S/V Soggy Paws - CSY44 - Dave McCampbell and Sherry Beckett

Future Additions:
12-19 Volt Step Up Transformer
Laser Thermometer
Laser Tachometer
Handheld Depth Sounder

(July 2007) Soggy Paws has 3 laptop computers aboard, all wifi equipped. However, early on we discovered that the wifi cards built into most laptops are pretty lame. Since email and the internet are a big part of our travel experience, having a better wifi setup seemed to be worth investing some time and money in. We now have 2 external setups ... the $300 'Big Gun' and the $100 'El Cheapo'.

Note: Make sure you read the entire set of 'wifi' entries before you buy anything. Especially here.

Setup:
Here is a picture of the 'Big Gun' hanging in the rigging on a flag halyard.

This setup consists of a 400 mWatt Engenius Access Point/Bridge EOC-3220 EXT (which comes in a weatherproof box) and a 15db omni outdoor antenna mounted right next to the Bridge.

For our setup, Dave mounted the antenna in a PVC pipe the length of the antenna, and then mounted the bridge using the supplied brackets, on the pipe. The PVC has a bit of line on either end to hang it up in the rigging with. (See note below about the drawbacks of this clever mounting arrangement).

You will need 2 Ethernet (Cat 5) cables; one that connects from the bottom of the Engenius bridge down to where you have 120v power (ie below decks). The second from the power injector to your computer. We are using a 25' and a 15' cable. The 25' cable is long enough so we can hang the antenna high up for better range (not sure yet how important this is). You will need 120v somewhere near the end of this cable. The 15' cable allows us to hook up to our laptop at any point in the cockpit or main cabin.

Links:
The Engenius Access Point/Bridge OC-3220 EXT from the manufacturer's site:
http://www.engeniustech.com/datacom/products/details.aspx?id=174
We bought from Keenan Systems in Ft. Lauderdale.

The HG2415U-PRO antenna: http://sharperconcepts.zoovy.com/product/YSC-HG2415U-PRO

This antenna/bridge was recommended by the Wifi provider in Marsh Harbor, Bahamas to another cruiser. (ie not our original idea)

You DO want an omni directional antenna instead of a directional (yagi or patch) antenna, if you plan to anchor out, because the directional ones are very focused and would lose signal as you swing. See note below in the box about using a 15db gain antenna.

The HG2415U-PRO is 40" tall (big) and heavy. There is an omni directional marine Wifi antenna available with less db and much smaller (and a little cheaper). But I was encouraged by my "overkill is just about right" friend to go for the 15db.

Costs:
Engenius Access Point from Keenan Systems: $154, plus a $15 pigtail to convert from the SMA connector to the N connector on the Antenna. On their website

HG 2415U PRO Antenna from Sharper Concepts: $120 On their website

Note that this particular product can be used with Apple computers, because the only connection to the computer is via a web page. Therefore no drivers required.

Downside:
Besides cost, this unit is designed to be a professional wifi provider device, so they assume you know quite a lot about networking. There is no hand-holding application to magically set up the connection on your computer. You DO have to know a little bit about networking, or have someone help you through it. You must have a hard wired network connection port on your computer (nearly every computer sold in the last 5 years has one). It looks like an oversized phone jack. You will have to change some network settings. It DOES NOT interface with programs like 'NetStumbler', but it does have a 'scan for available networks' option built in.

Note: Several friends have asked if the PVC pipe attenuates the signal at all. I posted the question (with a link to the specs on the antenna) to a wifi antenna guy I found on the net (Jeff Liebermann). Here is his answer:

8 degrees vertical beam width is going to make this antenna difficult to keep vertical. It has too much gain, therefore too narrow a vertical radiation angle. As the boat pitches and rolls, the signal will go up and down unless you're very close. A lower gain omni antenna (about 8dBi) would have been better. However, that wasn't your question.

PVC does not attenuate the signal much. That's not the problem. What it does do is detune the antenna.

High gain (15dBi) antennas have a fairly narrow operating bandwidth. They're lucky to cover the 83.5MHz of the 2.4GHz band. Any more gain, and these would be sold by the channel number. Putting it inside a PVC tube will lower the resonant frequency. It's difficult to guess how much, but there will be an effect. What you'll probably see is that it works better on channel 1 than on channel 11.

In any case the added water proofing is not necessary for this antenna. Just keep the connector water proof.

However, what seems to be the problem is a way to clamp the top of the antenna to some kind of eye hook. You could do that with some kind of plastic strap (UV proof) and a plastic eye hook. No need to embalm the entire antenna. Also, nothing wrong with mounting it upside down (as long as the water stays out).

Here's a link to another boater using a similar setup, but different mounting: http://www.panbo.com/yae/archives/cat_wireless.html

Because the Big Gun antenna is big and isn't very user friendly, we also bought the Engenius USB (EUB-362) product, which has an integral antenna (but also detaches) and a cheap/small external antenna. Both of these purchased from Keenan Systems (http://www.keenansystems.com) and total cost is about $70. This WILL work with NetStumbler.

+7dBi mag mount antenna with SMA plug (7dbimagsma) - $14.95
+EnGenius 200mW 802.11BG USB 2.0 EXT SMA Connector (EUB-362 EXT) - $50.00

I also bought an alternate antenna to try it out:

+8.5dBi omni directional antenna with N female connector (8.5dbi-omni) - $39.95
+plus a short pigtail to convert the N connector to an SMA connector ($10)

Right, the EUB-362, shown with it's original antenna, and the cheapo 'mag mount' 7dBi antenna, next to it.

After spending some time at anchor playing with antennas and wifi devices, and mixing and matching between devices and antennas, I have a hard time recommending our 'big gun' setup except in the case where you are staying in one place, know there's a wifi access point there you can hit, but just can't quite pull it in (or want to get a stronger (faster) connection). The bridge device is complex and painful to use when you are moving from place to place and trying to pick up wifi on the fly. Primarily because you have to keep switching your network connection configuration between 'fixed IP address' (to talk to the device) and 'assign an IP address' (to talk to the internet). I haven't found a way around this. When you lose connection (happens fairly frequently with tenuous connections) and want to check on the status of the signal, you have to switch your IP configuration and then switch back. (On the USB setup, there is an icon in your tray that you use to scan for new wifi and check on the status of your current connection). I haven't seen any big improvement in connection using the 400 mWatt device (as a bridge) versus the smaller 200 mWatt device.

Also, the 15db antenna is big (40" long) and heavy. I found that the 8.5dB 'marine' omni is almost as good and much easier to deal with (20" long and only weighs ounces). The one from Keenan Systems comes with u-bolt mounts, so it is easy to clamp to stanchions or other uprights on your boat. We also added a loop of line at the top of the antenna with a cable tie, and have hung it from various parts of the boat. You want to make sure that the path between the antenna and your access point (if you know where it is) is as clear as possible. Even trees (and rigging) will block the signal.

I understand the length of the antenna feed line is an issue (between the device and it's antenna). That's why they only sell a 15" pigtail. So what we do is put the EUB-362 in a ziplock and tape it to the antenna support, and use a 15' USB powered extension cable to feed it into the cockpit or down below (ours is made by BAFO).

This setup is of course only marginally weatherproof. And it does limit where you place your computer much more than the 'big gun' setup. But for most cruisers, it is workable. I much prefer to be sitting in my cockpit web surfing than anywhere else.

Does the extra expense produce wifi that you wouldn't get otherwise? When comparing any of the above combinations to my internal wifi on my laptop, YES YES YES!

We are currently in the Rio Dulce and for a time the wifi at our marina was out. Nobody at the dock was getting wifi. So we had to go elsewhere, an internet cafe, to do our internet work. I decided to try out my EUB-362 system and could pull in 2 different signals that could have been used. Unfortunately, both were WEP encrypted, and I haven't yet figured out how to break the encryption (though hackers say it's not very hard).

August 2008 Update: We still think the EUB-362 EXT is the way to go. Buy a spare, they're so cheap. They are now sold as a kit on at West Marine.

2007) After going without radar for our Caribbean cruise, I finally broke down and bought a small Furuno 1622 radar (cost: $550 on sale at West Marine). Now I don't know how I did without it. Photo here shows the screen mounted on a small West Marine swing out arm. It stays out of the way, and out of the sun/weather, until we need it, and we can also view it from down below in the case of middle-of-the-night thunderstorms. We find it VERY convenient to be able to use it in both places, and especially nice not to have to get wet at night to watch thunderstorms while at anchor.

The radar antenna is mounted on an aluminum plate atop an aluminum pole attached to our our arch aft. This mounting system has two positions... down and up. It can be moved from one position to the other in about 5 minutes with the use of only a screw driver. In the 'up' position it sits on it's pole mount just above the solar panels. Here it has a clear view all around but casts a shadow on the solar panels. So I keep it down whenever they are in use. It still does a pretty good job in the down position, although I'm sure we loose a little distance and probably have a small blind spot to starboard. The plate is fixed atop the pole so that it can be rotated side to side to match the boat's angle of heel when we are on passage.

We have nearly 100 chart CD's acquired from trading with friends over the years. We looked at a new color binnacle-mounted chart plotter, but the cost was pushing a thousand dollars before we had the first chart pack.

So we put our heads together and designed a very workable system, with the computer mounted below on the navigation table (velcro'd to the plexiglas tabletop), and an inexpensive (less than $150) 15" 12 volt LCD monitor (not waterproof, but could be covered with a big ziploc if needed) mounted on a small West Marine swing-out arm in the companionway.

The LCD only needs 12 volts, but normally gets it through its 120-12 volt brick converter (similar to a laptop computer brick) and an inverter. In order to simplify the electronics we cut off the cable plug at the LCD end and spliced it into a 12 volt wire coming directly from the 12 volt circuit breaker panel. Our computers now run off a 12-19 volt step up transformer that also does away with the 120-12 volt brick converter and the inverter.

The device that really makes this setup convenient is a 'presentation mouse' that provides mouse capabilities from as far as 15' from the computer, wirelessly. This allows us to control the computer from the cockpit without having to go below. Now the computer is safe and secure on the navigation table down below while we are watching the LCD screen and controlling the computer while on watch in the cockpit. This minimizes the computer's exposure to the elements. (See below)

I have (almost) converted Dave from his Yahoo account to using the mailboxes we get as part of our website. Both Dave and I still keep our old Yahoo and AOL accounts and check them occasionally, but our primary email is now using Outlook.

With Outlook and Pop3/SMTP mail mailboxes, we can download our mail in a matter of minutes and then browse our email (and answer it) offline. This is critical in places where we have to borrow or pay for internet access by the hour. It is also important to be able to access old emails while at sea ('what day was so-and-so leaving?')

Also, with our own mail server, we can set up many different email addresses and even add an 'auto-responder' to our mailbox ('sorry we are at sea and will not get your mail until xx/xx/xx').

For our 'at sea' email, we are currently using Winlink and Airmail, the ham email system, as well as Sailmail, for our limited amount of 'commercial traffic'. While at sea, we can check our email and request and receive weather forecasts via HF radio.

Airmail can also be used via Iridium phone, but we are not using that feature yet (due to cost of Iridium minutes and good HF coverage for now).

Cell phones seem to be a fact of life these days in the U.S., and a fantastic way to keep in touch with loved ones while you are cruising. Amazingly, they are also prevalent everywhere in South and Central America now too (and, I suspect, the rest of the world). If you have the right service in the states (Cingular/ATT or T-Mobile), you can roam the world with your phone. It 'only' costs $2-3/minute. Or you can, like most cruisers, buy a new cheap phone in every country, and enjoy local and 'back to the States' calls in the 10-20 cents a minute range.

But, better yet, with a little research and prep, you can just buy one phone and purchase only the 'sim card in each country.' ($5 expense vs $25 expense) and be able to stick with the same phone from country-to-country (in most places).

1. A GSM phone (Cingular/ATT and T-Mobile use GSM in the States)
2. To get the phone UNLOCKED
3. An understanding of the cell phone frequencies in use in your cruising area.

There are 4 frequencies in use around the world. To get a phone that works world-wide, you need a 'quad band' cell phone. (Motorola Razr, for example, is a quad band phone).

But if you already have a simple dual-band GSM phone from Cingular or T-Mobile, it is likely that that phone will work everywhere in the Bahamas, the Caribbean, Central America, and parts of South America. (if you go to your home provider's website and look for 'international roaming' and see what countries you can roam in, that will tell you whether your phone will work in that country). However, to use the cheap pay-as-you-go chip in each country, you will need to get your phone 'unlocked'.

Cell phones provided by cell phone providers are 'locked' so that you can't use your phone with other providers.

We have found an electronic fax account invaluable. After a little research, and a bad experience with a free account at efax.com, we settled on using Trust Fax as our eFax provider. For only $25/year, we keep an 800 number, and can send and receive faxes all over the world via email or web interface.