"Shocking" coax cable

[bassoprofundo]

Hey all,

I bought the house that in which I currently live a few years ago. All of the coax cable was run by the previous owner. It splits outside at the network interface box with one run going into my basement, and another going into my attic. From the attic, it is split and fed into the closets of all 4 bedrooms on the 2nd floor. The coax cable run into my office seems to shock me when I pick it up. It doesn't happen when I pick it up by the shielded black part, but if I touch the connector and something metal (ex. my PC case), I instantly feel a weird, painful feeling in the finger touching the connector. Is this normal? If not, does anyone have any idea what might be causing it? Thanks!

 

[iRONic]

It's not normal.

The connector was improperly assembled/crimped. Disconnect it in the attic then just cut it off below the connector, strip, and re-crimp.

 

[iRONic]

Coax crimping tutorial

 

[The Boston Dangler]

a new connector won't fix the foreign voltage on the cable.
possibilities:
1. there is a device sending voltage back into the cable.
2. the cable is not properly grounded, or there is a grounding issue with the house.
3. the cable has been punctured and electrified somewhere.
4. the voltage is induced by parallel electric lines.

i would call the cable company and have a tech check for proper bonding. acceptable grounds are an 8-foot ground rod, the electrical meter (not always), the electrical panel with a clamp, the water meter, or in a pinch COLD water pipes can be used if there is only copper and no PVC. hot pipes will not reliably conduct through the heater.

 

[Modelworks]

You could be getting leakage from the cable company itself.
The cable company uses 96vac on the cable lines between distribution amps to power the amps.
Its supposed to be blocked from going out to customers but if an amp were to leak, you could get a shock.

If you have a meter try setting it to AC and measuring the cable.

Also disconnect everything from the cable lines and measure the incoming cable, then slowly add devices back till you find the culprit.

 

[spidey07]

Boston Dangler has it.

Improper grounding.

 

[bassoprofundo]

Thanks for all the replies, folks. I'm going to check into it then using your suggestions!

 

[alkemyst]

something is bad in the crimp.

I made the mistake when I was younger of using my mouth as a third hand with a coax.

I totally forgot the signal is current.

 

[SonicIce]

Yea I always get shocked by mine. It's very small, though. I don't know how it affects quality but I live with it.