I need to establish a WiFi source on the roof of a 2-story office building to connect a WiFi device. The device only connects via WiFi. On the second floor, there is a wireless router and WiFi but it's not strong enough to make it through to the roof. There is no conventional access (stairs, hatch, etc) to the flat roof.

The building owner has given me permission to use the GUEST WIFI only that services the second floor - but not the main company WiFi (please - no sermons on why not). I need to stay on "GUEST".

There is a 110v outlet on the roof I'll be using to power the device.

What are some methods I can use to create a WiFi source near the device on the roof? Can a conventional WiFi extender work? Can the extender connect to the Guest side of the wireless router? Thanks in advance...

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Posted by Korkstand

Member since Nov 2003

28996 posts

Posted on 6/2/24 at 9:31 am to tigerpawl

quote:
There is no conventional access (stairs, hatch, etc) to the flat roof.

Then can I ask how the wifi device is placed up there?

If you really can't get anything up there, no wires or anything, then your best bet will be to place a WAP on the 2nd floor directly under the wifi device, and orient it so that the signal shoots upward.

My first option though would be to get a wire up there to place a WAP on the roof. Since there is 110v on the roof maybe there is also a comms conduit already run that you can pull through.

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Posted by VABuckeye

NOVA

Member since Dec 2007

37478 posts

Posted on 6/2/24 at 10:11 am to tigerpawl

I've seen a lot of commercial buildings and I have yet to come across one that doesn't have a riser system (telco riser) in the building and a path to the roof.

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Posted by BoudreauxsCousin

Member since May 2011

215 posts

Posted on 6/4/24 at 9:41 pm to tigerpawl

I would save yourself a ton of trouble and run a cable and place another AP in the vicinity of the wireless. What do the building risers look like? Are the closets secured? Place an access point as high in the building as you can get it--as close to the device as you can.

If that's not an option, I would buy a yagi antenna and point it directly at the device from somewhere inside the building and see if that works.

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Posted by LemmyLives

Texas

Member since Mar 2019

9957 posts

Posted on 6/4/24 at 10:09 pm to tigerpawl

Second this. My first thought was directional antenna. I think (at least with 802.11a/b) if you got a directional antenna up high enough, you *could* have a range up to 12? miles based on the curvature of the earth.

If the router has antennae that you can change, you can also take what is probably a stub antenna and replace it with a COAX antenna that you run up to the top floor or potentially outside to connect the device. If you do anything exterior, make sure you mount the cable to account for moisture accumulation so it doesn't have a high risk of screwing up the COAX. If there is 110 on the roof, you can likely replace a 2 gang weather protected outlet with a 4 gang, with one of the ports being COAX, for the remote antenna.) Fish the connection using the existing electrical. It's not optimal, since you're going to generate attenuation running power and data in parallel, but I sense you're in close to desperation mode.

What about using the POTS to get at least Cat 3 closer to the roof? I'm guessing you need a minimal amount of bandwidth.

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