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    Ruckus Access Points Heartbeat lost in LAN

    Scheduled Pinned Locked Moved General pfSense Questions
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    • A
      admins
      last edited by

      Hi all
      I've several Ruckus R320 APs in my LAN. A Pfsense with the newest version (2.4) is in Front of it.
      In the Logs of the Ruckus APs all two hours the error log: heartbeat lost. In the ruckus forum I've found following:
      https://support.ruckuswireless.com/articles/000003945

      I beleive that it could be some timeouts in pfsense. Has anyone an idea how I could fix that? - They are all in the LAN zone.

      Thx
      admins

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      • johnpozJ
        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
        last edited by johnpoz

        And why would you think pfsense would be involved in devices on lan talking to other devices on lan?

        Is the ZD on a different network then the AP, where pfsense is routing this traffic?

        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
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        • A
          admins @johnpoz
          last edited by

          Hi @johnpoz
          I've monitored the latency on L2 - no problems. Perhaps on L3 - PFsense is something wrong.
          I've seen such problems in the past with voip and udp timers.

          admins

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          • chpalmerC
            chpalmer
            last edited by chpalmer

            Note on that page that nothing implicates your edge firewall/router.

            Possible fixes include:

            1. Verify everything from AP all the way to the ZD

            Unless you have some more elaborate setup your pfsense is not in that path

            1. Make sure UDP ports 12222 and 12223 are opened if there is a firewall in between

            Do you have your LAN segregated somehow?

            1. Check with Ruckus Support and find the appropriate firmware to use

            Triggering snowflakes one by one..
            Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-4590T CPU @ 2.00GHz on an M400 WG box.

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            • johnpozJ
              johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
              last edited by johnpoz

              As chpalmer explained nicely - unless your network is different than what you have stated pfsense would not be involved in the conversations between the AP and ZD..

              Devices on a network do not talk to the gateway (pfsense) to talk to other devices on the same network.. They only need to send traffic to the gateway, to get OFF the network they are on..

              Since from your statement these devices are all on your LAN, pfsense is not involved in the conversation.. The only possible involvement pfsense could have is if the devices are using pfsense to resolve some fqdn to know where to send the hearbeat. But I have to assume they just talk to an IP, and not some fqdn that needs to be resolved.

              Only other involvement that pfsense might have, is if these devices are dhcp, and your dhcpd is running on pfsense.

              An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
              If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
              Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
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              • W
                WannabeMKII
                last edited by WannabeMKII

                Sorry to dig up an old thread, but I'm expirencing this too since moving to pfsense and I'm not sure why.

                Prior to pfsense (SG-1100 on 2.4.5), I've run DrakTek (2860 & 2862), USG and Araknis (110) and all ran without an issue on the same network. It's a flat network, no VLANs or anything special and the only thing that has changed is the router. The switches (UniFi) and Ruckus APs haven't changed.

                I know it's a doesn't make sense, but would anyone have any ideas of the hat might cause it or what I can Try?

                Thanks.

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                • johnpozJ
                  johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                  last edited by johnpoz

                  Again - the router at the edge has ZERO to do with conversation of devices on the same network.. ZERO... Not how it works... So unless you setup pfsense with the same IP as one of these devices or something..

                  An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                  If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                  Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
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                  • W
                    WannabeMKII
                    last edited by

                    That's what I thought. I just can't get my head around why it's been fine on all other routers and that's the only thing that has changed on the network, which prompted me to search the web and find this post.

                    Hmmm, back to the drawing board, or worse case, back to one of the old routers...? Argh, WiFi dropping every two hours is very frustrating, especially under the current climate, but more frustrating not knowing what's causing it.

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                    • johnpozJ
                      johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                      last edited by johnpoz

                      So the heartbeat is over wire? that goes through what? What are the IPs involved?

                      You understand how 1 IP talks to another on the same network right?

                      So 192.168.1.X/24 wants to talk to 192.168.1.Y/24 -- X needs the mac address of Y.. If he does not have that cached, he arps for it.. Which is a broadcast.. Says hey who has 192.168.1.Y

                      Y seeing this broadcast says hey thats my IP, hey X - that is my IP, and my mac address aa:bb:cc:dd:ee:ff

                      X then sends the traffic he want to send to Y on the wire to that mac address.

                      Router has ZERO to do with that.. It could be OFF.. The only time traffic is sent to the routers IP/mac address is when the devices wants to talk to something not on its local network..

                      192.168.1.x/24 wants to talk to 192.168.2.Y/24

                      Well that is not my network -- let me send that to my router/gateway since its not a local IP - he will know how to get there.. If device doesn't know the mac address of his router, lets say 192.168.1.254 - he arps for it.. Then sends the traffic routers mac address, but with destination IP of 192.168.2.Y.. Router says oh you want go get to 192.168.2 -- I know where to send that, or maybe he doesn't - and just sends it on to his default gateway..

                      So example, here cleared my arp cache - then pinged an IP on my network 192.168.9.0/24 where my PC is .100, and the dest nas trying to ping has IP of .10

                      So you see the arp, and the response - and then when send ping you can see that is being sent to the mac address of my nas (192.168.9.10)

                      localtraffic.jpg

                      Now you can see the mac address of my router at 192.168.9.253 (pfsense lan IP)

                      C:\WINDOWS\system32>arp -a | find "192.168.9.253"
                        192.168.9.253         00-08-a2-0c-e6-24     dynamic
                      

                      So when I ping say 8.8.8.8, look at the mac that the traffic is sent too..

                      outsidetraffic.jpg

                      So when 192.168.9.100 is taking to 192.168.9.10 - how would pfsense be involved in that conversation?? Its not!! So if your .X can not talk to your .Y your going to have to figure out why, but it has zero to do with pfsense, unless you have bridged interfaces and your X and Y are on other sides of the bridge?? Or pfsense IP is same .x or .y, etc..

                      So if pfsense does not have the same IP, nor your bridging - the only other way pfsense could be part of your problem is if your devices on this network are getting their IPs from dhcp (running on pfsense)... And that for whatever reason your devices can not renew their lease, and it runs out - and now the reason they can not talk to each other is they have no IP... If your lease time 2 hours for your dhcp? If so if your devices are not able to renew their dhcp, and the lease expires - then no they wouldn't be able to talk to each other.. But that would be because they don't have an IP... Not that pfsense had anything to do with them talking to each other..

                      Look in your dhcp log, do you see the devices asking for renewal of the lease - what does pfsense tell them? A dhcp lease should normally renew around the 50% mark of the lease, so if your lease is for 2 hours, after an hour client would ask for renewal.. If nothing then then like 30 minutes later he has again, then 15 - pretty soon he will be screaming for renewal very fast... Only after it has expired will he loose his IP..

                      An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                      If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                      Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                      SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

                      GertjanG W 2 Replies Last reply Reply Quote 0
                      • GertjanG
                        Gertjan @johnpoz
                        last edited by

                        @johnpoz said in Ruckus Access Points Heartbeat lost in LAN:

                        So when 192.168.9.100 is taking to 192.168.9.10 - how would pfsense be involved in that conversation?? Its not!!

                        And easy to test.
                        Step 1 : power up your network.
                        Step 2 : check that all LAN devices have acquired an IP - or have a static IP.
                        Step 3 : power down pfSense and/or rip out the LAN cable.
                        Step 4 : Use every device on LAN and check that they can communicate with each other by using IP address, name resolution (DNS) isn't available now.
                        Step 5 : with the knowledge obtained in step 4, start reshaping the way you think about networking.

                        No "help me" PM's please. Use the forum, the community will thank you.
                        Edit : and where are the logs ??

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                        • W
                          WannabeMKII @johnpoz
                          last edited by

                          First up, thanks for the detailed response, appreciated!

                          @johnpoz said in Ruckus Access Points Heartbeat lost in LAN:

                          Look in your dhcp log, do you see the devices asking for renewal of the lease - what does pfsense tell them? A dhcp lease should normally renew around the 50% mark of the lease, so if your lease is for 2 hours, after an hour client would ask for renewal.. If nothing then then like 30 minutes later he has again, then 15 - pretty soon he will be screaming for renewal very fast... Only after it has expired will he loose his IP..

                          I've done some more digging and it appears the AP's are getting a new IP every two hours, when the lease expires? Why would that happen?

                          Here's a snapshot for the MAC address;

                          Screenshot 2020-04-11 at 14.37.35.png

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                          • johnpozJ
                            johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                            last edited by johnpoz

                            Well yeah such an issue would cause a blip... Are you running multiple pools, do you have HA pair setup in pfsense? I would sniff that traffic to see why your lease might be considered unknown..

                            Did you delete old leases, do you see current lease for device on pfsense? Only these AP are having such an issue where you see that unknown lease entry in the log?

                            Do you have something else running dhcp services on your network, where the client might of gotten that IP from a different dhcp server?

                            An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                            If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                            Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                            SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                            • W
                              WannabeMKII @johnpoz
                              last edited by

                              I only had one pool, that I've just removed as I was using it for testing.

                              Nope, no HA pair.

                              Didn't delete old leases, but, I've also just run into an issue where I've run out of DHCP leases? I've allowed 89, but only have 25 in use? How can I prevent that happening? Is there a way to automatically free up unused leases?

                              Yes, just the WAPs having the 'unknown lease' entry in the logs.

                              No, no other DHCP services.

                              Many thanks for your continued patience and help, greatly appreciated! 👍

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                              • johnpozJ
                                johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                                last edited by johnpoz

                                I would do a packet capture - and lets take a look see at this request..

                                Can you just set these devices to be static? Try setting up a reservation for them, so they always get the same IP...

                                An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                • W
                                  WannabeMKII
                                  last edited by

                                  Is packet capture quite straightforward, as it's not something I've done before...

                                  In the meantime, I've assigned a reservation to see if that resolves the issue.

                                  JKnottJ 1 Reply Last reply Reply Quote 0
                                  • johnpozJ
                                    johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                                    last edited by

                                    Did the clients grab the reservation? Can you not set them static on the devices?

                                    An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                    If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                    Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                    SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                    • W
                                      WannabeMKII
                                      last edited by

                                      I rebooted both the AP's and they picked up the reservation. That was 1.5 hours ago, so in the next 30 mins or so, we'll see if they drop again.

                                      Strange they were needing a new IP each time?

                                      Also, am I right in thinking IP's become available again in 24 hours if not used based on default settings?

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                                      • johnpozJ
                                        johnpoz LAYER 8 Global Moderator
                                        last edited by johnpoz

                                        Depends on your settings... But once a lease has expired, then yes it should be made available again... You can always just clear out all your old lease that might be stuck in the leases file.

                                        As to why they were getting new IPs - because for whatever reason their request for renewal was not working, ie from your log they were asking for lease, but dhcpd was saying have no idea what that lease is "unknown" so can not renew... So client would have to do a new discover to get get an IP..

                                        If you set your reservation, and your lease time still 2 hours.. Then they should of already renewed, right around the 1 hour mark.

                                        An intelligent man is sometimes forced to be drunk to spend time with his fools
                                        If you get confused: Listen to the Music Play
                                        Please don't Chat/PM me for help, unless mod related
                                        SG-4860 24.11 | Lab VMs 2.8, 24.11

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                                        • W
                                          WannabeMKII
                                          last edited by

                                          @johnpoz said in Ruckus Access Points Heartbeat lost in LAN:

                                          Depends on your settings... But once a lease has expired, then yes it should be made available again... You can always just clear out all your old lease that might be stuck in the leases file.

                                          Is that done direct through the 'Edit file' options? FYI - I've not changed any of the lease time time settings.

                                          As to why they were getting new IPs - because for whatever reason their request for renewal was not working, ie from your log they were asking for lease, but dhcpd was saying have no idea what that lease is "unknown" so can not renew... So client would have to do a new discover to get get an IP..

                                          Hmm, strange. So is that the WAP or the router not playing nice?

                                          If you set your reservation, and your lease time still 2 hours.. Then they should of already renewed, right around the 1 hour mark.

                                          Here's what I'm seeing in the logs so far for the same WAP. Does it look right?

                                          Screenshot 2020-04-11 at 15.58.58.png

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                                          • JKnottJ
                                            JKnott @WannabeMKII
                                            last edited by

                                            @WannabeMKII said in Ruckus Access Points Heartbeat lost in LAN:

                                            Is packet capture quite straightforward, as it's not something I've done before...

                                            Go into Diagnostic > Packet Capture.
                                            Select LAN
                                            Enter port number 67 or 68
                                            Start the capture.

                                            After capturing the DHCP traffic, you can download the capture file, to examine with Wireshark.

                                            PfSense running on Qotom mini PC
                                            i5 CPU, 4 GB memory, 32 GB SSD & 4 Intel Gb Ethernet ports.
                                            UniFi AC-Lite access point

                                            I haven't lost my mind. It's around here...somewhere...

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