How do I provide wi-fi to an RV park/ campground?

Question

I just became manager of a small RV park in central Florida. Among a multitude of other things, I have been tasked with finding a solution to the lousy wi-fi signal that most of our residents have.

Half of the residents get a weak signal, and some get none at all. Since wi-fi is one of the amenities the park provides as part of rent, I have to find a solution that gives adequate coverage without breaking the budget.

Answer 1

You have allot to consider, firstly the existing solution they have. If there are some residents that have week signal might be their equipment so out of your control no matter what you do yourself. Anyway if you are starting fresh can you do any cabling in the park if you can bury one or two cables to the middle you could put in wired access points which is better than most mesh or repeaters as they are hard wired if the park is say less than 1km wide you could get away with 3 or 4 high powered access points placed to slightly overlap. Again this does not take into account anyone with old computers that tries to use it, there is no magic solution as if you use bad kit you get bad signal. But its a start. the alternative is to put in a mesh network 2 access pointson the edge and repeat it every 100m or so but you loose speed each time its repeated so 100mb becomes 80 then 60 and by the last repeat you would be luck to get 1

Answer 2

How big is the RV park? You can try to use Wifi repeaters if the park isn't too big. The only problem will be finding a way to power those repeaters. Repeaters will just find a wifi signal and extend it more.



Otherwise I think you will have to invest in a costly WiFi router that has big range built into itself.







Hopefully someone else can help you find a better solution.

Answer 3

Unfortunately, you have only two choices. 1. Use extenders that will allow all good access, but your speeds will be low (and could easily become unacceptable) depending on the number on line at any given moment. 2. Go with the professional equipment Tracy L mentioned. It is designed for covering large areas AND providing good speeds no matter the work load. Your ISP may also want to charge more for the higher "bandwidth" you will be using and it may require higher capacity connections from the park to the ISP. I installed a system like you want in a sprawling motel complex and it ended up costing hundreds of dollars for the on site equipment and a higher monthly internet fee from the provider.

Answer 4

Too many unknowns to specify how to do it. Get a professional company to review your RV park and see what they recommend. It may be simple and inexpensive, or it may be complicated and expensive.. It also depends on what Internet service you have to feed all these people, and how big the RV park is, along with many other factors.

Answer 5

In commercial situations you STOP USING home routers! You have Multiple Access points (not repeaters) designed for outdoor placement and those are "backhauled" using 5 gig or ethernet if possible.



You use gear from Ubiquiti Networks (like UniFi) http://ubnt.com or Motorola or EnGenius http://www.engeniusnetworks.com/ or even MicroTik or OpenMesh http://www.open-mesh.com/ . Stop shoping at Best Buy or Walmart. There are plenty of solutions but not at your local stores!



There are good wifi solutions when you take time to learn.

Answer 6

Tracy has it right. If you have existing wiring, you might need to do mesh networking but just deploy a few outdoor Access Points. But you will also need a pretty hefty ISP link and wireless lan controller.

Answer 7

A simple network switch, WAN server and a number of wi-fi repeaters would do it.

Answer 8

Visit komando.com for education about WiFi repeaters