Cell phone reception

If you have Internet you can add an M Cell. Wilson Electronics makes antenna/booster kits that work, too.
 
I used to have a very small (4"?) magnetic antenna that plugged into my cell phone. Worked perfectly!
 
I have a very good friend who just bought a cell phone booster, we tested it tonight - definite improvement!
 
They work if :
A) you take the time to point the Yagi at the tower.
B) You keep the front and back of the Yagi from pointing directly at the indoor antenna. (Feedback loop)
C) You get one with the correct bands for your carrier.
 
denverpilot said:
They work if :
A) you take the time to point the Yagi at the tower.
B) You keep the front and back of the Yagi from pointing directly at the indoor antenna. (Feedback loop)
C) You get one with the correct bands for your carrier.
Click to expand...

Very true sir. But once done - they work like a charm. My 4G service was horrible where I built my house. In fact, it still is - unless you're inside my house..

We put up a 3G one as well. The way they explained it (going back a few years) - the 4G is carrier specific - the 3G will work for all... in any event, well worth the investment.
 
I'll offer a few comments after owning and setting up three different Wilson systems at my cabin, which is 30 miles from the nearest cell tower. Line of sight is the deal. Multi-directional antennas are available but they don't work very well. Yagis do work well but they require a line of sight to the cell tower. In my case that required a 50' Rohn antenna tower and removal of several tall trees. The aim of the yogi is precise. I had to make an adjustable fixture to be able to fine tune my antenna when 50' up. Once that's done the DB Pro is a good booster amp. The old ones that don't have adjustable gain work better than the newer adjustable ones. Both will suffer from feedback issues but it's easy to reset them by turning off the power for a few second. Turn the power back on and the amp will go right back into the green. Once the yogi gets the signal and the amp boosts it it's sent to a radiating antenna for your house/hangar. I use a ceiling plate and it works great as long as you're in a 10' circle below the radiator. You can buy commercial building systems that'll cover more square feet but they're more expensive, and they won't fix a weak yagi signal. Depending on the quality of the signal these amps work with 3G, 4G and LTE. Some hours have better signal than others. I've been told it depends on the traffic load on the cell tower. Wilson tech support is very helpful in figuring out what'll work best and once you buy it they'll coach you on how to tune it in.

Seriously, if your building has internet service the M Cell is a much easier and much more reliable way to go. AT&T sold me one for $100. It works great for voice service. Obviously the internet service was already there so the data speed wasn't important.
 
I got one of these, and it appears to work well.

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=8950335&CatId=4977

Took the inside of my home from a no-call zone (marginal calling with AT&T, nothing at all with Verizon), to being able to place and receive calls just fine on both.

The instructions are pretty insistent that the outdoor antenna (a very small and simple affair) has to be at least 15' vertically above the repeater's antenna on the box; my first "home-boy" effort had the outside antenna simply outside the house (where cell phones work OK), but not elevated IAW the instructions, and as promised, it did not materially help. I then placed the antenna on a pole so it is, probably, 10' higher than the repeater antenna, and works reasonably well. Based upon that, I am going to get a second extension pole for the outdoor antenna, raising it another 5', and I expect good results.

For inside a metal hangar/building, I bet the less-costly model would still work well, and install would be simple.
 
Tom-D said:
Ship was equipped with a repeater.
Click to expand...


For cellular signal? I doubt that. This is a work boat hauling taconite, not a USCG research vessel. And any electronic equipment that is on top of the pilothouse is just that...on top of the pilot house. That'd be at least 14 floors up, and 1000' feet away from where I was, down below surrounded by steel bulkheads.
 
We use a Wilson and the omni antenna is on the highest eve of the house. If we turn it off, we have no signal. On, we get good service.
 
I have an MCELL and while it seems to be a good idea it's pretty annoyingly unreliable. It trips off into lala land on a regular basis and I have to go power cycle to get it back. We've got a few of them around our airport because the cell coverage is lousy (all carriers).

My favorite feature is my T-Mobile Nexus phone automatically routes calls through the wifi if it is active and the cellular isn't.
 
flyingron said:
I have an MCELL and while it seems to be a good idea it's pretty annoyingly unreliable. It trips off into lala land on a regular basis and I have to go power cycle to get it back. We've got a few of them around our airport because the cell coverage is lousy (all carriers).



My favorite feature is my T-Mobile Nexus phone automatically routes calls through the wifi if it is active and the cellular isn't.
Click to expand...


I'm planning a move to TMo for this feature. Our VZ microcell is pretty reliable but has crap for buffers and can't handle even a tiny bit of packet loss.

The folks I've talked to on TMo say their implementation of VoIP directly in the phones is way better.

My only pain point is our iPhone 5 units do not have two of TMos bands. I have to upgrade to iPhone 5s or 6 and the bastards at Apple killed the 64GB iPhone 5s when 6 came out.
 
Read recently that all the carriers are moving to WIFI routing capability very soon
 
Perezhr said:
Read recently that all the carriers are moving to WIFI routing capability very soon
Click to expand...

Can't happen soon enough. This would really help out the carriers by reducing load on their networks. I don't see why it's taken so darn long for all of them to follow Tmobiles lead.
 
dans2992 said:
Can't happen soon enough. This would really help out the carriers by reducing load on their networks. I don't see why it's taken so darn long for all of them to follow Tmobiles lead.
Click to expand...

Does this mean when I have no wifi I have no phone ?
 
Tom-D said:
Does this mean when I have no wifi I have no phone ?
Click to expand...

No; it would mean that, when you are connected to a wifi network with Internet connectivity, you could make calls even if you were out of range of a cell signal. The voice packets would be routed over the Internet connection.
 
Perezhr said:
Read recently that all the carriers are moving to WIFI routing capability very soon
Click to expand...

It makes sense. All it takes is a little software in the smart phone. Should be a nobrainer for the Androids and Apple will probably follow suit if the carriers insist.
 
Perezhr said:
Read recently that all the carriers are moving to WIFI routing capability very soon
Click to expand...


Verizon is lighting up VoLTE but has made no commitment that I've seen to direct VoIP off-network. Same with AT&T.

They probably don't want the customer service problems inherent with having to explain packet loss on a crappy DSL line to customers.

TMo's weak coverage map and significantly smaller number of tower sites, drove their decision to be first to direct WiFi VoIP to extend coverage, many years ago. You had to use specific phones, but they've had it far longer tha anyone else.

VZ and T may or may not play. Neither really needs to.

Sprint is just confused. They don't know what the hell they want to do. Their lack of strategy has been apparent since they purchased Nextel and they haven't really come up with one yet.

We're still headed for three large companies fully integrated with all services. We just haven't finished what Judge Greene started in 1984 yet. Still multiple telecom company deaths coming -- probably the "easy" way via mergers and acquisitions.

40 MHz of low GHz spectrum is expected to go for over $80B with a B at government auction soon. The smaller carriers are debt loaded and can't even play as that number goes higher each time.

VZ's last spectrum grab came with the requirement they be essentially a common carrier to have that spectrum. They bit. It hasn't hurt them.

Its a real estate and spectrum land grab race at this point. Well, has been for quite a while actually.

VZ and T showed their hand a bit at the announcement of the Apple SIM card. They said no. Nothing about making hardware that is otherwise completely carrier neutral, actually carrier neutral, benefits them in any way. They want to play the hardware subsidy game.

When threatened by TMo's offer to buy out contracts, VZ subtly changed their contracts to not pay down on a straight line. They moved the payoff date as far to the end as they thought they could get away with, and nobody reads the fine print.

That move will cost TMo hundreds of millions of dollars with nothing more than the stroke of a pen.

It's a fun game to watch. Chess on a huge scale.
 
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