WiFi To Outdoor Barn

[Bruntcrispy77]

Hello all FNG here. I put up a new pole barn in the back yard. It needs wifi. The house is 300ft away. The house has excellent signal from the Lynks G, and Amped wireless extender. The barn gets good signal with the doors open. Problem, I shut the doors I loose signal.?!?

Tried the new Asus router, same issue. Not wanting to bury a Ethernet cable.

Help, Please and Thank you.

 

[thiggins]

Had to change the thread title. I thought the old one was porn spam....

Anyway, you are better off using a pair of outdoor bridges like these or many others that EnGenius or Ubiquiti make. You then can perhaps repurpose that Amped extender as an access point (depending on model).

If the Amped can't be used as an access point, you can convert any router to an access point and connect it to the barn-end bridge.

 

[abailey]

I agree with putting in a P2P bridge and then using an access point in the barn. I would, however, use a 5Ghz bridge and not a 2.4Ghz bridge. I am sure EnGenius makes one, I am just not familiar with their products. If you use Ubiquiti something like this would be what I would use:
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004EHSV4W/?tag=snbforums-20

 

[azazel1024]

Agreed with the above. That said, 100m of direct bury cat5e isn't all that expensive and its probably only an afternoon of your time to bury it a foot down.

 

[Bruntcrispy77]

The barn.

Bridges and access point conversion is over my head currently. The Ubiquiti sounds interesting, is that plug and play? I would assume it runs off my current extender? I'm not a techy, just a mechanic.

Thank you for the responses, I will try to catch on quickly.

 

[Bruntcrispy77]

Up to 350 ft. the underground would have to run. Trenching threw gravel sucks. Could rent a trencher. But would rather pay and have device to plug in and make it work.

 

[TonyH]

Hi,
With door open signal is OK? Then how about installing an outdoor antenna on the barn wall pointed to the house? If you have a desktop or laptop with USB WiFi card with antenna connector. Worth trying. My motto is KISS in a situation like this.

 

[Bruntcrispy77]

The Barn

Ya. its awesome with the door open. The man cave is a 40x64 pole barn. Steel walls and steel roof, garage doors are insulated. My radio don't even like the steel. But, you shut that door and its like a dungeon. No communication. YET

 

[fistv]

Big Faraday cage is what you have. At 300ft though, I'd go with a buried fiber and fiber to ethernet transceivers at both ends. Oh, do you have power in that barn ? If so you could use ethernet over power, plug one end in at the house and the other in at the barn then plug a wap in.

 

[chadster766]

Ya. its awesome with the door open. The man cave is a 40x64 pole barn. Steel walls and steel roof, garage doors are insulated. My radio don't even like the steel. But, you shut that door and its like a dungeon. No communication. YET

How about adding a window where the signal is good and putting a wireless bridge on the window ledge.

 

[stevech]

How about adding a window where the signal is good and putting a wireless bridge on the window ledge.

If you are going to put in a WiFi bridge, lordy just put it outside on the roof eaves and run a cat5 inside, with a low cost power inserter. Like engenius sells for under $50.

If buried cat5 can't be done.

 

[chadster766]

Buried Cat5e or Cat6 isn't an option at over 270ft. In know from experience that at those distances if it works it will only get 10mb/s and drops. 270ft is TIA max.

 

[stevech]

Buried Cat5e or Cat6 isn't an option at over 270ft. In know from experience that at those distances if it works it will only get 10mb/s and drops. 270ft is TIA max.

If the cat5 is for 10/100, which logic says it would be, one can send power down the spare pairs and put a cheap switch in the middle of the run to regenerate the signal.

But I would add that on my advise, my brother in law ran cat5 from a room with a computer, down and under the raised foundation home. From there, to the far end of the house, then into a conduit going under a gravel driveway, then another distance to the router in an outbuilding. Pushing 100m. No issues. Just use cat5e for lower capacitance.

You can always buy cat5e or whatever, in the right length, and test it while in a coil before trenching.

But it is so much easier to just put a pair of these on the eaves of each building...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...&cm_re=engenius_bridge-_-33-168-116-_-Product
or the $49 version of this for 11g.

 

[abailey]

I agree with others. either bury a wire or use an outdoor wireless bridge. If it is too far for CAT5e or CAT6 then run an RG6 COAX cable and use one of these on each end: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00684E0UI/?tag=snbforums-20
A cable would be best but if not then you need to mount an outdoor bridge device at each location (like these: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004EHSV4W/?tag=snbforums-20 ) and run a wire from the bridge back into the structure for connection.

 

[Bruntcrispy77]

The barn does have electricity, it has its own service. Two bills a month now. No windows...also called windows of opportunity.

Thanx guys for all the responses! I do appreciate..

 

[sinshiva]

The barn does have electricity, it has its own service. Two bills a month now. No windows...also called windows of opportunity.

Thanx guys for all the responses! I do appreciate..

i think when the only common conduit between buildings is the power grid itself, it might not be a good idea to run copper. distance considerations aside.

 

[azazel1024]

If you mean putting it in the existing, correct. You would not want to run coax or cat through a common conduit with electrical wiring...especially cat. Too much interference, especially over a long distance. It would likely be just a wee difficult to insert it in to existing conduit though, so you'd need to direct bury or lay new conduit. However, he mentions seperate electrical service, so nothing connecting the two buildings.

Anyway, if you don't need much speed, a couple of low cost outdoor bridges should work just fine and pretty cheap. Not a lot of work involved.

Direct bury cat5e or 6 should work just fine over the distance though.

Or if you want lots of speed and don't want to wory about any possible distance restrictions or ground strikes...fiber. It wouldn't be all that much more than cat cable and no issues with degredation. IIRC, common mini GBIC cards typically used 850nm MM, which I think is good up to around 550 meters?

 

[stevech]

Most building codes prohibit putting low voltage and mains voltage wires in the same conduit.

 

[Scooterit]

Bridges and access point conversion is over my head currently. The Ubiquiti sounds interesting, is that plug and play? I would assume it runs off my current extender? I'm not a techy, just a mechanic.

Thank you for the responses, I will try to catch on quickly.

No the Uibiquity products are definitely not plug and play.
Since you have a good signal with the doors open, I think the easiest solution is to install an outdoor antenna (directional pointing at the house would be best!).

Losses in the coax cable between the router and the antenna are great, so you have to keep this as short as possible. Install the router inside the barn with the antenna on the outside. Run an ethernet cable from the router to your Man-Cave and be happy

If you need more connections inside the cave you can install a network switch (its as easy as a power strip...).

 

[sfx2000]

i think when the only common conduit between buildings is the power grid itself, it might not be a good idea to run copper. distance considerations aside.

Very good point - if they have their own Electric drops, the different in ground potential could be very, erm, disconcerting...

Definitely reach out to a qualified electrician if you intend to string CAT5/5e/6 out to the barn from the house - and do so before you connect things up - we'd like to ensure that you have the chance to report back on how it worked out.

sfx