Using Fleet Management to expand VCF Operations for Networks cluster from 1-# nodes fails at stage 5

Products

• VCF Operations for Networks

Issue/Introduction

• Expanding VCF Operations for networks fails at stage5 in the VCF Operations UI:

• In vCenter for the ESXi host(s) in the cluster you may see the following Alert:

esx-##.vmw.###
Host is out of complance with desired configuration.

• In VCF Operations /var/log/vrlcm/vmware-vrlcm.log you may see the following error which show the certificate process if failing because it is not trusted:

root@###-##-01 [ ]# tail -f /var/log/urlcm/vmware_vrlcm. log
2026-04-08T19:37:38.9222 INFO vrlcm[1619] [scheduling-1] [c.v.v.l.c.u.EventExecutionTelemetryUtil] -- Stop Instrumenting EventMetadata.
2026-04-08T19:37:38.9242 INFO vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-86] [c.v.v.l.a.g.s.EngineRequestServiceImpl] - Saving engine request:46101
2026-04-08T19:37:59.7372 INFO vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertificateUtil] -- Endpoint : https://:
2026-04-08T19:37:59.738Z ERROR vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertificateUtil] - IOException occurred - Connection refused (Connection refused)
2026-04-08T19:37:59.7382 ERROR vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertifiError: Connection refused

2026-04-08T19:37:59.7382 WARN vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.p.c.v.t.p.VrniPostInstallCheckTask] -- Certificate not trusted yet, wait for 60000 ms and retry
2026-04-08T19:38:59.7382 INFO vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertificateUtil]
2026-04-08T19:38:59.7392 ERROR vricmiib1yJ Lpool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertificateUtil] -- IOException occurred - Connection refused (Connection refused)
2026-04-08T19:38:59.7402 ERROR vrlcm[1619] [pool-3-thread-43] [c.v.v.l.u.CertifiError: Connection

 

• You may see this error coordination in the VCF Operations I which indicate a bad/unhealthy service was identified:

.LCMVRNICONFIG90083

Error Code: LCMVRNICONFIG90083

One or more essential services are not healthy on platform.
Please use virtual machine's CLI to restart services or
'appliance-reboot' CLI to restart the VM and try
creating/expanding cluster again.

 

• On VCF Operations for Networks platform node 1 as the Support user in /var/log/arkin/clustering.log you may see the following error for the clustering failing:

com. vmware. vrealize. lcm. plugin. core. vrni. common. exception. VRNIPlatformClusteringStatusException: Cluster creation failed as few of the services are not in healthy state.
kindly re-start services manually in all cluster node.
com. vmware.vrealize.lcm.plugin.core.vrni.task.clustering. VRNIPlatformClusteringTask.checkClusterStatus(VRNIPlatformClusteringTask.java:399)
com. vmware. vrealize.lcm.plugin.core.vrni.task.clustering. VRNIPlatformClusteringTask.execute(VRNIPlatformClusteringTask. java:222)
com.vmware. vrealize.lcm.automata.core.TaskThread.run(TaskThread. java:62)
java.base/java.util.concurrent.ThreadPoolExecutor$Worker.run(Unknown Source)

 

Environment

VCF Operations for Networks 9.X

Cause

NTP is not properly configured in Fleet Management so the clustering process stops/fails

Resolution

• Resolve NTP Server issue and re-try cluster process, Once the NTP issues are resolved the clustering process will complete

Additional Information

Adding an NTP Service

Configuring the NTP Settings for VMware vSphere Foundation Components