Your mast upgrade spoiled my connection!

[Rob64]

I got the Three broadband box a couple of weeks ago to evaluate as my possible primary broadband source.

It looked promising, although I am on the edge of the indoor coverage zone, I worked out where the lone mast was and by putting the router on a little shelf high in the loft eve facing the mast I got a rock steady 'good' 5G signal. Speeds were typically 50 to 100mb, off peak even hitting 180mb at times, other times dropping down to 30mb for short periods. I even ordered an 4x4 MIMO external antenna with a view to mount externally on a pole for more height (height is always good in radio)

Then a few days ago 5G disappeared, the service status page said they were doing mast upgrades to be finished on the 16th. I was looking forward to probably even stronger service.
Its come back on and the workmen have gone, but its really poor!!  With the router in the same position I can only get 'fair' signal, I have spent a lot of time tweaking the position around but cannot get it to improve. Sporadically it flips to 'good' with a sub -100db signal but signal quality -12db is poorer and it quickly flips back to the weaker channel -108db with better quality -3db. I can't get past 20 to 35mb and before it was pretty stable but now the speed wobbles like crazy.

I am really gutted, I was gearing up to cancel my cable broadband and switch to the far better value Three 5G, but its now looking like I will be sending the router back, luckily I only took the 1 month at a time deal.
They have done what ever they did to the mast (big tower - 3 guys up it for days) and gone so its not likely its going to improve is it? and my area (small town) is unlikely to get another 5G mast anytime soon.

[JonathanB]

Hey @Rob64,

Sorry for the delay in picking up on your post. I'm sorry to hear that your speeds and signal seem to have dropped so much since the engineering work.

Having a look at what you've shared, I do wonder if you may be flicking between two nearby masts. I'm not sure if you've seen this on any other threads, but quite a few other customers have had success in improving the connection by using the band management options in the router's settings?

This should be Network Settings > Broadband > Cellular Band

Band auto selection can be switched off, then if you experiment with a combination of N78 (Required for 5G) and the various "B" bands you may find this will help you stay connected to the signal with the higher speed you mentioned. You need N78, and at least one B band selected to stay connected.

Bands best to have and 5G Not Turning On threads have some discussions about this that you might find helpful. Let me know if this seems to help at all.

If you'd like me to get you in touch with some colleagues that can take a closer look into the situation with the engineering work and the subsequent drop in coverage, I'll be happy to refer you over. Have you spoken to our customer service or technical teams about this at any point up till now?

Thanks,
JonathanB

[Rob64]

Hi, Thanks for the info. I have posted subsequently about how the coverage map had changed quite a lot recently, the 'reach' of the mast being some what reduced so where as before I was just in the 'inside/outside' Red zone, its now falls quite a bit short of my location and the map has been revised since the works.
I don't think I am mast switching because they are very rare around here with 5G and I am definitely staying locked on 5G, the one above is the only Three 5G for some distance around here, in any other direction there is virtually no 5G I could pick up, the corner of the loft facing out to this mast is the only place I get any coverage.
Something a bit disconcerting is the difference loading on the mast makes, a speed tests at the crack of dawn today saw an amazing over 200mb, tested at peak midday a mere 25mb, just tested now 6pm, 82mb and monitoring over a lot of days this pattern is not unusual. It tends to be a bit all over the place.

Its just a pity the locations of the masts carrying Three and which services - or the upgrade schedule is not published. I have a collection of masts virtually at the top of my road that had a lot of work a while ago but from the coverage map its not got Three on them otherwise I would have more signal strength than I could imagine!

[bulldog555]

Band locking sometimes won't work cos if your nearer 4G has the stronger signal, it will refused other band selection with N78. Cell locking is best way! But this features don't have it at the moment.

[bulldog555]

Blimey very scary engineers get up to the height. Please watch Netflix called Fall (two girls)

[Rob64]

Its a long way down if you need a couple more cable ties from the van!

[Anvil_Iron]

Hi, Can you provide a screenshot of the Cellular Info page in it's current state. It may help to diagnose the problem.

[Rob64]

Yes, thank you.  Its frustrating but I am glad they did what they did before I got to the point of cancelling my wired broadband if I can't improve things.

[Rob64]

Perhaps they forgot to plug everything back in.... 🤣

[Geluk]

Look up your postcode on 3's network coverage page; see what it says there.