[SOLVED] How to Share my home Wifi Internet to a cabin 15 miles away

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iusedtobegood

May 24, 2019
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Hello guys,

So I have a small cabin in the woods near ny home and wanted to know what would be the most practical way to share the internet from my house to my cabin. I've heard of some ubiquity and microtik antennas and receivers but it all seems very confusing to me. I don;'t really know for sure what exactly do I need to buy.

  • The phone line comes directly to my house and I have a good local home network with modest internet.
  • The distance between my house and my cabin is about 10-15 miles in a straight line. it might be less...
  • There is nothing blocking the line of sight between my house and cabin.
  • I only have basic networking knowledge. (I know how to set up a modem, router etc...)
  • My budget for this project is $500 for the equipment. (I have the tools, modems, routers, and small antenna/pole tower if needed)

Thanks a lot in advance. Surely someone here has dealt with a similar thing before!!!
 
Solution
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Assuming this is truly line of sight then 1/2 km shouldn't cause any problems at all. Maybe start looking at Ubiquiti's AirMax product line. The units are very affordable and work quite well.
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"Line of sight" ?
"In the woods" ?

You can physically see one house from the other?
No trees?
Seeing as the ground level (2 meters, human eyeball height) horizon is ~3 miles away...this requires a tall pole.
A 100 foot pole gets you 12.2 miles.
 
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There is no way to share internet with a building 15 miles away. Not without 15 miles of Cat5 cable and signal amplifiers. I am 100% unaware of ANY kind of wireless device short of a satellite transmitter than can provide a signal to a device more than maybe a few hundred yards away.
 
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USAFRet said:
"Line of sight" ?
"In the woods" ?

You can physically see one house from the other?
No trees?
Seeing as the ground level (2 meters, human eyeball height) horizon is ~3 miles away...this requires a tall pole.
A 100 foot pole gets you 12.2 miles.
Click to expand...

What kind of device is going to beam a signal that far and be capable of offering usable speeds, aside from commercial satellite signals? If there is something, I'd sure like to know what it is because I know people who own a campsite and would like to use it.
 
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USAFRet said:
"Line of sight" ?
"In the woods" ?

You can physically see one house from the other?
No trees?
Seeing as the ground level (2 meters, human eyeball height) horizon is ~3 miles away...this requires a tall pole.
A 100 foot pole gets you 12.2 miles.
Click to expand...

Yes, you can physically see my house from my cabin and viseversa of course. due to the slight elevation in the terrain trees are not an issue, nor are other objects or other buildings in the way.

I think I might be wrong about the 10-15 mile distance. that was a silly estimate. it is probably a lot less than that
 
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Wolfshadw said:
Best option: Get an Internet provider to set you up at your cabin (at normal cost).
Another option: If you have a good cell phone contract, see if you can turn your cell into a wireless hotspot at your cabin.

-Wolf sends
Click to expand...

not very good cellphone signal here. the only ISP i have available where I live will charge me an absurd amount of money. Plus I need to get other permits and crap due to the nearby forest
 
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iusedtobegood said:
Yes, you can physically see my house from my cabin and viseversa of course. due to the slight elevation in the terrain trees are not an issue, nor are other objects or other buildings in the way.

I think I might be wrong about the 10-15 mile distance. that was a silly estimate. it is probably a lot less than that
Click to expand...

Unless 10-15 miles actually means "a few hundred feet" then this isn't happening. And with $500, your cabin and house would essentially need to be next door to each other.
 
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There are re-purposed satellite dishes that have yielded excellent results, in terms of distance and signal levels, but bandwidth WILL suffer. Do a few YouTube searches to find some of the more creative contrivances that DO work over several miles distance.

######### EDIT ##########

Bear in mind that heavy rain and snowfall holds the prospect of obliterating any low-power connection that you may have established in this manner. Power amplifiers on each end of the link may be necessary, if a consistent connection is desired.
 
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You can certainly get the radios to do that distance for less than $500. Take a look at the Ubiquiti Powerbeam antennas. They start at around $225 a pair and go up to about $450 a pair. The lowest having around a 20km distance, the more expensive having a 30km distance. You will then have the cost of poles and cabling. Also make sure to ground everything properly. Ubiquiti has some info about how to mount, and an online calculator for how high you will need to mount the antenna.
https://help.ubnt.com/hc/en-us/articles/204952224-airMAX-Planning-an-Outdoor-Wireless-Link
 
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Apparently, that's true. I suspect the investment of two poles high enough to make this feasible, plus the labor to install them, plus the Ubiquiti hardware, plus the hardware to connect the whole works to whatever you have already AND possibly any other fees required to make this work such as bandwidth or licensing (IDK, just reaching here) are going to grossly exceed the amount the OP was estimating they might have to invest in making this happen.

All of which assumes there is ACTUAL line of sight from point A to point B, as in, you can literally SEE somebody standing on the porch waving at you from one place to the other using binoculars. Or something relatively close to it.
 
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Ok. thank you guys for helping me out. I seriously did not expect anyone to take it very seriously

My straight line measurement was WAY off. I used google maps to measure (I know it is not 100% accurate but it is close enough) the actual straight line distance from my home to my cabin is 1830ft. I feel pretty dumb now, it sure seems a lot farther away. it is a 57somehting mile drive distance around a mountain so I kinda guessed it was at least 10 miles in a straight line. Pretty dumb guess. oh well...

taking this now more realistic/accurate info into consideration, what ubiquity antenna and receiver do you guys suggest?

*** There is nothing physically blocking the view from my home to my cabin. (except for sometimes fog, but that's very rare here)

Thanks again guys.
 
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You also have the problem called Fresnel Zone. This is related to the reflection of signal from the ground interfering. It is extremely complex topic. There are simple calculators.

For yours it says 80ft using 2.4g equipment. This means your signal at the mid point must be 80ft above any thing. This means say a building or hill + 80ft. Generally you need towers on both ends to accomplish this.

So I see you updated your post....As long as you have clear line of site you likely can use ubiquiti nano stations loco to go that distance. You still want to go as high as practical. Someone could park a big truck in the way.
 
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bill001g said:
So I see you updated your post....As long as you have clear line of site you likely can use ubiquiti nano stations loco to go that distance. You still want to go as high as practical. Someone could park a big truck in the way.
Click to expand...

I think the difference in the elevation helps me with that. Unless a tall building gets built near my home blocking the view that wont be an issue.
 
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Assuming this is truly line of sight then 1/2 km shouldn't cause any problems at all. Maybe start looking at Ubiquiti's AirMax product line. The units are very affordable and work quite well.
 
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Solution
Actually, at that distance, you can make a cantenna out of a couple of the large-sized coffee cans (braze the cans together, end-to-end, after cutting the bottom out of one of them), for each end of the link, and you'll have better than expected performance out of it.

A few years ago, there was a video done on that very construction, and the link that was reliably established exceeded 2KM--more than sufficient for your needs.
 
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