Re: [smartBridges] Disappointing Signal Strength

[support8]

Get some good topological mapping software and plot both locations in it, then calculate the range and bearing in both directions. Get a good compass and use it to align both sides to the correct bearing. Then get a protractor, pencil, and paper and draw lines up from your sea level to the height of each antenna. Use the protractor to draw in the vertical beamwidths of both antennas and figure out how much downtilt/uptilt you need on each end to get them pointed directly at each other. Then adjust both ends to the proper downtilt/uptilt. Once you have done this, use a spotting scope for a sanity check to make sure you did your math right. Test your signal strength again. If you are still not satisfied, you probably have a bad antenna, cable, or cable ends, or your power supply is not outputting the proper voltage. We have a 5.1 mile link working with an airPoint on a 14.5 dBi sector and an Outdoor airBridge Total at 65% RSSI and 85%-90% link quality. Granted, this is over dry land, so we don't get reflections off water, which could also be causing a problem for you. If you have large vertical beamwidths on your antenna you may be getting multipath interference from the water/waves you are shooting over. If you think that might be the case, then get a couple antennas that have very narrow vertical beamwidths (like a dish). Just keep in mind that if you reduce your beamwidth, you will need to be even more precise in your aiming.   Eliot Gable Great Lakes Internet Technical Support [EMAIL PROTECTED] 1-810-679-3395 ----- Original Message ----- From: Oliver Leamy To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Wednesday, June 11, 2003 4:21 PM Subject: [smartBridges] Disappointing Signal Strength Hi, it�s me again.  The pest from the West.   Today, in the beautiful sunshine (a rare occurrence in West Ireland) I tried to do a link between one of the islands and the mainland.  I positioned a 20.5dbi dish on the harbour wall, and on the island we had a similar dish mounted on the wall of a house which was about 70-80� above sea level.  The distance between the two was about 3 miles.  Cable lengths were about 5� from AirNic (on the Harbour) and the AirPoint (on the island) and only two connectors (one at the antenna and the other on the AirNic (or AirPoint)).  The SB Airmonitor program at the AirNic end showed a signal strength of 20% but it jumped intermittently to 40%.  It also showed a link quality of 75%.  When trying to download pages from the web, it was very bad.  Also, the Windows status window showed only one bar, and reported poor signal quality.   While I could go up to a 24dbi antenna, I am not inclined to go that route since I THINK that we should have got better results.  Any ideas, feedback �..   Oliver Leamy   Ogenek Teoranta, Ballingeary, Macroom County Cork +353 (26) 47808 ; +353 (86) 8337664

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