Spent a whole day chasing a ghost signal in a new build

Got called out to a big new house in the suburbs last week for a weak signal on one line. The homeowner said it kept cutting out. I checked the wall plate, the splitter in the garage, even the drop from the pole. Everything looked fine, but the meter showed a huge loss. I must have re-run the test five times. Turns out, the builder had run the coax right next to a main power line for about twenty feet inside the wall. The interference was killing it. I had to fish a whole new line through an interior wall to get away from the power, which took me from 9 AM to almost 5 PM. Has anyone else run into this with new construction where they bundle everything together?

3 comments

3 Comments

adam18619d ago

Classic builder move right there.

ninar6819d ago

Saw a whole thread about this last week, some builders cut corners on the foundation to save a few bucks upfront. It always leads to bigger problems down the road, like cracks in the walls or doors that won't close right. Makes you wonder what else they skimped on if the basics are messed up. Really shows why you need a good inspector before you buy anything.

jones.kim19d ago

Oh man, that exact thing happened to me on a job last month! The coax was zip-tied right to a romex bundle running to the kitchen. I ended up pulling it out and re-routing it through the attic space above the garage. It was a huge pain, crawling over insulation for an hour, but it fixed the signal drop completely. Builders just don't think about low voltage interference.