Extend WIFI through metal wall?

johnnyb58

Member
I have a small shop inside a steel shipping container about 60 ft away from house and want to use a lap top inside. The WIFI works outside about 60ft from house, but not inside the shop and the sun is just too bright to see the screen outside.

Many years ago, an electronic friend made an antenna with a cable drilled through the wall to a coil so I could listen to radio inside the building and I was wondering if there was something similar for WIFI.
 

johnb35

Administrator
Staff member
Can you run an ethernet cable from router to outside through container and then terminate at a wireless access point or a second router?
 

johnnyb58

Member
Can you run an ethernet cable from router to outside through container and then terminate at a wireless access point or a second router?
No. I can go from the house to the container, but not through the house. The router is at the farthest point in the house.
 

Trizoy

VIP Member
Pick up a wifi repeater(wifi from house to container outside), mount the antenna through a hole in the container, with the router on the inside(Ethernet from box the computer). Plug into sweeee ethernet. Might work.
 

beers

Moderator
Staff member
Many years ago, an electronic friend made an antenna with a cable drilled through the wall to a coil so I could listen to radio inside the building and I was wondering if there was something similar for WIFI.
You'll probably need something similar, but this can be achieved in multiple ways. The container acts like a faraday cage so it would be difficult to get signal from outside of it to inside unless you drilled a hole for something inside like another access point, wireless bridge, or just ran a wired run into it.

A mesh AP or something with a dedicated backhaul radio would probably suit the best.
 

johnnyb58

Member
I don't have any problem with drilling a hole and I've been thinking about cutting in for a window toward the house, but I'm still arranging my shop and not sure were on the wall to put it. Someone mentioned a device that sends a signal through the electric power lines, but I'm not to hot on that because of security. I once was picking up my neighbors computer screen on my screen next door. I ended up moving from that place shortly afterward.
 

geek 0001

Member
I don't have any problem with drilling a hole and I've been thinking about cutting in for a window toward the house, but I'm still arranging my shop and not sure were on the wall to put it. Someone mentioned a device that sends a signal through the electric power lines, but I'm not to hot on that because of security. I once was picking up my neighbors computer screen on my screen next door. I ended up moving from that place shortly afterward.
Powerline adaptors can be password protected like Wifi, so security isn't really a problem. That said, they don't always work. I had one at my old house and it worked great with no problems, but at my new house, the speeds were crap. If you get one, make sure the place you get it from has a return policy.
 

johnnyb58

Member
I was looking into the WIFI repeater and it looks promising, but I need more info. I guess I'll have to put an outdoor receptacle outside the steel container for power and build some sort of weather proof shelter or box for the repeater. I will need a repeater that a ethernet cable to be plugged into to go through the steel wall.
 

beers

Moderator
Staff member
You probably want them to use /r/homenetworking . /r/networking is full of a bunch of long-term veterans and usually focuses on enterprise and data center technologies. I had the dude that makes the INE training videos Brian McGahan reply to some of my chits once :p
I feel like ultimately running an ethernet cable inside the container than doing an AP inside it will be easiest and most effective.
This, really. No real configuration changes other than specifying SSID on the AP and you can power it with an injector. Other bridges and stuff work but add complexity.
 
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