Blogs

Three brand new batteries, should keep our solar array at Keserovich (which serves several customers in Rice Canyon) alive and well.

Some background:

Radio Unit - Meraki MR-58 Power Consumption: 7.5Watts typical (12.8 max)

 

We hit a major milestone today in raising the Chernos Community Repeater in De Luz Heights.  As evidenced by my less frequent blogging, we've been extremely busy at 1 On 1 Communications, working multiple projects simultaneously during an agressive growth phase.  We've provided some brief updates on our progress over on our Facebook page along the way, but today's milestone warrants a larger announcement of our progress. 

A comedy of errors, this project began as a "simple" 20-foot elevated radio installation, but trees and other issues required significant design changes in the field - I ultimately delayed this project by a full three weeks as problems with the initial design were vetted.

We've had more than our fair share of help along the way from some really great folks.  Juha Silvola of JS Welding & Fabrication did some beautiful work adding custom CNC manufactured tear drops to our pipe stock for affixing guy wires.  I'm relatively certain that despite being a country boy at heart, I had a much more "ghetto" concept in my mind when Juha described this to me over the phone.  This is what they look like, and the finished product.

The newest member of the 1 On 1 Communications team, Fredrick Rasp of Rainbow California, has proven to be an absolute rock star.  We simply couldn't have completed this project anywhere near on time without his vast skill set - there just aren't many things Fred doesn't know how to do, and do WELL.  Here's a shot of Fred yesterday with our long pole. 

Today, we raised our 40-foot span perpendicular, applied 240 Lbs. of concrete, and guy wires at 30 and 40 feet.

We still have plenty of work to accomplish this week to bring this project to fruition.  I'll be cutting in an outdoor weatherized 110 electrical outlet, and performing some "doggie don't chew here" enhancements along the way.  

The most important function remaining:  Dustin gets to put on his skinny jeans, pretend he's light as a feather, and shinny up that pole to turn the radio unit 30 degrees to direct signal towards Red Mountain.  (This will allow us to service pretty much ANYONE presently North of Mission Rd. in Fallbrook between Red Mountain and De Luz.)

It's been a good little while since I last blogged... I've been a busy little beaver out in De Luz and Fallbrook.

JC Iamurri installed a 30 foot tower at his location, and we've deployed several radio units atop it to expand our service area significantly.

I've also got the Chernos Community Repeater 85% completed.

Friday was a rough day.  FastEthernet0/1 on our Cisco router decided AutoNegotiation was no longer an option on the link to our Fiber Optic handoff switch, and dropped us off of the Internet.  It took about an hour to determine the cause with Cisco and AT&T on the phone.

Later in the day new Ubiquity equipment was deployed on Rainbow Crest in Rainbow.   This flipped RbwCAMR58CrestGW from a Repeater to a Gateway, greatly improving througput speeds for downrange customers.  This allowed removal of Meraki equipment at one customer location that was experiencing problems with their new Verizon Wireless Network Extender device, which could not connect properly when stuck behind the Network Address Translation layer that Meraki imposes on non-Enterprise customers.

Saturday night stomach flu symptoms set in HARD at casa de 1On1, and Dustin is only just this morning approaching an upright and functional state.  UPS is delivering equipment for the Iamurri Community Repeater in De Luz.  Construction is anticipated to begin on Tuesday the 20th, fully operational within 48 hours.

It was a L O N G day today - beginning at sunrise.  Last minute preparations including a trip to Home Depot (and bless you Starbucks!) and then I was off to De Luz.  

It's a wonderful drive with coffee and the excitement of pulling the trigger on a long awaited project.  I stopped in to visit with Jim Iamurri and pick up gear we had previously ordered for his location.  (We're playing musical radio equipment.)

Most of the day was spent atop Jim Velazquez's roof.  Once I had the perpendicular hardware affixed to the chimney chase, it was time to add the antennas and radio equipment.  I'd say I was near 85% complete with an hour of sunlight left when I began cleaning up after myself.  I'll be on station early tomorrow morning to complete the installation, and perform signal testing near the fire station.  I'll be performing some customer installations quickly over the next several days.

Been running just to stand still it seems, and haven't blogged lately.  Over the weekend I did some troubleshooting for the Verizon Wireless Network Extender a customer of ours recently purchased.  It didn't want to come on-line properly.  Details of the issue are outlined in a paper I cobbled together.

Brooke and I are waiting for UPS to deliver a radio shipment in Rainbow today, and we're expecting a significant shipment to build our first Community Repeater in De Luz Heights, CA will also arrive in De Luz before close of business today.

First time ever, our Meraki MR58 radios are starting to show their spots.  Lacking the robustness of a TDMA implementation such as Ubiquity provides, we're seeing radio 3 in 2.4GHz on RbwCAMR58HeightsGW push into dangerously high utilization, 80%+ during peak hours.  We're taking steps to reorient select customers to alternate repeaters to lighten to load, but it's clear that Meraki's days are numbered on our network.

We'll be working a great deal in De Lux Heights for the remainder of 2011.

OK really... not a complaint.  I'm pretty darned proud of all of the progress I've made in De Luz Heights, California, despite the rain and other interruptions.  I managed to install three new radio units on Sunday.  Today, two more crucial radio units made their way up into the air.  Alas, I ran out of daylight and must return to complete the cabling into the house in the morning.

When these radios become operational, all of Ross Lake and much of the surrounding area will be covered with high speed wireless Internet!

It was a sloggy mess in De LuzHeights today, but I was determined to make headway despite the rains.

I managed to deploy three radios in the rain without incident, and by 4:30 PM we were enjoying a steady 8.5Mbps download speeds and well beyond 15Mbps upload speeds at the Rittenberg residence.

I'll be pushing forward to our next hop - which will bring coverage to all of Ross Lake.  Stay tuned for more announcements.

This afternoon, I pulled the trigger on phase II of a series of upgrades to RbwCAMR58Keserovich, a Meraki MR58 radio repeater station perched high atop Mountain Rim Road in Rice Canyon.  Not long ago,  I replaced the 60-Watt DC/AC inverter and 110AC-48VDC POE injector with a purely DC 12V to 48V POE unit, which doubled our solar capacity.  Today, I reoriented the solar panels with my compass to a more optimal bearing for maximum insolation.

I also replaced the entire mounting assembly for the radio unit, elevating the radio and antennas an additional 15 feet.  Former hand-made RG9 antenna cabling on the primary 5GHz antenna linking the unit to RbwCAMR58BakerEAST was also replaced with custom LMR400 cables.  An immediate improvement presented, increasing the back-haul connection to this radio from an average of 3.5Mbps to more than 25Mbps!  This will increase total bandwidth to customers on Rainbow Crest being serviced by this unit.

In preparation for the upcoming heavy Santa Ana winds the "road sign" component of the trailer was lowered horizontal to the ground to reduce wind load.  The solar panels are also now more readily cleaned to ensure optimum output.