electric and share the ground. http://img.contractortalk.com/smilies/eek.gif

 

[Inner10]

Here's a little hint for next weird electrical problem. The residential power system is the first thing to get blamed and the last thing to actually cause a problem.

 

[cwatbay]

Comcast sent their bestest… most excellent… senior… head dude to the house yesterday at 3:45. TV starts pixilating at 3:54. By 4:15 he has it diagnosed as a bad signal booster. He’s gone by 5:00 after watching TV for 30 min. – turning the pump on and off 4 – 5 times.

All fixed! At least for the last two days :thumbsup: :clap:

Well that makes sense. It seems that the more I hear of these specific problems, it all goes back to Comcast signal strength, and, them having to boost it.

It also makes sense that you have to wait for them to finally send someone out who actually has more experience than just drilling a hole in the side of a house. It's like getting past the Tier 1 tech support named "Bob" in Bangladesh to finally get someone in the US that speaks English and isn't following a script.