diff -Naur opendnssec-1.4.0a3-orig/signer/src/signer/zone.c opendnssec-1.4.0a3/signer/src/signer/zone.c
--- opendnssec-1.4.0a3-orig/signer/src/signer/zone.c	2012-08-06 06:52:03.000000000 -0400
+++ opendnssec-1.4.0a3/signer/src/signer/zone.c	2012-09-12 17:00:01.813426466 -0400
@@ -355,7 +355,7 @@
             return ODS_STATUS_MALLOC_ERR;
         }
         ldns_rr_set_class(rr, zone->klass);
-        ldns_rr_set_ttl(rr, zone->default_ttl);
+        ldns_rr_set_ttl(rr, 0); /* special case */
         ldns_rr_set_owner(rr, ldns_rdf_clone(zone->apex));
         ldns_nsec3_add_param_rdfs(rr,
             zone->signconf->nsec3params->algorithm, 0,