Wifi stability on production floor

[vrapp]

In our company we are using wireless tablets on the production floor, where there's a lot of heavy machinery in all places, to manage inventory; the tablet is connected to the LAN and to the database server and needs to maintain stable connection, sending relatively short messages back and forth, as the associate is roaming the facility. Hence the throughput is not a challenge at all, but stability is. Can someone share recommendations or success stories on how to improve it? Should we look at Wi-Fi6, 6e, 7? any particular brands of access points?

 

[L&LD]

I've set up similar situations. The solution there was wired mesh with as little overlap of coverage as possible (but also lighting up all the required areas fully).

How many SqFt is the area to be covered? Is this a standard long/rectangular bay? Is it sub-divided by (thick) walls, and/or large/metal machinery? Is the WiFi originating from one end, or closer to the middle of this area? Does the machinery generate RF noise?

Are you able to run Ethernet to the locations where the nodes are located?

 

[Tech9]

Should we look at Wi-Fi6, 6e, 7?

No. I have a pretty large warehouse with electric forklifts, reach machines, compactors, etc. and 8x Cisco Wi-Fi 5 APs do the job with no issues. I have 10 isles of metal racking for pallets inside and some open spaces for loading/unloading trailers. We use a lot of hand scanners on 2.4GHz and a bunch of 5GHz mobile devices pulling data from inventory database. All computers are wired. Few employees have company laptops. The network is set with 40MHz wide channels on 5GHz and 20MHz wide on 2.4GHz. High-powered machines may generate RF noise, but you have to deal with your specific issues.

 

[sfx2000]

Can someone share recommendations or success stories on how to improve it? Should we look at Wi-Fi6, 6e, 7? any particular brands of access points?

I think this is one of those situations where paid-consulting is a win...

 

[RMerlin]

I think this is one of those situations where paid-consulting is a win...

Agreed. I have a friend who works for a very large telco, and one of his customers is a very large company in the food industry. They have large warehouses where employees on the floor use wifi-connected tablets to manage inventory. They have a very specific wifi network deployed to be able to deal with the size and the interference. This is something best addressed by someone with actual experience with this type of deployment, as this is very different from your average personal home wifi coverage issues. You need the right products, and the right planning and deployment as well. We're probably looking at a Meraki solution there, or something of a similar calibre.

 

[ika]

Agreed. I have a friend who works for a very large telco, and one of his customers is a very large company in the food industry. They have large warehouses where employees on the flood use wifi-connected tablets to manage inventory. They have a very specific wifi network deployed to be able to deal with the size and the interference. This is something best addressed by someone with actual experience with this type of deployment, as this is very different from your average personal home wifi coverage issues. You need the right products, and the right planning and deployment as well. We're probably looking at a Meraki solution there, or something of a similar calibre.

Have to agree, definitely sounds like a scenario which needs enterprise grade solution. We do this a lot at my company with large establishments (thousands of STAs during large events).
Onsite wireless survey done by a professional would be the must have number one step. Very important to make that done with somebody who are not the ones who will sell the hardware and the solution (that is my long time experience).

Depending on the situation (how many STAs in a cell, how fast they move in and out), one might need high destiny APs, but even if that is not the case, I would still consider industrial grade hardware (Cisco, Aruba, etc.), with highly controlled antennas and centralized cell managements.

Warehouses are very special, lots of interferences can happen, maybe a private LTE network based on CBRS would be much more efficient there.... getting a professional opinion is highly recommended indeed.

 

[vrapp]

Thanks everyone. Any recommendations of consultants? We are in Chicago suburbs.