Wifi on board

[TwoHooter]

I endorse Teltonika as a manufacturer. We fitted a RUT950 in the boat almost exactly 3 years ago and it seems to be a very well-built piece of kit. Now that I have got used to the interface (the browser page that gets you in to manage the router's settings) I find I am very comfortable with it. I have not yet installed the masthead shelter+antenna but that will be done this year.

The support wiki is a bit "community" at best

When the router was new I had a problem and got through to Teltonika support, they were very helpful (the problem was unexpected congestion on the channel we had chosen).

I think that, for me, having a dedicated SIM on the boat that I cant easily get at is step too far.

I have consolidated everything to be SIM only on a single contract wit EE. The contract provides over 100Gb per month data allowance and I can swap ("gift") the data around between phones, tablets, and the boat as required. At the beginning of each accounting period I set everything up with the data allowance I think will be needed. If a particular device starts to run out of data it pings me a warning and I "gift" it some more data. I never need to swap SIM cards and there is only one bill to pay. The RUT950 has a dual SIM card slot so when we are in Europe I will buy a local card with EU-wide roaming and that's the only time I will need to change cards.

compared to a mobile phone at 2m above water to this antenna 5m above water (and no obstructions around) what sort of performance/throughput difference should I expect? Mobile was 1bar signal at most on lower helm when the boat looked the "right" way.

You will only know when you try it. Sorry, that's how it is. But the Teltonika routers are a world away from a mobile phone.

I guess there's a limitation on how long a 4G antenna can be, else you could just have the antenna way up and the h/w in the cabin.

Yes, the loss of cellular signal over hard-wires is enormous. That is why the trend is towards putting the router up the mast and either broadcasting WiFi from there or using ethernet to bring the data down the mast to a WiFi hotspot.

Also keen on connecting to office network which when moored in home port is at 300-400metres away but I get nothing from my mobile.

Our router has a WAN connection to a WiFi bridge. This should do what you want.

I have a friend who is having to diversify his business because of Covid. He is an expert in this sort of thing. If anyone would like a quote please PM me.

Does anyone think there would be a market for a self-installation kit whereby all the necessary hardware would come in a single box with all the cables prepared and labelled + illustrated instructions for installation by the boat owner?

 

[lustyd]

We didn't want to invest too much in a 4G router as we will upgrade to a 5G router as soon as practical (price and router choice). We already have a 5G SIM card so once the coverage is there and the increased speeds, especially for my wife's work will mean that hopefully we will only need to pop home to water the plants...

If you look into it properly 5G is 4G for all intents and purposes so there's no backward compatibility issues for boat use. The main addition is extremely short range high bandwidth (think Wifi for your phone signal) so won't add anything in terms of boat use. As such just get a 4G modem which will happily connect to "5G" networks for many years. If you get a "5G" device it's very unlikely you'd know the difference. I think I mentioned that the theoretical bandwidth is 150Mbps but in reality you'll get more like 15-20Mbps on the Cat4 device. This is nowhere near full 4G but more than you'll need for two streaming hi def movies. To put this in perspective the iPhone 8 was cat 12 but I guarantee you nobody got 600Mbps over the network! The categories are LTE which also apply to "5G" which itself is just a marketing term to make you buy stuff.
long story short, the router mentioned here is cat 4 which is really, really limited 4G. Newer 4G is available but generally not in devices like this. 5G chipsets currently suck power (the iPhone turns off 5G almost all of the time as it's not needed) and offer no practical benefit unless you're next to a transmitter...which we don't yet have installed in the UK.

 

[Moodysailor]

If you look into it properly 5G is 4G for all intents and purposes so there's no backward compatibility issues for boat use. The main addition is extremely short range high bandwidth (think Wifi for your phone signal) so won't add anything in terms of boat use. As such just get a 4G modem which will happily connect to "5G" networks for many years. If you get a "5G" device it's very unlikely you'd know the difference. I think I mentioned that the theoretical bandwidth is 150Mbps but in reality you'll get more like 15-20Mbps on the Cat4 device. This is nowhere near full 4G but more than you'll need for two streaming hi def movies. To put this in perspective the iPhone 8 was cat 12 but I guarantee you nobody got 600Mbps over the network! The categories are LTE which also apply to "5G" which itself is just a marketing term to make you buy stuff.
long story short, the router mentioned here is cat 4 which is really, really limited 4G. Newer 4G is available but generally not in devices like this. 5G chipsets currently suck power (the iPhone turns off 5G almost all of the time as it's not needed) and offer no practical benefit unless you're next to a transmitter...which we don't yet have installed in the UK.

I'm certainly no expert but being a completely different frequency, a 4G router will not be compatible with the new 5G signal when it is available. 5G is already rolling out in cities, and it will only be a matter of time before it is usable for us.

We're very happy with our current setup, so I doubt we will change to 5G for a season so this is all very much just hypothetical planning. The final decision may look different depending on what we learn and available equipment when we come time to change.

Thanks for the input.

 

[lustyd]

The additional 5G frequencies are short range high bandwidth, and will not be likely to help you on a boat. The purpose of them is to help in busy cities because the signal doesn't go far so more smaller cells make more sense. Basically everything about 4G LTE remains intact in "5G" so for a boat the two will be indistringuishable outside the marina.
5G in the UK is "rolling out" in so much as providers are changing the logo on your phone. There are very, very few actual 5G cells and even if you find one you'd need to be really close to it.

 

[TwoHooter]

lustyd - this is your thread - does this sound right to you?

If all this gets a bit too much for anyone who would rather just go sailing, it might help to remember that everything we are talking about consists of digitalised data transmitted over radio signals using various frequencies. That's all there is to it. The complexity comes because there is layer upon layer of technobabble and a commercial need to slap labels on everything for marketing.
The key take-away from this thread, IMHO, is to have a router on the boat, not a tethered phone, and put the boat's router up the mast in a waterproof box with an in-built high quality omnidirectional antenna, then broadcast WiFi from the router (or, if you want, bring the signal down the mast through an Ethernet cable to a WiFi hotspot inside the boat).
Remember, even WiFi is just a radio signal carrying digitalised data which complies with a particular standard.
Get it right and you can work from the boat using Zoom or Teams or whatever, as I was doing through the summer, without worrying about burning up the electronics in a tethered phone. In fact this year my router wasn't even up the mast, it was in the wheelhouse. But in the new normal we must all deal with I intend to give my boat the best possible cellular reception and that means going up the mast.
Being totally mercenary about it, when the time comes to sell our boat I intend to market it as a mobile WFH opportunity. Huge demand for those for the foreseeable future.

("WFH" - more jargon - Work from Home)

 

[lustyd]

Now that’s a cockpit!

 

[RobbieW]

Also keen on connecting to office network which when moored in home port is at 300-400metres away but I get nothing from my mobile. Have you tried that at all?
Network is passwd protected and all, guess you configure it once and when it finds it automagically turns to that, right?

Reason for home port internet is that I setup a raspberry pi with Victron Venus OS to monitor batteries, solar, inverter and have a decent overview of the whole el. setup on board (plus a few alarms) would rather have that on wifi and only get a data plan for June-Oct in summer

Dont think you had a reply to this bit, you could use a wifi extender on the boat with a directional antenna oriented to the network you want to connect to. Perhaps a Ubiquiti Bullet with a directional antenna, if the Teltonika supports it you could piggy back the wifi extender into that with failover so that when theres no mobile network available (you've pulled the SIM perhaps) it tries the wifi extender.

 

[prv]

if the Teltonika supports it you could piggy back the wifi extender into that with failover so that when theres no mobile network available (you've pulled the SIM perhaps) it tries the wifi extender.

Surely you‘d want it the other way round. WiFi if available, otherwise failover to LTE.

I don’t know if Teltonika supports it, but Mikrotik can have both WiFi and LTE in the same device. They do some nice IP-rated versions in metal cases for direct outdoor mounting, too, though the antennas are separate on those rather than integrated.

Pete

 

[RobbieW]

Surely you‘d want it the other way round. WiFi if available, otherwise failover to LTE...

Not really as @vas wants to connect to a specific network when in his home port and he doesnt have an active SIM. It seems that network is c. 400 metres away and not showing up when he tries to connect to it on his mobile whilst onboard (if I've understood the scenario)

 

[RobbieW]

Surely you‘d want it the other way round. WiFi if available, otherwise failover to LTE.

Having thought a bit more, you're right

 

[lustyd]

Just to confirm the Teltonika does support WiFi as one of the networks with auto-failover so in theory you could have wifi then local sim then roaming sim in some of their routers. The one I posted has wifi and one sim. Everyone I know who has this though never bothers with WiFi - why would you when you have 4G? Marina WiFi is partly what I was trying to escape

 

[Seven Spades]

I have a Hubba Global on my boat. It has three aerials. One for 3/4G and takes 2 sims, two for WIFI. You then add a wifi hotspot. You connect all the devices on your boat to the boat wifi hotspot and and then the Hubba can connect to a marina WIFi and route traffic that way and if not it will use a data sim. This is the theory, in practice I have not yet been able to get the global to connect to any marina wifi. Having said that the 3/4G part is brilliant. So if you want a simply boat WIFi I recommend the Hubba X4, it is a 3/4G router and creates its own boat wifi.

https://www.buzzwireless.co.uk/product/hubba-x4-go/

This device will pick up 3g/4g and share the data with devices on the boat. It also has wifi built in allowing all your iPads and lap tops and Raymarine etc to connect to it. I had this device before "upgrading" to the global version but I have not yet managed to get the global to share a connection to a marina wifi, I have not given up, I took it home and managed to connect to a BT wifi router but it will not connect to a Vigor router for some reason, it seems to be very picky as to what it will connect to. I have spoken to Buzznetworks support and they are mystified by the problem. I would take the two routers to their office so demonstrate the issue but with the CV they are not open.

 

[lustyd]

Blimey those are expensive units! They are very likely Teltonika models inside the IP66 casing too, the feature sets look identical.

 

[RobbieW]

Just to confirm the Teltonika does support WiFi as one of the networks with auto-failover so in theory you could have wifi then local sim then roaming sim in some of their routers. The one I posted has wifi and one sim. Everyone I know who has this though never bothers with WiFi - why would you when you have 4G? Marina WiFi is partly what I was trying to escape

In principle I agree on WiFi, however @vas has a very specific requirement

 

[lustyd]

thanks to the OP!

having spent September on board with both of us having 2-3 meetings a day (Teams/Zoom) some of them concurrent, tethering of wife's mobile (Samsung S9 I think) in a couple of anchorages that signal was iffy at best, I'm v.keen to get a decent solution. Having a mobo, things are easier as I fit the whole antenna box on the f/b hardtop and still able to access it from upper helm easily.
routing an ethernet cable from there will be a bit of a problem but will see what I'll manage.
few Qs (which is a bit how long is a bit of string...) though:

compared to a mobile phone at 2m above water to this antenna 5m above water (and no obstructions around) what sort of performance/throughput difference should I expect? Mobile was 1bar signal at most on lower helm when the boat looked the "right" way
I guess there's a limitation on how long a 4G antenna can be, else you could just have the antenna way up and the h/w in the cabin.

Also keen on connecting to office network which when moored in home port is at 300-400metres away but I get nothing from my mobile. Have you tried that at all?
Network is passwd protected and all, guess you configure it once and when it finds it automagically turns to that, right?

Reason for home port internet is that I setup a raspberry pi with Victron Venus OS to monitor batteries, solar, inverter and have a decent overview of the whole el. setup on board (plus a few alarms) would rather have that on wifi and only get a data plan for June-Oct in summer

cheers

V.

Sorry I missed this one, thanks RobbieW for pointing it out. The throughput will be lower than your mobile phone when both devices have a good signal. The main difference is that this will usually have a good signal due to better antennas - as I said I get a consistent 10-15Mbps which is enough for two of us, the newer devices are cat6 LTE so should give higher bandwidth. The wifi and mobile antennas are all external on these so as others have said you can fit directional ones if needed, and you can split the installation, on a mobo you could easily put just the antennas on the roof as it's a shorter cable run. There are some really, really good antennas on the market if you really want a strong signal, but test the included ones first. For a couple of hundred metres you might not need to, the included ones are pretty good. For the money it would likely be worth buying one to test and just use it in your cockpit initially with your mobile phone sim and plug into the cigar socket if you have one. With a long power lead you could try all kinds of positions on board. Height is obviously key here so you might want a pole mount on the QuSpot if you go ahead with permanent installation - the bracket looks to be included so you'd just need a pole. Since you're a Mobo I'll state the obvious - don't put it at the same height as your Radar. You probably know this but always worth stating the obvious.
In terms of connecting, yes it will connect to your wifi at the same time as letting you connect to its wifi. It supports VPN in both directions so you can remotely connect to the boat using DDNS if you desire (many use this to monitor systems on board). You can use this to remotely connect to your office from on board too so the boat would be like a small remote office, or big depending on your boat. Some of the other models support other inputs and some have GPS so you can use this to track the boat as well as connecting to NMEA remotely - this is obviously a bit more work but you have a rPi so I assume you're a bit technical! It also supports IoT solutions for anyone who wants to get really technical and has MQTT queuing built in.

 

[TwoHooter]

Blimey those are expensive units! They are very likely Teltonika models inside the IP66 casing too, the feature sets look identical.

Product A hiding inside a more expensive product B has been mentioned already and it is something to watch for. When we bought our WiFi bridge (RobbieW calls it an extender) from a marine electronics supplier and took it apart our very good electrician found the motherboard for a Ubiquiti bullet nside. Very easy to be sure of this because we just looked up the motherboard part number on the internet. Ubiquiti virtually invented the concept of "bridging" WiFi from one place to another and IMHO they are not only the market leaders but the best - except that their "bullet" casings had a reputation for not being completely weatherproof. I don't know if they are better now. But you can put the working parts in a plastic IP67 box and the signals will pass through unimpeded.

Just in case it gets forgotten, all the radio signals we are discussing, whether cellular or WiFi are line-of-sight. They may bounce around a little bit to sort of get round corners but if there is a building between Vas's office WiFi antenna and his boat there will not be any reception. There are ways round that but it's complicated.

 

[vas]

thanks for all the ideas guys!

my very (well almost very...) specific requirement stems from the fact that Greece as far as mobile comms is concerned is still in the middle ages and the providers charge silly money (as well as not having IoT data tuned sims, or data only plans). Apparently Greece has the highest charges in the whole EU.
Hence for the 8m the boat is in port, I'd rather not pay silly money for v.little use (and no you obvs cannot change a data plan twice a year with the equiv. monthly charge diffs!) and only stick a sim in for the four months I'm actually using it but still have 2way comms to the boat systems (raspberry pi for solar/bat, and custom domotics for fire/water/intrusion alarms)
So yes, WIFI first and fallback to 4G would be ideal, but I could configure a different setup at the start and end of season no big deal.

wonder if I should invest in a Ubiquiti Bullet as RobbieW suggests at the work building to get better wifi reception as well for these months. Or even install one on the roof of my house and do it from there!
Straight line of sight in both cases, 260m from office, 750m from home. Home is approx 40m above waterline and signal has to go through the foliage of one tree 60m from home, shouldn't be a massive issue I guess (especially now in winter with no foliage on the tree
Good thing is that all this kit is manageable cheap so I can start building a system and see how it goes.

Considering how I should progress, I already have a leftover wifi router (two actually...), so could order the QuSpot for Teltonika RUT240/230 first and see what signal I get from the office building and then work from there.
could then buy a bullet for the office (or home)
and eventually finish off with the router (although RTU240 is around 130euro-not much)

cheers

V.

 

[vas]

Sorry I missed this one, thanks RobbieW for pointing it out. The throughput will be lower than your mobile phone when both devices have a good signal. The main difference is that this will usually have a good signal due to better antennas - as I said I get a consistent 10-15Mbps which is enough for two of us, the newer devices are cat6 LTE so should give higher bandwidth. The wifi and mobile antennas are all external on these so as others have said you can fit directional ones if needed, and you can split the installation, on a mobo you could easily put just the antennas on the roof as it's a shorter cable run. There are some really, really good antennas on the market if you really want a strong signal, but test the included ones first. For a couple of hundred metres you might not need to, the included ones are pretty good. For the money it would likely be worth buying one to test and just use it in your cockpit initially with your mobile phone sim and plug into the cigar socket if you have one. With a long power lead you could try all kinds of positions on board. Height is obviously key here so you might want a pole mount on the QuSpot if you go ahead with permanent installation - the bracket looks to be included so you'd just need a pole. Since you're a Mobo I'll state the obvious - don't put it at the same height as your Radar. You probably know this but always worth stating the obvious.
In terms of connecting, yes it will connect to your wifi at the same time as letting you connect to its wifi. It supports VPN in both directions so you can remotely connect to the boat using DDNS if you desire (many use this to monitor systems on board). You can use this to remotely connect to your office from on board too so the boat would be like a small remote office, or big depending on your boat. Some of the other models support other inputs and some have GPS so you can use this to track the boat as well as connecting to NMEA remotely - this is obviously a bit more work but you have a rPi so I assume you're a bit technical! It also supports IoT solutions for anyone who wants to get really technical and has MQTT queuing built in.

separate reply for the points you raise lystyd

first thanks for the time taking to reply to all that!

two concurrent TEAMS/Zoom meetings is my aim when onboard in the summer using 4G, so if you're doing so fine with the RUT240, I'm happy also with cat4.
when at port, I may attend a teams meeting once every couple of months if I cannot be bothered to walk 1km back home for some reason, not serious. It's mainly going to be controlling and playing with systems remotely.

I wonder if I you could point a few v.good antennas for wifi and 4G,
For example, I do have on the coachroof a short stub VHF antenna which after fitting a hardtop and adding a decent antenna up there I don't need anymore. Is there any decent WIFI antenna that can use VHF coax infrastructure (it's only 2.5m from antenna to lower helm where I could fit the router)?
Or am I better off getting a Ubiquiti Bullet M2 and be done with as far as port wifi access is concerned?

cheers

V.

 

[prv]

wonder if I should invest in a Ubiquiti Bullet as RobbieW suggests at the work building to get better wifi reception as well for these months. Or even install one on the roof of my house and do it from there!

Mikrotik have an almost bewildering array of kit for doing this kind of thing:

MikroTik

Pete

 

[vas]

Mikrotik have an almost bewildering array of kit for doing this kind of thing:

MikroTik

Pete

oh!
only knew of their routers...

bewildering array indeed, I better shut up and not post again before I properly study all my options
Directional at office/home, and omni (for looks!) at the boat end if such a setup works would be ideal!

cheers