Losing connection to Tesla Gateway 2 when using Ubiquiti Amplifi mesh network

[yblaser]

A little tangential, but I have issues accessing my GW through my local network that maybe some network experts can help with.

I'm using a mesh network (Ubiquiti Amplifi) and if I kick the GW off the network temporarily by rebooting or shutting down the node it is connected to I have no problem reaching the GW via the static IP address I set for it. I can communicate it for some length of time (~1 hour) but then after that I get an address unreachable error. The GW still shows present on the router and I can see it sending/receiving data so it does not appear that it dropped the network connection. After some digging I've found that when I get the address unreachable error that the GW is not showing up in the ARP table of my local machine. If I manually set up an entry for the GW in the ARP table I can reach it again. It's almost like after some length of time the GW is not responding to ARP requests or the requests are not making it to the GW. I don't have this issue with any thing else on the network. Any ideas?

 

[scdoubleu]

A little tangential, but I have issues accessing my GW through my local network that maybe some network experts can help with.

I'm using a mesh network (Ubiquiti Amplifi) and if I kick the GW off the network temporarily by rebooting or shutting down the node it is connected to I have no problem reaching the GW via the static IP address I set for it. I can communicate it for some length of time (~1 hour) but then after that I get an address unreachable error. The GW still shows present on the router and I can see it sending/receiving data so it does not appear that it dropped the network connection. After some digging I've found that when I get the address unreachable error that the GW is not showing up in the ARP table of my local machine. If I manually set up an entry for the GW in the ARP table I can reach it again. It's almost like after some length of time the GW is not responding to ARP requests or the requests are not making it to the GW. I don't have this issue with any thing else on the network. Any ideas?

I see similar behaviour, also using Ubiquiti access points. My router caches ARP entries for 20 minutes, after which it re-arps the device. Sometimes the GW2 responds correctly, but most times it take a few minutes to finally reply. Adding a static ARP entry on the router cures the problem.

Steve

 

[gpez]

Since your observation is specifically about ARP this may not be related but I had 0 luck keeping my TEG connected to my Unifi network (regular AP system, not mesh). I eventually just ran cat6 under the house to the TEG and disabled the wifi, been working great since. That'd be my #1 suggestion.

#2 suggestion is that supposedly the TEG has a terrible time if an SSID is associated with both 5 and 2.4 ghz bands. Disabling the 5ghz and/or band steering and/or "high performance devices" is reported to fix the problem. Powerwall+ Wifi Connected but using Cellular if you'd like a TMC post,

https://www.reddit.com/r/Powerwall/comments/quqqmo

is on Reddit.

 

[scdoubleu]

I'd already all tried those suggestions after some searching here and on Reddit. As @yblaser stated, the GW2 remains associated to the AP and tcpdump on my router shows the GW2 still trying to send data to Tesla. Yet ARP "who-has" requests from the router to the GW2's (static) IP address go unanswered.

Over the holidays, time permitting, I'll try tcpdump on the Ubiquiti AP itself to see if that sheds any light. My Tesla devices are on a dedicated VLAN/SSID so errant traffic should be easy to spot.

 

[yblaser]

I see similar behaviour, also using Ubiquiti access points. My router caches ARP entries for 20 minutes, after which it re-arps the device. Sometimes the GW2 responds correctly, but most times it take a few minutes to finally reply. Adding a static ARP entry on the router cures the problem.

Steve

Thanks. Good to know it isn't just me.

 

[yblaser]

Since your observation is specifically about ARP this may not be related but I had 0 luck keeping my TEG connected to my Unifi network (regular AP system, not mesh). I eventually just ran cat6 under the house to the TEG and disabled the wifi, been working great since. That'd be my #1 suggestion.

#2 suggestion is that supposedly the TEG has a terrible time if an SSID is associated with both 5 and 2.4 ghz bands. Disabling the 5ghz and/or band steering and/or "high performance devices" is reported to fix the problem. Powerwall+ Wifi Connected but using Cellular if you'd like a TMC post,

https://www.reddit.com/r/Powerwall/comments/quqqmo

is on Reddit.

Thanks. I did disable band steering and setup a separate 2.4 GHz SSID but that hasn't helped. Running a cable is my last resort of course, but I may just live with it as is for now.

 

[jboy210]

Is everyone having issues using a GW2? I have the old GW1 and it connects to my Unifi Access Points just fine on 2.4 Ghz. But, I usually just connect a Cat 6 Ethernet.

For a device like a GW in a garage, I would use 2.4 GHz unless you have an Access Point very close. Mine AP is 5 feet away, but on the outside of a wall with stucco construction, so there is a Faraday cage of wire mesh in the walls. And 5 GHz really gets attenuated by that.

 

[yblaser]

Is everyone having issues using a GW2? I have the old GW1 and it connects to my Unifi Access Points just fine on 2.4 Ghz. But, I usually just connect a Cat 6 Ethernet.

For a device like a GW in a garage, I would use 2.4 GHz unless you have an Access Point very close. Mine AP is 5 feet away, but on the outside of a wall, and with stucco construction you there is a Faraday cage of wire mesh in the walls. And 5 GHz really gets attenuated by that.

Sorry I should have specified in my first post. This is a GW2 in my case.

 

[miimura]

I also have a Unifi network that consists of a Dream Machine and an AC-Lite AP. I have only one SSID that is 2.4G + 5G. I have a GW1 TEG. The WiFi setup took yesterday but now it has an exclamation mark through the signal bars as shown below. I am not at home right now, so I can't see if it's still passing traffic or not. However, when I remote login to my desktop PC it cannot access the GW UI from the LAN. Pings from the desktop to the GW also time out.

 

[jboy210]

I also have a Unifi network that consists of a Dream Machine and an AC-Lite AP. I have only one SSID that is 2.4G + 5G. I have a GW1 TEG. The WiFi setup took yesterday but now it has an exclamation mark through the signal bars as shown below. I am not at home right now, so I can't see if it's still passing traffic or not. However, when I remote login to my desktop PC it cannot access the GW UI from the LAN. Pings from the desktop to the GW also time out.

View attachment 744713

Sound like something is out at home. Unless you have made any changes to the network very recently. I just tried to add an IoT VLan network to isolate that traffic and screwed something up. I got the same exclamation point on all of the devices I tried to connect via the IoT VLan and associated Wifi IoT network,

I am also using a UDM Pro. Wifi is from with 3 Unifi Access points (2 AC Pro, 1 Wifi 6 LR). One of the AC Pros was installed in the garage for the X and S, and as a backup for the Ethernet connection to the GW1

 

[miimura]

"Configure WiFi" appears to have unconfigured my WiFi all by itself. There is no longer a ">" next to my SSID in the app.

 

[miimura]

This is not a good graph...

 

[BGbreeder]

Software version? Seems odd behavior no matter what. I like the SSID names, though.
All the best,

BG

 

[miimura]

Software version? Seems odd behavior no matter what. I like the SSID names, though.
All the best,

BG

Gateway software is 21.44.
Miraculously, the app indicated that the wifi was connected and I was able to remote login to my desktop and the Tesla Gateway UI actually came up. I still have no idea why and when the wifi works correctly on my WLAN.

 

[jboy210]

This is not a good graph...

View attachment 745077

Where is this display? I don't see anything like it in the Tesla App.

 

[miimura]

Where is this display? I don't see anything like it in the Tesla App.

That is the iOS UniFi Network app.

 

[qlin]

i had similiar issue with ASUS mesh network, but the reason is more related to the "Guest" network.
i put all IOT on Guest network , but after moving them back to Main network and disabled the Guest, everything is fine. never lost them .
not sure about ur case but just FYI

 

[Will792]

I use dedicated IOT 2.4 WiFi with UDM Pro and AC Pro For GW2. It is very stable. The only network options that are on are BSS transition, Multicast enhancements and Optimize IOT WiFi connectivity (cannot recall activating last option. Most likely it is a default value in recent versions).

 

[miimura]

I use dedicated IOT 2.4 WiFi with UDM Pro and AC Pro For GW2. It is very stable. The only network options that are on are BSS transition, Multicast enhancements and Optimize IOT WiFi connectivity (cannot recall activating last option. Most likely it is a default value in recent versions).

View attachment 745356

That's good to know. I somehow lost proper UI.com management of the UDM and am left with only iOS app access, so I have to factory reset the UDM. After I do that and get all my settings entered from scratch, I will set up a dedicated 2.4 WLAN for IOT stuff. Hopefully that will do the trick. When it does connect now, the TEG finds my AC-Lite AP.

I really want to get Ethernet into my Gateway but it's completely outdoors and I would have to run conduit from the telco/cableco point of entry box to the TEG. I have two unused Cat5e cables in that box and it's ~8ft from the TEG.

 

[jboy210]

That is the iOS UniFi Network app.

Thanks. I did not know they even had an app. I log into my UDM Pro and it shows the stats for the network pieces. And after your post, I see it can show the stats for each client. You learn something new every day!