Apache stop takes from 6 seconds to one minute on RHEL 7.6

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Recently migrated a server from RHEL 6 to 7. It runs 300 vhosts and about 80 virtual IPs. On the RHEL 6 server restarts were quick. On RHEL 7 with apache 2.4 and systemd, the restarts are slow. 'time' run with the systemctl shows the stop part of the action is the culprit. We see anything from 6 seconds to one minute to stop the service. It takes longer to stop if it has not been restarted for awhile (as in a few hours, not days).

We expect to be able to make modifications for new hosts or configurations without impacting the availability of our sites, and this service disruption has become significant enough there is talk of putting that work into maintenance window period.

I put in a support ticket a few days ago complete with sos report, and I can't say they have been quick with suggestions. Google search on this has not revealed a common problem and solution.

Aspects like memory, cores, load are not a factor in the slow stop. It could be that we are in need of some config value, but I don't see anything obvious.

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