Necessity is the mother of invention. We pulled into to
Noumea, New Caledonia and someone was offering free wireless internet for a
month. Now that sounds like a great deal ANY cruiser would love, but the problem was that the signal wouldn’t reach the boat. I
had to
go to the grassy spot at the end of the dock, where I could get a spotty
connection. My battery life wasn’t very good and the dogs seem to be using
the same area to take care of their business, so the environment wasn’t
conducive to a good browsing experience. I thought about a satellite dish
and imagined that if I could focus the incoming signal at the antenna I
would have a much better connection. A solid metal bowl would reflect
the sun and melt my antenna so I used a stainless steel mesh pasta strainer
(with a plastic handle). The
stainless mesh reflects hi-frequency WiFi signals but allows the sun and
breeze to pass through - Whammo, instant WiFi range extender! You can’t focus
the beam at the computer but you can focus it at an
external USB wireless adapter.
I put
a swivel at the base of the strainer and centered the adapter
in the middle of the strainer portion. Focus the WiFi extender at the
transmitter and you’ll get a much better signal. Use a
USB extension cable to get the antenna
on deck and keep your computer below. Within a day most of the
boats on the dock had one, the French must have thought that we all eat a
lot of spaghetti! The best range we’ve ever seen is five miles
(Bums Bay to the Yacht Club, Australia), but I think that was a strong signal to begin
with. Beware that if your boat swings at anchor and your access point is far
away, you’ll be in and out of service.
Comments
For site comments or questions please use the site comments page.Comments by Disqus