Hi again, I just wanted to post an update regarding the engineer visit that we had on Monday 22nd.
The engineer arrived right at the beginning of the booked time slot. He tested the line but at the time the crackle wasn't really playing ball! But he looked in the man hole outside our house and found a lot of water in it, and the connector housing totally submersed. He explained that they are supposed to be water tight, but a quick look revealed water inside it.
After replacing the junction unit he came in to check the line again. Fortunately, the crackle was playing ball so he realised that the water was not the only problem. After seeking permission to continue for a much longer time he went off to do a line swap between the exchange and the cabinet. After this the crackle was gone, so fingers crossed that has sorted it for good. This engineer seemed to be extremely thorough, and was allowed the time to hopefully fix the problem properly, which others hadn't been able to do as they were not lucky enough to witness the fault in action themselves. I cannot thank him enough, and really do hope that our fault is now sorted out. I will try to remember to update this thread again if the fault comes back yet again in the future.
It would be wonderful if OpenReach could better diagnose intermittent line problems, but as a retired software engineer myself I am fully aware how difficult intermittent problems are.
Fingers crossed that this problem now stays away!
