Lost half a day on a job because of a bad ground block

I was troubleshooting a weak signal at a customer's house last Tuesday and must have spent 4 hours chasing noise on their line. Finally checked the ground block on the side of the house and it was one of those cheap plastic ones with the metal insert falling out. Took me 30 seconds to swap it and the problem disappeared. Cost me about $300 in lost time for that one stop since I had to push two other jobs to the next day. I thought I was being smart keeping a few of those blocks in my van from a bulk order I did years ago. Anyone else have a bad ground block cause a nightmare service call?

2 comments

2 Comments

jessica_robinson2313d ago

Oh man, I literally just read an article about this exact thing last week in some trade magazine my boss left in the break room. Apparently those cheap plastic ground blocks are notorious for failing because the metal insert corrodes over time and the plastic gets brittle from UV. The article said a lot of techs are switching to the all-metal ones even though they cost a bit more upfront. I remember it mentioned that a bad ground block can cause intermittent issues that look like ingress or even a bad drop, so it's sneaky. Sorry you lost so much time on it though, that's brutal when you think you're prepared with spare parts and they're the problem themselves lol.

mary_foster9213d ago

Those plastic ground blocks are the worst. I had a similar issue last spring on a house off of Maple Street where I spent 2 hours checking everything from the tap to the modem. Finally looked at the ground block and it was cracked right down the middle. Swapped it and signal was perfect. @jessica_robinson23 youre right about that UV damage, I keep mine in a sealed bin in the van now. Makes me feel pretty dumb when I get outsmarted by a five dollar part.