Caravan WiFi

[Micky]

I have virtually unlimited download on my 'phone, so I use that an a hotspot for my MacBook Pro. Not one problem, can stream MotoGP Sunday afternoons, with a bier

Upload photographs to SmuMug blisteringly quick. Far better than site internet and a darned sight safer

 

[sparkplug]

Might be worth asking Sparkplug of this parish,he's good at this sort of stuff

Kimbo

Thanks Kimbo

Others have pretty much covered the options.

1) Tether to smartphone
2) MiFi / Hotspot
3) Starlink

Tethering is great if you get a good enough signal on your phone inside whatever structure you're using it in. The more insulation and especially metal you have between your device and the signal the worse this will be. In my van it was terrible. The other consideration is the number of devices you need to connect. Tethering is OK for a small number of connected devices but starts to get problematic if you're trying to connect a ton of stuff.


MiFi / Mobile hotspots are the logical next step if tethering doesn't quite work for you. I have the Netgear Nighthawk M1 which suits my needs very well - but there are tons of these around including 5G enabled ones (the M1 is only 4G). Typically these have better antennas that smartphones built in - so you're likely to get better signal than you would with your phone anyway.

Adding an external antenna is the real game changer though - as long as you don't get one of the cheap ones which are pretty much useless. Expect to pay upwards of £60 for a decent one. One of the other advantages is that you can often connect a lot of devices to them (depending on which MiFi Hotspot you buy). For my setup I can have my phone, my work phone, Mrs S' phone, her iPad, my laptop, my work laptop, her laptop, my PiHole (don't ask... ) and a smartspeaker in the van at any given time. I also have it set up with a 'guest' network so there are quite often a couple of other people using my WiFi at events.

I use a Three mobile Unlimited SIM which is £16/month and I use it frequently enough to make it worth having a subscription. If you're only using it for a couple of weeks here and there then you can buy a PAYG SIM and pick and choose which network you want to use based on where you are. Three do an unlimited PAYG SIM for £35 or you can get 50GB for £20. EE do similar pricing, but don't offer unlimited and they cap the speed at 25Mbps. This stuff changes all the time so you'll want to shop around for the right SIM.

There are also Strongest Signal SIMs which are data only and will automatically pick the strongest available signal irrespective of the carrier. However, they're pretty expensive and would only really make sense if you were living full time in a moving vehicle or worked in Mountain Rescue or similar.


Starlink is next level. I have no personal experience of it, but even on the RV bundle which allows you to only pay for the months in which you use the service, it's prohibitively expensive IMO. Feedback from people who I know seems to be very good once the sometimes tricky initial setup has been completed and it is possible to modify it to work with 12v systems.

You could also look at Vsat systems as used on ships if you wanted, but they make Starlink look cheap

That's pretty much all I have to say on the matter other than there are also options to buy/build (Raspberry Pi) mobile routers that will pick up a free WiFi signal from somewhere else and let you connect to them securely through a firewall and a VPN. I've been tempted to build one for the learning process, but TBH I've never found myself in a situation where I really needed one. Good if you're in hotels a lot I guess, but then I just take my M1 and use that so...

Hope some of that might have been of use to someone.

 

[bowser]

Not with a fruit cake such as that fella. He/she/it started it with calling sound advice shoddy.

have to agree with that, the link provided is pretty much the norm for mobile home or cavaran if buying the package from a supplier, about the right price and Avtex top quality kit, there are others but all about the same price bracket

Me i did it myself a lot cheaper but there was a lot of fecking around, I have roof top antenna, cheap usb powered router from amazon and one of them mobile hotspot devices again usb powered.

the only other thing I looking at is a directional wifi antenna just to improve things on campsites where I have wifi but no mobile signal

 

[sparkplug]

have to agree with that

FWIW I don't agree with the tone and needless personal attack.

As I tried to point out in my post, there isn't a 'one size fits all' solution here. The choice of tech you buy is going to depend on what you actually need and what you can afford.

This will also be influenced by how much you understand about the technologies involved and how much you want to get hands on and mess about with building your own system.

Nothing wrong with any of the systems mentioned or linked, but I picked up my M1 second hand (on here) and a used Poynting antenna from eBay for half of what one those Avtex kits cost for comparable performance. But then I also built my own ad blocker, recursive DNS server, VPN link and firewall system for the van - because I'm a nerd.

Not everyone has £500 to spend on a system + £20/month just to have internet in a van. Not everyone needs to. The idea that this is the answer is shoddy advice.

Good advice explains the options available, the costs involved and the advantages and limitations of each option.

It also points out that the devil is in the detail. No one has really spoken about the various SIM options and how some will cap your speeds, while others won't (that's true of contracts as well as PAYG incidentally) or that you can get data only SIMs, or SIMs that have a fixed IP address (if you're living full time in a mobile vehicle and running a server of some sort) etc, etc.

For getting better signal on campsites you probably need something like the Kuma WiFi kit (another £200+) or build your own using a directional antenna and maybe something like a Mikrotik router. Of course then you've got the faff of having to be able to position your directional antenna in ..er.. the right direction...

Campsite WiFi is notoriously poor (unless you happen to be on one of the campsites that my company provides internet to as we've actually addressed the problem) with slow connections shared among many users. I actually get significantly better (and uncongested) signal from my SIM based system. For £16/month with unlimited (and uncapped) data it's a no-brainer for my purposes.

At the ABR rally a couple of years ago there was virtually no signal for anyone on GSM on their phones (too many people all in one place), I was still getting 15-20Mbps in the van (nothing to speak of on my phone). At one point I came back to the van to find thee people sitting up against it 'stealing' my guest WiFi

 

[Auwyn]

have to agree with that,

It's not really sound advice, though, is it? He just listed the ways you can spend money to achieve the result which may or may not be necessary. You already pointed out the fact that you have probably the same equipment just without the brand names for less. Pretty much the same as in the link. Does the OP need it? No idea. Depends on what he needs to use the internet for and what he has by way of caravan and phone already.

The theory is that in the van, you are sat in a make-shift faraday cage (assuming metal construction), which blocks internet signal. Sometimes that is the case for some, other times not for others. Your internet use is going to play a bit part of that. For my van, I will be wanting something that it always on, so will be opting for some expenditure. At this point though, when I use the van, my phone is good enough for me to stream and my kid to game online. That requires no expenditure on my behalf so the statement that if you want to have good internet access you have to spend is not accurate...at least for some.

 

[Pops]

To be honest I don’t know if my caravan is metal, glass fibre, or wood with concrete supports, though I suspect it’s probably metal.
The use I had in mind for WiFi is a bit of light reading and catching up on this forum in the evenings and for Mrs P to go through Faceplant as is her want.
Not a great deal of download for films etc as the point of the caravan for me is to get away from all that crap.
I’m leaning towards tethering or a MiFi unit, but if tethering is the best option for me I will have to increase my data allowance. I currently use Lebara for my personal mobile, and Vodafone for the business mobile so either of these could be used with an increase in data allowance.

 

[Auwyn]

To be honest I don’t know if my caravan is metal, glass fibre, or wood with concrete supports, though I suspect it’s probably metal.
The use I had in mind for WiFi is a bit of light reading and catching up on this forum in the evenings and for Mrs P to go through Faceplant as is her want.
Not a great deal of download for films etc as the point of the caravan for me is to get away from all that crap.
I’m leaning towards tethering or a MiFi unit, but if tethering is the best option for me I will have to increase my data allowance. I currently use Lebara for my personal mobile, and Vodafone for the business mobile so either of these could be used with an increase in data allowance.

If that's all you use the internet for, a basic data allowance will be sufficient. It is definitely not worth splashing out on, unless your phone is unable to get a signal in your van. You will be fine with your phone data.

 

[EPG_19]

Not everyone has £500 to spend on a system + £20/month just to have internet in a van. Not everyone needs to. The idea that this is the answer is shoddy advice.

There was 4 options on that advice.

 

[Wapping]

There's no need for that now really is there? Surely you can disagree in a more civil manner than that?

I’ve edited out both protagonists’ posts, before this section too, spirals into the cesspit which the pub has become.

Richard

 

[Wapping]

Back to the opening post’s question.

As others have suggested, I would try just using your phone, particularly if your usage is limited to the basic tasks you outlined in post #26.

If you find it works OK over the spring and summer, job done. If it really doesn’t or you want something ‘more’ out of the whole thing, drop by again and spell out which bits were ‘missing’ to stop your intended use from working. Someone will help you, I’ve no doubt about it. There’s a wealth of alternatives, right up to potentially spending hundreds (or not) but if a simple data top-up works for much of the time, great.

 

[bowser]

It's not really sound advice, though, is it? He just listed the ways you can spend money to achieve the result which may or may not be necessary. You already pointed out the fact that you have probably the same equipment just without the brand names for less. Pretty much the same as in the link. Does the OP need it? No idea. Depends on what he needs to use the internet for and what he has by way of caravan and phone already.

The theory is that in the van, you are sat in a make-shift faraday cage (assuming metal construction), which blocks internet signal. Sometimes that is the case for some, other times not for others. Your internet use is going to play a bit part of that. For my van, I will be wanting something that it always on, so will be opting for some expenditure. At this point though, when I use the van, my phone is good enough for me to stream and my kid to game online. That requires no expenditure on my behalf so the statement that if you want to have good internet access you have to spend is not accurate...at least for some.

Of course it was sound advice, question was asked what was good what bad, not - whats just enough, what can I make do with etc etc etc. specifically did not say GOOD INTERNET, but simply whats good I take that to me whats good kit and whats not good kit

Feel free to offer your own advice, just dont tell the world that sombody elses advice is shite

Having just been to a show and looked and having done it myself the kit refered to is about the average cost of kit that comes ready done that you dont have to fek a bout with, as said I have very similar set up but it took time to get the bits and fit it and make it all work together.
But answering the question what's good then the link was accurate concise and to the point that is good kit, at the right price or at least the average, norm for that equipment.

for ME, and external antenna is %100 must have as my van is like a faraday cage, with me and the wife with phones and laptops watching telly etc then a router of some sort is essential,.

so my two penny worth,

whats good. any system with exterior antenna, inside router, both 12v - the link provided is a good bit of kit at a reasonable price

Whats bad, anything where you have to cobble it together on a daily basis, trying to share one phone signal between multiple people, and anything that is only either wifi or mobile as there are lots of places where you may get only one or the other,

 

[Pops]

Thank you all for your contributions.
I think Wapping’s advice is about right, I’ll try tethering initially and see what service I get. If that fails I’ll revisit the post and see what is out there in the way of mifi or an exterior mounted jobbie