Being working RVers and with a daily blog that gets a high readership, being able to get online is very important to us. In fact, we have avoided going some places because we could not get a reliable signal. We don’t just surf the internet, it’s an important tool to get our jobs done.
Over the years as technology has evolved, we have run the gamut of options, from a huge Hughes Direcway satellite dish on the roof of our MCI bus conversion to 3G aircards, and now smart phones that serve as 4G hotspots.
For the last few years we have used a Wilson Trucker antenna mounted on the roof of our Winnebago motorhome and a Wilson AG SOHO signal booster, supplemented by a Wilson flat plane antenna inside the coach. It has served us pretty well in most areas, though when we were on the Oregon coast last year there were places where it would not work.
That’s when we mounted a Wilson directional antenna on a pole, as I described in the We’re Connected blog post. It allowed us to get online, but a lot of work was involved in putting the antenna mast together and securing it to the side of the motorhome, and then rotating the mast to point the antenna toward the nearest cell tower.
A while back the folks at WilsonAmplifiers.com contacted me and asked if I would be interested in trying out their weBoost 4G RV Cell Phone Signal Booster Kit and sharing my thoughts about it with our readers in a review.
The system uses an outside panel antenna to pull in a weak existing signal, multiplying it many times with an amplifier, and then redirecting the signal with a desktop antenna inside the RV. According to their website, the kit works with all major US carriers, including AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, T-Mobile, US Cellular, Leap Wireless, C Spire, MetroPCS, etc. It also works with Canadian carriers Rogers, Bell, Telus, Fido, Wind, etc.
It arrived a couple of days ago, and yesterday I decided to check it out. The kit included the outside flat-panel antenna, RV 4G wide-band cell phone amplifier/repeater, desktop antenna, both 30 and 15 foot RG6 cables, a plastic holder for the flat plane antenna, suction cups for mounting it on the outside of the RV, an AC power supply, and a 12 volt power supply.
The instructions said to locate the nearest cell tower, which I did using the Open Signal app on my phone, and then to mount the panel antenna facing in that direction. It is suggested to mount it as high up on the RV as possible. They also say to make sure there is at least 20 feet between the outside antenna and the inside signal amplifier.
Because of the angle that we are parked here at Elkhart Campground, I couldn’t mount the antenna pointed directly at the tower, it’s probably off by about 15 degrees. Because this was just a simple test we used a stepstool to get up high enough to mount it at about the level of the bottom of our bedroom window.
I ran the cable to the front of the motorhome and inside, connected it to the amplifier, and then connected the amplifier to the desktop antenna. Before I turned anything on I did a quick speed test, which showed my download speed using the Wilson Trucker antenna and our old signal booster. I was showing 9.09 mbps download speeds and a very slow .56 upload.
I unplugged the old signal amplifier we had been using, plugged in the new system, gave it time to settle in, and these were the results I had. Over twice the download speeds, and the upload is unbelievable. I’m impressed, to say the least.
Looking at the online support info, you actually can mount the flat antenna inside an RV, attached to a window. Doing it that way, you can probably expect some signal loss, especially if you have dual pane windows, but it will work if you don’t want to go to the hassle of going outside and running a cable through a window and all that.
The system isn’t cheap, at $399 on the WilsonAmplifiers.com website, but if getting online is important to you, and if you appreciate not having dropped calls when you are in fringe areas, it’s money well spent. We’ve seen a lot of technology come and go over the years, and in my opinion, this is the best and easiest to use I’ve ever seen. I like it!
Thought For The Day – Television may insult your intelligence, but nothing rubs it in like a computer.
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Nick Russell
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Nice piece-o-gear! I use a hotspot but don’t see why it wouldn’t work on that too.
You should get them to send one to your friend Greg White. If anyone can find any weak spots in the system, with his knowledge, he should be able to pick it apart if there is something not quite up to par.
That sounds like a great idea, if I could get it set up correctly. That’s always a problem for me … LOL
Do you know if the outside antennae requires a grounding plate of must be on the side of the motorhome? I’d like to figure a way to mount it to theTV bat wing antennae so I can rotate it to point to the cell tower and get it as high as possible. The bat wing is never used….
Nick,
If I understand this correctly, the outside antenna will have to be re-mounted, every time you relocate, so it can be aimed at the nearest tower, correct?
Butch
Impressive! For forty bucks a month I only get 4-5mbps download on my Telebeep connection. Now that people are streaming more it can get bogged down a lot slower. Living out in the sticks has it’s disadvantages. I don’t think I can justify the cost of the equipment, the cellphone and acell/data plan with about 15 gigs of data though since I’m not using it to make a living.
We’ve tested the RV 4G head to head with other models of boosters out there. It does perform quite well with the higher gain. However, for ‘mobile’ RVers who change locations pretty often – we found the need to aim the antenna at each stop to be a bit cumbersome.
For those who are mobile and like no-fuss (ie. you’re lazy like us), we recommend one of their mobile certified models with an omni-direction antenna that you can permanently mount on the roof. Just turn the booster on if you think you need it.
The 4G-M and 4G-X are our two top picks of the weBoost line – both of which the reseller you got your evaluation unit from also sell.
Yes Butch, but it’s quick and easy to do.
Your old amplifiers was a 3G amplifier, and this new one is a 4G?
We bought one this summer and traveled through some extremely fringe areas in New England and along the NY / Canadian border. We have TMobile phones. The Open Signal app would almost always find but one cell tower, always a long way away with a weak signal.
WeBoost was not helpful to us. Turned out, that carriers have roaming agreements based on individual towers, not in general. TMobile did not have roaming agreements with the towers that we most often found, so while there may have been at least a weak signal available, we still were unable to take advantage of it.