Long range point to point (bridge) wireless network

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Tricksdrummer

25 posts

Geek

#33272 5-May-2009 19:40

Hi all,
Im looking at setting up a wireless network between 2 locations thats are 3km apart,
Im on a hill (100M above sea level according to mapmyride.com) and my mate is on the flat,
Its line of sight (i can see his house from my house)
There is no buildings or trees in the way(minimal interference from objects)

Would someone be able to tell me what specs for all the wireless hardware i would need?
Also if you could recommend some hardware (prefereably cheap) that i could use, i already have an outdoor 2.4ghz directional grid antenna (looks a bit like http://www.snappernet.co.nz/PublicFtpFiles/ProductImages/SP920P-24.jpg and has a n type connector on it)

Thanks,
(Im hoping i have more luck with responses here than at pressf1 forums with 0 replies...)

Ragnor

8218 posts

Uber Geek

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#212683 5-May-2009 21:34

There used to be a really good NZ community site for DIY wireless, can't remember what it was off the top of my head though.

kiwiscoota

237 posts

Master Geek

#212698 5-May-2009 22:18

Check out this link, there seems to be lots of useful information relating to what you want to achieve.'

http://www.usbwifi.orconhosting.net.nz/

alexx

867 posts

Ultimate Geek

#212724 5-May-2009 23:18

Where are you?
In the city, small town or in the wop wops?

2.4GHz band can be a bit crowded.

Mattnzl

281 posts

Ultimate Geek

#212746 6-May-2009 07:08

http://gowifi.co.nz/ have some good gear. On recomendation (cyril I think) I got some Ubiquiti Nanostation Loco's thathave been great. Not grunty enough for 3km, but the Nanostation5 could be.

cyril7

9058 posts

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#212779 6-May-2009 09:17

Hi, yep a couple of Nanostation5's will do the trick the locos might be a bit under gain. Anyway $500 allup for a pair of Nano5s and your away.

Cyril

Tricksdrummer

25 posts

Geek

#212924 6-May-2009 18:35

alexx: Where are you?
In the city, small town or in the wop wops?

2.4GHz band can be a bit crowded.

Im Lower Hutt, on he hill up Kelson.

cyril7

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#212926 6-May-2009 19:16

Im Lower Hutt, on he hill up Kelson

hmm, busy town, use 5.7GHz for sure.

Cyril

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Tricksdrummer

25 posts

Geek

#212984 6-May-2009 23:11

the ns2's can do 5km LOS(Line Of Sight) according to the documentation...

raytaylor

4014 posts

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#213000 7-May-2009 00:55

Yea but thats 5km with low noise.

You will find alot of other access points, and cordless phones on the 2.4ghz band will cause interference which you have to have enough signal power to overcome.

To give you an idea, I was recently working for a customer on Hospital Hill in Napier, and was able to connect to a $30 belkin access point 1.2km away below the hill. Radio waves travel further than you think, and there are only 3 non-overlapping channels in the 2.4 band so in an urban area, you need a really-really good signal.

To overcome this, use the ns5's as there is less activity in the 5.8ghz band

Ray Taylor

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Tricksdrummer

25 posts

Geek

#214875 14-May-2009 17:25

I got the NS2's in the end,
3.2km distance with nearly LOS got up tp 54mb with down to -53dbm, that was on channel 1

Im now on channel 13 and get minimal noise.

raytaylor

4014 posts

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#214883 14-May-2009 17:49

Thats good to hear. If you change the internal antenna polarity to horizontal, it will help with the link reliability even more. Where did you get them from? Were they NS2's or NS2 locos?
I am really impressed with that performance.

Ray Taylor

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Tricksdrummer

25 posts

Geek

#215123 15-May-2009 19:10

they were ns2, not ns2 loco, yea the polarity was set to horizontal by default.
I got the NS2's from gowifi.co.nz,
I'm impressed with the results first time too, there was a roof in the way that we just managed to get over by mounting the antenna on an extendable house washing brush and securing that to a tv aerial pole, and the direction the antenna was facing was slightly out too.
Plugged it in at both locations and it worked first time :)

Mudjee

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#221130 2-Jun-2009 22:41

I live on a boat and have a AWUS036H adapter by Alfa which works very well (up to 54 Mbps). Its only 802.11b/g and not n though. I looked around for long range adapters and found this one was the best in the blogs. I bought it from OZ as they dont seem to sell Alfa in NZ. Does anyone use this gear or is it obsolete already? I thought hi power (500mW) was the max we can use in NZ......

raytaylor

4014 posts

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#221468 3-Jun-2009 23:36

You are allowed up to 4 watts eirp. You take the watt rating of your wireless adapter (0.5 watt) and the dB gain of the antenna then key it in to the calculator here

http://www.distributed-wireless.com/calculators/EIRP.html

If you select watts for both the drop down boxes, then it will give you your answer. In your case, you may add up to a 9db antenna to it, which with a 0.5 watt transmitter, makes 4 watts eirp

Ray Taylor

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Mudjee

3 posts

Wannabe Geek

#224195 11-Jun-2009 23:44

Thanks for that, it was a great help.