IPv6 default route lost

wallabybob · Mar 17, 2011, 5:28 AM

I have a Hurricane Electric IPv6 tunnel.

It has been operating but today, when I attempted to ping6 ipv6.google.com, I discovered there was no default IPv6 route in pfSense. Through the pfSense web GUI: System -> Gateways, Gateways tab I edited the HE_NET entry, saved it, applied the change and then I saw I had a default IPv6 route and I could successfully IPv6 ping ipv6.google.com

My IPv4 address changed a few days ago and that probably caused my tunnel to go down. Could it have also resulted in the loss of my default IPv6 route?

netstat -r -n

Routing tables

Internet6:
Destination Gateway Flags Netif Expire
::1 ::1 UH lo0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::1 2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::2 UH gif0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::/64 link#15 U bridge0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::1 link#15 UHS lo0
fe80::%rl0/64 link#2 U rl0

netstat -r -n

Routing tables

Internet6:
Destination Gateway Flags Netif Expire
default 2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::1 UGS gif0
::1 ::1 UH lo0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::1 2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::2 UH gif0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::/64 link#15 U bridge0
2001:470:pqrs:wxyz::1 link#15 UHS lo0
fe80::%rl0/64 link#2 U rl0

Cino · Mar 17, 2011, 11:57 AM

Go to Routing, Edit your HE gateway and then click Save. That should fix that. Also, did you update your IP address on HE's website? If not, you tunnel wont come up.

wallabybob · Mar 17, 2011, 12:35 PM

@Cino:

Go to Routing, Edit your HE gateway and then click Save. That should fix that.

Thanks, that did fix the missing default route.

@Cino:

Also, did you update your IP address on HE's website? If not, you tunnel wont come up.

Yes I did, but that wasn't sufficient to recover the default route.

I appreciate the difficulty of completely automatically recovering the tunnel after a public IP v4 address change. However the observed behaviour raises the question: will an IP v6 default route recover after a up-down-up transition (e.g. an IP v6 tunnel over a ppp link that goes down then recovers with the same IP v4 address or a pure IPv6 link to an ISP that goes down overnight because the modem is powered down after work then powered up the next morning).

iFloris · Mar 17, 2011, 1:16 PM

There is a script on the he.net website to change your ip. By installing cron and calling the script every 24 (or so) hours, you can sort of automatically update your endpoint.

jimp · Mar 17, 2011, 4:13 PM

@iFloris:

There is a script on the he.net website to change your ip. By installing cron and calling the script every 24 (or so) hours, you can sort of automatically update your endpoint.

That sounds like something that would make a good candidate for a dyndns update type.