Why would a lower stratum ntp server revert to its pseudo-clock device (hardware clock) for time synchronisation when communication breaks occur higher up in the stratum chain?

Solution Verified - Updated -

Issue

When a stratum 2 device (for example, a Cisco Router) looses connection to its stratum 1 device (for example, a GPS timing device) (through either power failure at stratum 1 or network issue), the stratum 3 device (Red Hat Enterprise Linux server) which has the Cisco Router as its only time source, reverts to its pseudo-clock device (hardware clock) for time synchronization.

One who is not aware about how the stratum chain works would find this unexpected, as the communication break is occurring only between the GPS timing device and the Cisco Router, and yet the Red Hat Enterprise Linux server is also negatively impacted in its time synchronization.

Environment

  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux
  • NTP server configured to synchronize time from only one higher stratum time source

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