Houston, We Have Boost

To some this may look like your average cast iron skillet sitting on the roof of a travel trailer.  But no! This is not just an ordinary misplaced skillet - it is a ground plane, at least until a suitable piece of ferrous metal can be attached to the roof for our cell boost antenna.  The ground plane serves to improve the reception of the antenna. Note to self: Do not tow trailer with temporary ground plane still on the roof.  Remove before flight.

We have a barely adequate signal with Verizon at our residence. The booster is not providing a 'super' boost but it is definitely improving the signal. How much? Read on.

Communication Cabinet Power

Before anything useful could happen the 'communication cabinet', described in a previous post, had to be outfitted with power. A 12 VDC coax plug was added to provide power for our eventual WiFi Ranger Go2 router. A charge station, with a cigarette lighter and dual USB plugs, was installed. The 4G-M booster uses the cigarette lighter plug, and its power supply steps down the voltage from 12V to 6V. Our iPhones will use the 5V/2.1A USB plug while serving as our hot spot. All of these were wired into a 'master' comm equipment switch so that it will be easier to avoid leaving things on and draining the battery unnecessarily when we are away. Flip one switch and the entire comm system is off.

weBoost 4G-M and iPhone in Hot Spot Mode Placed on Internal Antenna

As planned the external antenna connection was routed through the slide out seal to the roof and placed as far away from the communication cabinet as permitted by the cable length.  This is to avoid a feedback loop with the internal antenna. All that remained was to connect the Hershey bar internal antenna, plug in the power supply, and give it a go.

With the booster off the iPhone showed 2 bars of signal from inside the trailer.

The bars do not indicate just signal strength however. The indicator reflects other aspects of the connection based on some mystery iOS algorithm. To get a reading of just signal strength in db you need to put the iPhone into Field Test mode. This provides a measure of only signal strength.  -115 db is a very poor signal.  -55 db would be a very strong signal.

Without the booster the iPhone was receiving a -107 db cell signal.

Without Booster:  2 Bars

Without Booster:  -107 db 

With the booster on and the iPhone near the internal antenna the signal improved to 4 bars/-90 db.

With Booster: 4 Bars

With Booster: -90 db

Great, we have an improved cell signal, but the iPhone is now inconveniently located in a little 'communication' cabinet. That is where the iPhone's role as the amazing Arctic Fox mobile Wi-Fi hot spot comes in.

To test this part of the system the Wi-Fi router in the house was turned off so that there would be no doubt that the iPhone only had internet access through Verizon cellular. An iPad was connected to the iPhone Wi-Fi.  This worked perfectly and internet surfing through Verizon commenced immediately. The connection was used to download the Speedtest app.  Similarly, any of our other devices can now simultaneously share this local wireless network and access the internet through our Verizon data plan. By using Skype on the iPad calls can be placed to anywhere in the world for free or just a few cents per minute when the iPhone is busy providing internet and Wi-Fi service.  Either of our iPhones can serve as our Wi-Fi hot spot so one of our phones is always free for normal use.

iPad Connected to iPhone Hot Spot

So, with the boosted signal was the internet access speed good enough to get along when on the road? Here are the speed test results:

Cellular Data Download Speed from iPad thru iPhone Hot Spot

Cellular Data Upload Speed to iPad thru iPhone Hot Spot

We now have local Wi-Fi around the trailer with internet access wherever there is at least marginal Verizon cell coverage, including international roaming in Canada and Mexico for an additional $2/day as needed. All of this powered by our solar charged trailer batteries.  Time to increase the data plan limit - we are going mobile. Don't be surprised when you get a Skype or FaceTime video call from us from the middle of nowhere.