Skip,
Did you build your own antenna? I didn't understand that from the post.
Depending on the height of the antenna from the surface of the water,
you'll get different a different emission pattern ("donut"). If you
really want long range, you can build yourself a directional antenna. I
don't know anything about wifi antennas and the way that signal is
polarized, but you could use either 2 dipoles or a Yagi sort of setup,
minus the parasitic directors. A two-dipole directional setup requires
two identical antennas, parallel and next to each other, emitting in
phase, and seperated by 1/2 wavelength (about 6.25cm in the case of
wifi, unless I'm mistaken about the freq). The emission will near zero
in the plane of the two dipoles, and maximum in the plane perpenticular
to that. With a Yagi sort of setup, you just need a passive (isolated)
reflector 1/4 wavelength from the emitting antenna, parallel to it.
There'll be nearly no signal behind the reflector in the
antenna/reflector plane, and maximum signal in front of the antenna in
the antenna/reflector plane. The reflector is just a conductive rod
approximately the same length as your antenna. For the exact geometry
of the reflector, you'd have to search on the internet.
With a directional setup like that, if you were at anchor somewhere you
could turn your antenna until you got maximum reception. You'd add
greatly to your range. Maybe someone manufactures directional wifi
antennas, though they'd likely be priced out of this world.
-Max Camirand
Skip Gundlach wrote:
Today was day one of the trials. Motor only, just to get familiar with
the
new prop setup, and see what we could break.
Nothing really broke, other than the forward bilge pump switch stuck
"on"
and the aft bilge pump switch wouldn't turn on, and some anomalies in
the
instruments (no speed on either unit, flaky until it settled down on
the new
depth gauge), there seems to be a bit of harmonic vibration in the
shaft
(putting my hand on it feels a bump on the opposite sides, and
depending on
the speed, it's different points on the clock) and the dripless packing
system isn't, yet.
However the point of this was to report on the wifi setup's first real
challenge. I got the bridge up on the mast (the end of the Dec06
gallery in
the refit section for any who are interested -
http://justpickone.org/skip/gallery/...c06&start=115),
and the line to it for the POE and data run through the mast (have yet
to
decide where to put it and some other downstairs gear, so it's
currently
just sitting in the Vee with the ethernet strung on the sole from the
mast).
The signal is so strong up there that it latches on to a pay site,
something
I was afraid would happen (the bridge, in open mode, vs a stated target
SSID, goes to the strongest site). No amount of fiddling in the way
I'd
become accustomed, which is to just type the URL of the bridge in my
browser, bringing up the setup pages, would do anything other than
bring a
signup page to the pay site. I grumbled but the other sites we had
been
using were a bit less than stellar, so we gave it a 30 day trial, by
which
time we fervently hope to be gone.
Initially it was great. Good download and upload, no problem logging
in,
great VoIP, and so on. However, lately, I've not been able to address
it
through the access point and router which were in between my wifi
laptop,
and the bridge.
Happily, however, before that failure, which happened as I went from
inverter power on return to the dock, to shore power (where it had been
functioning for the last many months), while we were anchored, and
rocking
and rolling in the swells, a few miles out in Tampa Bay, I picked up
the
phone and called Lydia's Mom in England and my Dad in New Hampshire,
both
over the Vonage system which is connected to the bridge (seeing its
data
stream as an IP feed).
So, assuming I can figure out what's going on with a system which
previously, for months, worked very effortlessly, but now is a real
pain,
and actually currently won't work at all other than as a
wired-to-my-computer bridge, internet only for me, no phone, no other
computers on wifi (because it somehow won't pass data through either of
them), it has proven my expectation:
I expect that I'll be able to see many stations from which to choose as
we
cruise, as many as 3-4 miles from shore. If those stations are
broadband as
I've been led to believe is usually the case, we'll have internet and
my
home number in most ports and anchorages in populated areas.
Now if I can only sort out what's going on to make it not as simple
(and for
that matter, not functional in other than a very simple way) as it's
been
for the last many months.
We'll probably put up some sails tomorrow; if I can get this working
before
then, that will be another test. That is, as one respondent on one
list
pointed out, a high gain antenna gets its strength by flattening the
donut
of the radiated signal. Our rocking and rolling wasn't enough to be
trouble
today; that far out, the donut disk gets pretty broad, I imagine - but
I
don't know about when we're heeled a bit...
Stay tuned (so to speak)...
L8R
Skip
Morgan 461 #2
SV Flying Pig KI4MPC
See our galleries at www.justpickone.org/skip/gallery!
Follow us at http://groups.google.com/group/flyingpiglog and/or
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheFlyingPigLog
"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you
didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail
away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.
Explore.
Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain