WAR-1 Losses

[mickeym]

Since we began installing WAR-1 units, we have lost over 17% of these due to seemingly not too sever weather - these have all been in Rootennas - our grounding practices are the same as always: all mounting hardware (mast or tripod or wall mount or eve mount or whatever) is grounded - the cat5 run goes through a metal Hyperlink lightning arrestor (also grounded) before reaching the POE + PS - all customers PS are in surge strips.

In all but one case, the PS is shorted and cold, putting out no power - these are the 3Comm PS we received when ordering our gear from Star resellers.

In EVERY case, the radio (WLM54bg) is NOT damaged and performs fine in a new WAR-1, suggesting something on the WAR-1 board much more sensitive than the radio.

Our network still has a mix of Tranzeo, CB3, Trango, and Waverider, all grounded as above and with NO losses from this same weather.

This is becoming a credibility issue with subscribers, not to mention the time used on part replacement taken away from new installs.

Thanks for any suggestions.

[lonnie]

We have not seen any WAR1 deaths. Is anybody else seeing them die like that?

[soulmata]

We have deployed about 10 WAR1s, a mixture of 2.4GHz using the WLM54G and SR2 and 900MHz using the SR9


None have failed...

[luke541]

After deploying about 130 of the war-1's, I have had about 7 that won't see the wlm54g card right out of the fedex box until being re-seated several times. I have 4 that never show a card once booted, even with the newested beta os loaded it won't see a card.

I have only had one war-1 fail while in service. It powers on, but does not boot. Can these be re-flashed? I'll search around some more. on that.

So my biggest problem has been the units that don't see a card right out of the box.


I love the war series boards though!

[Stratolinks]

We have deployed nearly 50 WAR1 thus far. I have one that brand new would not recognise the mPCI card no matter what I do. Other than that we have not had a single failure in the field. During a storm in June we lost 9 of the realtek client bridges.

I will not that we do NOT ground the installs anymore. After consulting with our insurance company we either have to follow the Ontario Electrical Safety Authority standard for grounding, or we simply do not ground them. The Ontario ESA requires minimum of a 4ga ground wire to an approved ground. An approved ground is one of: a new buried ground plate, a 10' 1/2" dia ground rod driven to full depth, or a permanent connection inside the electrical panel to the existing ground (which must be connected by a licensed electrician).

The example the insurance company cited was this: When Bell ExpressVu or StarChoice installs a dish on your home for satellite TV, do they ground the dish? The answer is obviously no. It is accepted practise for this type of install that it is not grounded and thus you can not be held liable for any lightning damage that may arise from the unit being present even if it is proven that lightning struck this equipment and burnt the house down. Since we sell the hardware to the end user, any lightning damage becomes their responsibility. We have done full grounding of a few sites that appeared as though they would be a problem, at considerable extra expense to the customer.

Thus far my opinion of the WAR1 is that it is a solid and reliable performer.

[rbolduc]

We have deployed nearly 50 WAR1 thus far. I have one that brand new would not recognise the mPCI card no matter what I do. Other than that we have not had a single failure in the field. During a storm in June we lost 9 of the realtek client bridges.

I will not that we do NOT ground the installs anymore. After consulting with our insurance company we either have to follow the Ontario Electrical Safety Authority standard for grounding, or we simply do not ground them. The Ontario ESA requires minimum of a 4ga ground wire to an approved ground. An approved ground is one of: a new buried ground plate, a 10' 1/2" dia ground rod driven to full depth, or a permanent connection inside the electrical panel to the existing ground (which must be connected by a licensed electrician).

The example the insurance company cited was this: When Bell ExpressVu or StarChoice installs a dish on your home for satellite TV, do they ground the dish? The answer is obviously no. It is accepted practise for this type of install that it is not grounded and thus you can not be held liable for any lightning damage that may arise from the unit being present even if it is proven that lightning struck this equipment and burnt the house down. Since we sell the hardware to the end user, any lightning damage becomes their responsibility. We have done full grounding of a few sites that appeared as though they would be a problem, at considerable extra expense to the customer.

Thus far my opinion of the WAR1 is that it is a solid and reliable performer.

Execpt for my AP's I have grounded none of my CPE installs and have lost NONE to bad weather/lightning.. some CPE200's are over 5 years old.. well that said, now I'll get hit :(

Reed

[tog]

The physical miniPCI slot on the WAR-1 seems touchy, we also often have to re-seat the miniPCI card to get it to recognize.

We've had I think 2 DOAs and a couple that died out of 50. Nothing out of the ordinary really.

[mickeym]

Thanks for the replies - one more question:

Are the 'good survival' installs being done with shielded or unshielded cat5?

We're using heavy sheath, flooded, unshielded - thinking of switching to shielded.

Thanks again.

[kbldawg]

We lost 7 WAR1s in one day about a month ago when a storm rolled through, none were grounded. All of them had their ethernet ports blown.

We didn't lose any of the old Tranzeos that were in that same area. The obvious differences between the two CPE is the tranzeo ethernet surge protector.

I can't complain and say that the WAR1s are defective because we didn't ground them properly (our bad). However, I suspect that they are more sensitive compared to other CPE.

Once we have been through a few storms with our newly grounded WAR1s, we will know more.

[lonnie]

We always use shielded cable. I was not aware you could buy outdoor cable that was unshielded.+

[mickeym]

Could you describe how you have chosen to ground?

Thanks.

"Once we have been through a few storms with our newly grounded WAR1s, we will know more."

[kbldawg]

We run a #10 straded wire from one of the Rootenna mounting bolts strait to a ground rod. We either use an existing ground rod or drive our own.

We have assumed that since the only failure has been with the ethernet ports that it is due to a moderate static build-up. In other words, if it were a direct hit or sever static charging taking place then we would expect to see further damage.

So, giving the charge a place to go, instead of the board, is our intent.

If this does not work, we will have to install ethernet surge as well and go from there.

[lonnie]

I don't think it is static buildup. A lightning strike generates a HUGE magnetic pulse and that pulse can induce voltage spikes in any conductor within a mile or more of the strike.

The shield reduces that pulse through decoupling. The conductors still get a shot but greatly reduced and the voltage generated as a result is reduced.

[Stratolinks]

Execpt for my AP's I have grounded none of my CPE installs and have lost NONE to bad weather/lightning.. some CPE200's are over 5 years old.. well that said, now I'll get hit :(

Reed

Yes, ALL our equipment is well protected. Some sites have taken many hits and the only things I have lost since Feb 2002 are 2 omni antennas (one was blown to bits, another has a hole burned in through the fibreglass) and one AC power supply (it was on the site that had the onmi blown to bits, and then I found out that the grain leg had the ground wire broken off. Had to assume the surge then jumped to the hydro panel and came in the AC line.)

The topic was WAR1 which is a CPE product thus the answer specific to CPE equipment.

[therealboss]

All our CPE's are with unshielded CAT5, all our AP's have shielded CAT5, never lost a WAR 1 or 2 CPE but lost a few old WAR4's and WAR2's running as AP's in the odd storm. (Lost 2 WAR 4's last sunday, direct hit to tower but the metro on the same tower is still running).

[rbolduc]

Yes, ALL our equipment is well protected. Some sites have taken many hits and the only things I have lost since Feb 2002 are 2 omni antennas (one was blown to bits, another has a hole burned in through the fibreglass) and one AC power supply (it was on the site that had the onmi blown to bits, and then I found out that the grain leg had the ground wire broken off. Had to assume the surge then jumped to the hydro panel and came in the AC line.)

The topic was WAR1 which is a CPE product thus the answer specific to CPE equipment.

I understand, I have about 15 war1's in the field now.. I was just making a point.. I guess it also depends on location to.. Here in general we get little lightning, but I DO use shielded cable and ground that, I figure if the CPE got hit its dead anyway, but as Lonnie pointed out induced current is most likely going to be the problem.. It was also mentioned in this topic about radio problems..so my approach is clean the WAR1 mini PCI with a light fiberglass brush first and then a coating of deoxIT 5 on the contacts before assy..

Reed

[Stratolinks]

We used to use shielded cable. Ran out of it for a while once and used unshielded cable. Before long we realised we has less trouble with the installs using unshielded cable and have since stopped using the shielded cable. One site has a run if unshielded cable going from an equipment box at the bottom of the tower, accross and up a 364ft tower and then accross under the deck to the equipment box, and we have never had a problem with that wired link (installed Dec 2003).

I have not looked close at the WAR1, but many new devices have minimal or no magnetics on the ethernet port. That is why new devices will fry the ethernet port much easier than old devices. This is a design change due to newer cheaper chips that are designed to interface directly with the ethernet port and don't need the external magnetics of the old devices. When was the last time you saw an old 3com ISA NIC that had a blown port? Lower prices do sometimes come at a cost. The standard spec for new ethernet controller's is survival of a fixed width pulse of 600V. The old chips combined with the inductive circuit on the interface could often survive small spikes in the 3000V range. Still no guarantee that either will survive a nearby lightning induced surge, but at least a better chance.

[lonnie]

Have you tried the approach that rbolduc suggests, or the simple wiping with a pen eraser that we have used?

After deploying about 130 of the war-1's, I have had about 7 that won't see the wlm54g card right out of the fedex box until being re-seated several times. I have 4 that never show a card once booted, even with the newested beta os loaded it won't see a card.

I have only had one war-1 fail while in service. It powers on, but does not boot. Can these be re-flashed? I'll search around some more. on that.

So my biggest problem has been the units that don't see a card right out of the box.


I love the war series boards though!

[valenti]

We always use shielded cable. I was not aware you could buy outdoor cable that was unshielded.+

Home Depot sells outdoor cable that is not shielded. I started using it a year ago (due to convenience, also it was a step up from my indoor rated cable) and haven't noticed any problems with it.

[handyman]

Thanks for the replies - one more question:

Are the 'good survival' installs being done with shielded or unshielded cat5?

We're using heavy sheath, flooded, unshielded - thinking of switching to shielded.

Thanks again.

We get a lot of lightning strikes to the ground in our service area and we and everyone else loses stuff as a result.

Our experience is that equipment attached to a house is rarely damaged except via the AC power grid. We do not bother to ground CPE attached to a house. If it was easy, we would do it, but normally it would not be easy. We use unshielded outdoor (CMX) cable. Usually the cable, and the unit, are pretty high up on the house. We think of that as a relatively safe location, lightning-wise.

Being the highest point on an exposed house would be a different story. Usually a house in a high, exposed location in our area has a lightning protection system on the roof, and we can tie in to that.

Most trouble comes across the power grid. We lost an AP (a WRAP board) when lightning struck two MILES away. We assume the power grid was the connection. By far the biggest losses within the confines of customer houses are AC adapters (surge protectors only help somewhat), presumably due to surges on the power grid.

Anytime we put a cable on or in the ground outdoors, things are different. We use shielded flooded direct burial UV resistant cable. Unless the run is short, if possible we put a PoE-capable surge arrestor on each end of the run, connected to the best nearby ground we can find. The idea is that the high voltage travels across ground and gets onto any wire it can find.

Our losses would suggest that lightning-induced high voltage is more likely to travel across the ground than across the outer surface of a house. Of course, if lightning actually strikes the house, you are just going to lose your equipment.

We also have some belief that exposed aerial runs are susceptible and we are pretty aggressive about grounding and protecting those.

Some of our access points are in vulnerable areas, and we give them major protection. Grounding via rods driven into the soil or copper strap just laid across the surface (as long a run as we can afford). Everything grounded. Equipment in grounded metal boxes. Grounded surge-protection on DC power wires. Grounded surge arrestors on every ethernet wire. And for on-grid locations, battery power for the AP driven by a charger plugged into the AC.

We lose equipment every month in the summer. Mostly AC adapters and Ethernet switches; an occasional AP, surge arrestor, solar panel (ouch!), or client unit.

[lonnie]

Except that as I explained, shielded cable will reduce the induced voltage from a nearby strike.

Home Depot sells outdoor cable that is not shielded. I started using it a year ago (due to convenience, also it was a step up from my indoor rated cable) and haven't noticed any problems with it.

[oscarBravo]

Most trouble comes across the power grid. We lost an AP (a WRAP board) when lightning struck two MILES away. We assume the power grid was the connection. By far the biggest losses within the confines of customer houses are AC adapters (surge protectors only help somewhat), presumably due to surges on the power grid. The only place surge protection is useful on AC mains is at the point of entry, where there's a decent connection to ground. On our key high sites we have two surge arrestors installed in the main switchbox - one to tie live to neutral, and one to tie neutral to ground.