Teleco phone booster van 2.0 not working

TonyMaslin
TonyMaslin Forum Participant Posts: 1
edited November 2022 in Parts & Accessories #1

On paper, while not cheap, this should be every answer to the remote CL lover's dream for enhance mobile reception when the signal strength is poor but still exists (say, between -100 and -110). This was a characteristic of 11 of the 13 sites we used on our recent tour of The North.

But, the booster never made a significant difference for our caravan, a Lunar Delta TI with 300 watts of solar panel and associated cabling on the roof, and neither the installer or Scan-Terieur, the importer, could work out why.

Which legal helped me recoup most of my money and have it removed, but I'm no nearer getting that improved signal strength. We do not stream, but need it reliably for camp site bookings, financial transactions etc, which we make on the hoof as we go..

Has any other member, please, found a reliable way of achieving this - obviously with fingers badly burned I would prefer not to rely on 'sales outlet's' talk for a second time.

Thank you.

Comments

  • Simon100
    Simon100 Club Member Posts: 665 ✭✭✭
    500 Comments
    edited November 2022 #2

    I have found that an EE data SIM in a mobile phone works well in most places.

    4G usually gives me sufficient speed to stream TV and plenty for email and the internet.

    What network are you using?

  • nelliethehooker
    nelliethehooker Club Member Posts: 13,636
    1000 Comments Name Dropper
    edited November 2022 #3

    We use a 3 Mobile 4G MiFi dongle, for want of a better word, wherever we travel, throughout the whole country with very few places where we get no signal. OH streams most programmes, Sky, Netflix, Prime, and all the main channels while I just use it for correspondence and general internet.

  • ABM
    ABM Forum Participant Posts: 14,578
    1000 Comments
    edited November 2022 #4

    I never use General Internet Cos I Out-rank him !!

  • richardandros
    richardandros Club Member Posts: 2,681 ✭✭✭
    1,000 Likes 1000 Comments Name Dropper Photogenic
    edited November 2022 #5

    Since the beginning of this year I have been using a TP Link router, Poynting aerial on a 10' mast attached to the jockey wheel with a standard aerial bracket. I have used an EE 120GB data sim (which cost £50) and it has lasted most of the year with us away one or two weeks every month and provides us with mobile internet - streaming TV - etc etc.

    I have been getting an average download speed of about 50 Mbps in most areas around the country and sometimes much more although I have to say that where we are at the moment (Thornton Le Dale near Pickering), it's 'only' about 20Mbps and falls off significantly during the day.

    There is no doubt in my mind that signal strength is much improved over that achieved with a mobile phone and, of course, that permits Wifi calling in poor areas.

    One word of warning, though. Last time I used the sim card was just over a month ago and there was about 20Gb left on it. When I came to use it at the beginning of this week, it wouldn't work, although swapping the sim in the router for either of those in our phones (also on EE) and a spare data sim I had as a standby - it worked perfectly. My suspicion is that it had been deactivated because of non-use for a month and there are other reports of this happening, on the internet.  EE didn't want to know, however, saying that they had no record of the sim on my account.  Well, they wouldn't, would they, because it's essentially a PAYG sim. A bit annoyed to say the least.

    Total outlay for the router, aerial and mast was just under £200 and if the sim works as advertised, it's cheap internet - but now I'm realising it's not quite as cheap as it appears.

    I may try a sim with another provider although that runs the risk of not having such good coverage.

    Hope this helps.

     

  • young thomas
    young thomas Forum Participant Posts: 11,356
    1000 Comments
    edited November 2022 #6

    3/4/5g aerials like the Poynting, above, are very popular in vans at the moment. It needs mentioning that these aerials need a connection point on the router which some smaller/cheaper mifi type units may not have.

    our Vodafone mifi has worked really well all over France/Spain over the past two years without an additional aerial and gives a slightly better signal than just using my iPhone 13 as a hotspot.

  • richardandros
    richardandros Club Member Posts: 2,681 ✭✭✭
    1,000 Likes 1000 Comments Name Dropper Photogenic
    edited November 2022 #7

    Agree yt. The main reason I chose the TP Link router is that the two attached aerials can be removed and replaced with the two aerial leads from the Poynting.