Starlink - How to power it. (1 Viewer)

[acewoodturner]

I bought a new Starlink a few months ago to help me in my small business.
I run a small craft business and use a sum up machine for taking payments at events such as highland games, county shows etc. The signal in some locations is dire without the event taking place and non existent with several thousand people wanting to use social media etc and lots of traders trying to take payment at the same time. Occasionally an event organiser will have a wifi network up and running but these are pretty dire in most cases.
The scenario needing a solution!
At most events I can park my motorhome behind my gazebo with a bit of space for the Starlink to be set out. Sometimes there is no room for the motorhome and I have to leave it in the car park.
I spoke to a trader yesterday who was using Starlink for payment and he bought a big Anker Solix Power bank and left the Starlink on 240V. He gets about 18 hours use out of it and at a 4 day show can scrounge a 240v socket to charge it up. I like this idea as it only takes about 1 hour to charge it up to 80% but if its on overnight then it will be back up to 100%.
The difference between taking card payments for payment or cash can be several hundred pounds per day as generally there isnt a nearby cash machine and if there is then it soon runs out of money. Most folk these days carry little cash and they want to keep it for refreshments if they know they cant get more money anywhere.
I could possibly subsidise my costs by letting a few nearby traders access to the network as well.
Would it be better perhaps for duration of usability to convert it to a 12v Starlink or leave it on 240v if it makes no difference.
Are there better power banks out there apart from Anker? I am familiar with them as I have 4 smaller power banks for charging my phones, ipad and led stand lights when I am out and about at events.
I did read the big long thread but it got a bit long winded and technical for me and thats the reason for this thread.
Any thoughts or advice will be most welcome.

Thank you in advance.

 

[Tombola]

I assume your van isn't near to where the stsrlink will be deployed ? So you can use your van 12v power if adapted or.you don't have solar and inveter in that ?

So yes the easiest is the power bank solution, whether you convert to 12v for a bit more longevity is the main question, and that is governed by time and cost.
I wouldn't think it would have to be a big name power bank, as long as it has the highest power should do you. Then charge that up each night at home, hotel, on the road via socket etc.

 

[MisterB]

there are lots of diy 12v set ups on youtube - some of the better set ups have been devised by ukranian techies to meet their specific needs on the battlelfield ....

 

[Coolcats]

I bought a new Starlink a few months ago to help me in my small business.
I run a small craft business and use a sum up machine for taking payments at events such as highland games, county shows etc. The signal in some locations is dire without the event taking place and non existent with several thousand people wanting to use social media etc and lots of traders trying to take payment at the same time. Occasionally an event organiser will have a wifi network up and running but these are pretty dire in most cases.
The scenario needing a solution!
At most events I can park my motorhome behind my gazebo with a bit of space for the Starlink to be set out. Sometimes there is no room for the motorhome and I have to leave it in the car park.
I spoke to a trader yesterday who was using Starlink for payment and he bought a big Anker Solix Power bank and left the Starlink on 240V. He gets about 18 hours use out of it and at a 4 day show can scrounge a 240v socket to charge it up. I like this idea as it only takes about 1 hour to charge it up to 80% but if its on overnight then it will be back up to 100%.
The difference between taking card payments for payment or cash can be several hundred pounds per day as generally there isnt a nearby cash machine and if there is then it soon runs out of money. Most folk these days carry little cash and they want to keep it for refreshments if they know they cant get more money anywhere.
I could possibly subsidise my costs by letting a few nearby traders access to the network as well.
Would it be better perhaps for duration of usability to convert it to a 12v Starlink or leave it on 240v if it makes no difference.
Are there better power banks out there apart from Anker? I am familiar with them as I have 4 smaller power banks for charging my phones, ipad and led stand lights when I am out and about at events.
I did read the big long thread but it got a bit long winded and technical for me and thats the reason for this thread.
Any thoughts or advice will be most welcome.

Thank you in advance.

Best ask Musky for dilithium crystal’s he keeps stealing terms and names from Sci Fi

 

[TerryReis]

Running my Starlink Roam with an Anker SOLIX F1200 (PowerHouse 757) brilliant, very happy with it. Will give me days of connection although I am probably not as intensive as your use.

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[TerryReis]

It does concern me that Mr Musk is probably only one nervous break down from a Bond Supervillain but currently if you want off grid internet it is the best system out there.

 

[Langtoftlad]

I have a Anker 757... which I believe is about 100ahr
Perhaps those who have Starlink can tell the OP how long that is likely to last

 

[stewartwebr]

I converted to 12Volts a few months back and have seen a 45% reduction in power, so a well worth project. I also have it flat mounted and seen no degradation of service.

 

[starquake]

There is also a cheaper per month alternative, which is to whack a great big directional antenna on the van pointing to the nearest cell tower (or maybe the one in a town 5 miles away if the campsite is busy with locals on social media). It's a bit more faff, but it'd cost less per month, and would run for days on standard PoE.

Mikrotik LHG is the solution I've used to get such in no/very congested areas (it's about a 200-300 quid device, you want the LTE18 version) and you just put a sim in it, and wire it back to a router to distribute to your own wifi/wired devices. It does work but will require tinkering to get it to stick to say a cell tower 5-10 miles away instead of the one all the iphones in peoples hands can find singal to, and use.. It does require some "knowledge" on how to configure it, as it's not plug and play like Starlink is.

(it's about the size of a Sky dish and operates a small directional beam instead of the motorhomewifi type "omni" antenna, so as such is far better at pulling in signal from towns miles away).

LHG will require aiming and putting on a pole pre-event, but I've used at events many times prior to starlink existing -> it was designed in Latvia for similar "I live miles from a cell tower" type problems, and for use (by TV people) to get live outside broadcasts back over mobile from similar congested festival type sites (given they rarely use satellite feeds now for cost reasons).

Should add with the wind load on it, I don't have one on my own motorhome simply becuase you need to take it off the roof before you would move anywhere, it's not good for 70mph driving, but does stand up to 70mph gusts of wind. (it would likely break under constant driving load, as its' not rated for that at all). The lower profile omni antenna are fine for the motorhome in movement use case, but for a temporary event setup that you move inside afetr event you better off with the larger directional antenna.

 

[TerryReis]

I have a Anker 757... which I believe is about 100ahr
Perhaps those who have Starlink can tell the OP how long that is likely to last

Hi, not easy answer that, it will depend on how good the view of the satellites is and how intensive the use case. I use intensively in the morning for a couple of hours (work). In the evenings/night we will do a bit of surfing and watch Netflix of similar for 2-3 hours. The 575 will last a few days the way we use it. But everyone will be different.

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[TerryReis]

There is also a cheaper per month alternative, which is to whack a great big directional antenna on the van pointing to the nearest cell tower (or maybe the one in a town 5 miles away if the campsite is busy with locals on social media). It's a bit more faff, but it'd cost less per month, and would run for days on standard PoE.

Mikrotik LHG is the solution I've used to get such in no/very congested areas (it's about a 200-300 quid device, you want the LTE18 version) and you just put a sim in it, and wire it back to a router to distribute to your own wifi/wired devices. It does work but will require tinkering to get it to stick to say a cell tower 5-10 miles away instead of the one all the iphones in peoples hands can find singal to, and use.. It does require some "knowledge" on how to configure it, as it's not plug and play like Starlink is.

(it's about the size of a Sky dish and operates a small directional beam instead of the motorhomewifi type "omni" antenna, so as such is far better at pulling in signal from towns miles away).

LHG will require aiming and putting on a pole pre-event, but I've used at events many times prior to starlink existing -> it was designed in Latvia for similar "I live miles from a cell tower" type problems, and for use (by TV people) to get live outside broadcasts back over mobile from similar congested festival type sites (given they rarely use satellite feeds now for cost reasons).

Should add with the wind load on it, I don't have one on my own motorhome simply becuase you need to take it off the roof before you would move anywhere, it's not good for 70mph driving, but does stand up to 70mph gusts of wind. (it would likely break under constant driving load, as its' not rated for that at all). The lower profile omni antenna are fine for the motorhome in movement use case, but for a temporary event setup that you move inside afetr event you better off with the larger directional antenna.

I agree such systems are very good, I have used similar for a few years now. Even though I have bought Starlink I'm keeping it because I know there are a few places we stay with extensive tree cover where it will work better. But as you said starlink is plug and play and when it is working it is so much easier and faster. Biggest downside it isn't cheap but if it is important to your work or business then it is the best system available.

 

[TerryReis]

Probably another point to bear in mind the Anker 757 charges up really quickly.

 

[Kups]

To power my Starlink I bought a 300 watts low power inverter to draw from my 120Ah lithium battery. Starlink only uses around 50 to 75 watts. https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B076P9PGX3?tag=mhf04-21

 

[Gromett]

There is also a cheaper per month alternative, which is to whack a great big directional antenna on the van pointing to the nearest cell tower (or maybe the one in a town 5 miles away if the campsite is busy with locals on social media). It's a bit more faff, but it'd cost less per month, and would run for days on standard PoE.

Mikrotik LHG is the solution I've used to get such in no/very congested areas (it's about a 200-300 quid device, you want the LTE18 version) and you just put a sim in it, and wire it back to a router to distribute to your own wifi/wired devices. It does work but will require tinkering to get it to stick to say a cell tower 5-10 miles away instead of the one all the iphones in peoples hands can find singal to, and use.. It does require some "knowledge" on how to configure it, as it's not plug and play like Starlink is.

(it's about the size of a Sky dish and operates a small directional beam instead of the motorhomewifi type "omni" antenna, so as such is far better at pulling in signal from towns miles away).

LHG will require aiming and putting on a pole pre-event, but I've used at events many times prior to starlink existing -> it was designed in Latvia for similar "I live miles from a cell tower" type problems, and for use (by TV people) to get live outside broadcasts back over mobile from similar congested festival type sites (given they rarely use satellite feeds now for cost reasons).

Should add with the wind load on it, I don't have one on my own motorhome simply becuase you need to take it off the roof before you would move anywhere, it's not good for 70mph driving, but does stand up to 70mph gusts of wind. (it would likely break under constant driving load, as its' not rated for that at all). The lower profile omni antenna are fine for the motorhome in movement use case, but for a temporary event setup that you move inside afetr event you better off with the larger directional antenna.

This is on my list of things to buy.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08438JFH8/?tag=mhf04-21

Won't be getting 5G round here for the foreseeable.

 

[Gromett]

Linked the wrong one I think.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08S71NQGT/?tag=mhf04-21

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[starquake]

Linked the wrong one I think.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B08S71NQGT/?tag=mhf04-21

You want the LTE18 kit really these days Gromett for 75 quid more, the LTE6 gives about 100Mbit we've found in an area having zero EE or Three signal on handsets , and gives a reliable 100Mbit (only on EE, as the Three signal is a single frequency thats more congested) when the cell tower not busy, down to about 20Mbit when it's a bank holiday weekend during the parks annual largest event of year (it's a holiday area so this is peak demand). Either way it's acceptable given the fact you get zero signal on any iphones around the entire 3 mile area. The LTE6 is what I mostly use "now" though as it's more than acceptable when bonding 2 channels.

Mikrotik LHGG LTE18 Kit with Gigabit Ethernet - LHGGM+EG18-EA

Mikrotik LHGG LTE18 Kit with Gigabit Ethernet - LHGGM&EG18-EA At a Glance: 64Bit ARM CPU 256MB RAMLTE 1.2Gbps Downlink, 150Mbps Uplink3G 42.2Mbps Downlink,...

linitx.com

^ is a one of the UK distributors of it, unlike Amazon who just have resellers on there. If stock exists above place has it.
The key point is the LHG has 18Dbi of gain, which is frankly insane on most mobile frequencies, in a very directional antenna (the difference between 80Mbit and 5Mbit is about 4mm on the antenna aim). Thankfully you can monitor the frequencies in use as you move the antenna using whatever wifi network you align it to, so can check by moving/rotating the pole rather than moving the antenna. In a permanent install we have to realign the dishes every 9 ish months as subject to wind, and the movement over time is enough to cause us to need to pop up to realign.

Theres a new ATL model Mikrotik do too for "mid" signal areas too -> won't work in zero signal, but will likely give some good outcomes if you have a few bar of signal on a phone.

Should say at other end I use one of the Mikrotik HAP AC3 (about £100) as the local router + wifi hotspot all in one... as these devices can on one port also provide PoE to the dish meaning I don't need to faff with additional kit/ power injectors as I would if using say a cheap Netgear router/wifi combo.

 

[matbic]

If you are using these highly directional antennas- and why not!

Have a look at the cellmapper.net website - it’s super technical so takes a bit of effort to use - but it can show you exactly which tower has what antennas pointing at you.

I started thinking always go for the closest but this is not always best if there is no antenna on the mast pointing at you and/or your network does not use that mast - I found often that the correct mast is much further away.

Another thing I found useful was to use a SIM card that roams in the UK This sounds strange but it means it will work with whichever network has a signal where you are. This results in much better chance of getting a good signal everywhere.

Like this : https://anywheresim.com/

I think you can find roaming UK plastic SIM cards, but I have switched over to using eSIM now and there are lots to chose from - but not sure the Microtik support them.

 

[starquake]

If you are using these highly directional antennas- and why not!

Have a look at the cellmapper.net website - it’s super technical so takes a bit of effort to use - but it can show you exactly which tower has what antennas pointing at you.

It's useful but not super accurate unfrotunatly as it relies on people on Android running their app and not enough people do that.

I have found cell sites entirelly not on their map more than once! -> and on frequencies the cellmapper says the tower doesn't do too. We do use Cellmapper as a guide to where the cell towers "may" be initially though, and aim in their direction with the LTE device.
We aim initially by by moving it 12 times equally in a circle with the "cell monitor" page up, which lists all the towers it can receive and the relative power levels. You then just hone in the aim on the strongest signal in each segment to work out best tower. The mad thing with a LHG in particular with it's high gain is that you can pickup a further away cell with "better" throughput a lot of time, as in towns 5-10 miles away or further!

There is some programming you can do with a LHG to get it to stick to a single tower to help with aim too. (Otherwise you may shoot past the town in question and get a competing signal from the next down 3-4 miles further away). (it's called cell-lock).

And no the Mikrotik kit dosn't do eSims (yet) - rumours in the 5g varients to come later. Some models of their kit does do dual sim though so you can test with EE and Three without popping up to dish to eject sim cards. Mikrotik does have some 5g kit alreayd but it's not really compatible with the huge dish antenna, and the 18dbi gain is amazingly effective at allowing band 3 and band 1 coverage at significant range.

 

[Gromett]

starquake thanks for the info. There is only one cell tower, it is pretty close (I can clearly see it) But it is on the other side of a metal industrial building and there are trees on the other side of that.
When it rains the trees get wet and the signal drops even further. On a good day I can get 15Mb/2Mb on a bad day 3MB/0.5MB.

The big problem though is that there is no consistency and I get periodic dropouts for about half a second at a time.

I am extremely familiar with networking due to the trade I have been in the last 25+ years

I have multiple bits of Mikrotik gear including PoE kit/router which I have been using since I went fulltiming. Although some of it does need upgrading to GB from 100Mb networking. I never bothered upgrading as I have never had a better than 100Mb internet connection.

So onto the question. Do you know of any apps I can install on my phone that will give me cell tower info, signal strength etc etc etc. I want to have a wander round the property and see where the signal is best and what tower I am connected to etc.

 

[starquake]

So onto the question. Do you know of any apps I can install on my phone that will give me cell tower info, signal strength etc etc etc. I want to have a wander round the property and see where the signal is best and what tower I am connected to etc.

Android:

CellMapper - Apps on Google Play

Advanced network information and crowd sourced cellular coverage and tower maps

play.google.com

Should do the job.

Just bear in mind what it doesn't tell you -> if your handset doesn't support a frequency it won't necessarily tell you the tower offers it.

Key bit is if using Three they seem to rapidly be rolling out B28/29 coverage (700mhz) which is WAY better than their 800Mhz when offered. And the LTE4/6 Mikrotiks don't do these, so you need to know if you need the B28 capable model (2024 model of LTE6 does it https://linitx.com/product/mikrotik-lhgg-lte6-antenna-kit-2024-edition-lhggr+fg621-ea/17926 according to spec, ditto the LTE18 will).
Notably my iphone era, doesn't support this frequency ! The key bit is nearly all Three/EE towers offer band 3 coverage nowadays, so if you can find where the towers are by surveying just band 3, you can find the other frquencieis usually at same place. If your handset if only picking up band 20 it's less useful as even "good" signal on band 20 is a max of 30-40mbit. Most antennas for Three at least offer B1/B3/B20 these days, with some adding B28 and a higher downlink only B30/B32, which the latter of which only work with some equipment. Don't worry about the higher frequencys though, as B28 is the key "new" one to watch for.

Definitely worth trying above first. I think there is a iphone equivalent.

Worth noting when surveying I have a cheap SXT device (same as LHG just less gain) I got off an ebay auction for 20 quid. Why SXT and not LHG, because it's reasonably useful given it has a wider sectional antenna (60 degrees instead of 30 degree beam) allowing a full survey in 6 turns instead of 12 for a LHG!). Going up/down ladders is annoying for me, so my other tip is I usually survey with a SXT on end of a table umbrella pole (which I can fit in car easily and raise/lower whilst looking at a laptop on other end). It allows me to see if height required, which is interesting sometimes (one of my antenna I had to lower at a caravan site, as it was getting more tree interference when positioned above roofline than below)

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[starquake]

starquake thanks for the info. There is only one cell tower, it is pretty close (I can clearly see it) But it is on the other side of a metal industrial building and there are trees on the other side of that.
When it rains the trees get wet and the signal drops even further. On a good day I can get 15Mb/2Mb on a bad day 3MB/0.5MB.

Should add a directional antenna should fix that to your local node, we don't get any real degragation due to rain on the LHG's I've installed. Father in law watches Sky Sports near 24/7 via the LHG (LTE6) we have, and was complaining when ADSL caused the picture to break up which is why I went all out to fix his INternet to be 20Mbit minimum at all times.

Should add though we don't aim at the EE node thats nearly "on the caravan park" as in 2 mile away as ... it has zero performance, it's got a single, no CA frequency, so it maxes at about 80Mbit) (but also gets heavily congested as everyone on site uses mobile phones in hotspot on EE with one bar to watch TV, so it kills performance when the park busy down to 500K max) When we aim at the town 5 miles away, we can aggregate it with another node in the same town, providing > 100Mbit, and the performance crucially doesn't get impacted by the 4 nearby (large) caravan parks as most people don't have good antenna.

 

[Gromett]

Should do the job.

Well that was interesting. The tower which is around half a mile away north of me is not shown on the app and I am not connecting to it apparently.
The one I am connecting to (Tower 10115) is 3.3 miles away in the opposite direction.



I am a Radio Amateur as well as a networking engineer (I use the word engineer in this context very loosely). So you can talk technical to me without dumbing down.
Although I do not do anything with cell stuff.

As I read it (For Three) Band 20 is 800Mhz (5Mhz). and Band 3 is 1800MHz (15Mhz). So band 20 has better long distance and band 3 will have higher speeds if you can connect but you can only connect over shorter range.

Tower 10567 is around 1 and a half miles away. We are up on a hill relative to it. But it is across town. The industrial building is in the way. although I could position the dish with direct line of site with a fair bit of work.

So my question is this. Is it worth attempting the work to get Band 3 access which is in the centre of town. Or stick with my Band 20 which is very rural and I have line of sight to it and get the dish to improve speed..

 

[starquake]

Well that was interesting. The tower which is around half a mile away north of me is not shown on the app and I am not connecting to it apparently.
The one I am connecting to (Tower 10115) is 3.3 miles away in the opposite direction.

View attachment 896794

I am a Radio Amateur as well as a networking engineer (I use the word engineer in this context very loosely). So you can talk technical to me without dumbing down.
Although I do not do anything with cell stuff.

It's worth using both ie, cat6 router with CA bonding, so you can use both B20 and B3 bonded. Both pointed in direction of the 10567 antenna, depending on elevation may be worth a shot to 7951 too.

I say this as Band 20 only Cells are usually terribly uplinked antennas from Three and EE (both) often with only a tiny "34Mbit" max uplink as thats all they can install. A Band3/20 antenna will at least have a 100Mbit feed (or more). Modern cell towers get a 10G uplink to rest of network. To summarise, just becuase the radio can do 50Mbit doesn't mean they installed a 50Mbit uplink. Back in 3g days (despite 3g supporting 30-40Mbit) some towers only had a 2Mbit backhaul!

Worth playing withh https://www.cellmapper.net/4G-speed -> and you'll see 5mhz of 4g even with BEST modulation and 2x2 mimo = a 50Mbit max throughput, where 15mhz of 1800 gives a max of 115Mbit on 2x2 mimo and 64qam encoding (cat6), and about 150Mbit with 256qam encoding (cat18). Bear in mind if you can pickup BOTH B3 antenna within 30 degrees of each other you may be best aiming between the 2 and trying to bond 2x15Mhz band 3, giving a possible peak theortical of 300Mbit. More likely you'll end up bonding 5mhz of band 20 and 15mhz of band 3, so about 170Mbit possible peak.

The other thing (I can see smarty in use) may be trying another Three band, as I've tested smarty to be "poorer" than 3 business. Sims for this are very cheap on amazon, a lot cheaper than 20/month for smarty but cruicially seem to be better throughput too. But you not hitting any smarty limits at moment, it's pure bad signal today.

May also be worth finding out what network is using that local antenna of yours -> it may not be Three or EE -> The only thing I can say is the Mikrotik survey mode (it's like cell finder I think, it's obvious under LTE mode, but spits out every signal on every frequency beacon it picks up to a gui) will spit out ALL the cell towers it can pickup, not just the ones you have access to.

So the absnwer is YES you want Band 3 or Band 1 above band 20. Band 20 is awful congested, and 3 (or 1) will double your throughput minimum. The long link I mention at the in-laws is dual bonded Band 3 from 5 ish miles hop..

 

[Fragle]

I bought a new Starlink a few months ago to help me in my small business.
I run a small craft business and use a sum up machine for taking payments at events such as highland games, county shows etc. The signal in some locations is dire without the event taking place and non existent with several thousand people wanting to use social media etc and lots of traders trying to take payment at the same time. Occasionally an event organiser will have a wifi network up and running but these are pretty dire in most cases.
The scenario needing a solution!
At most events I can park my motorhome behind my gazebo with a bit of space for the Starlink to be set out. Sometimes there is no room for the motorhome and I have to leave it in the car park.
I spoke to a trader yesterday who was using Starlink for payment and he bought a big Anker Solix Power bank and left the Starlink on 240V. He gets about 18 hours use out of it and at a 4 day show can scrounge a 240v socket to charge it up. I like this idea as it only takes about 1 hour to charge it up to 80% but if its on overnight then it will be back up to 100%.
The difference between taking card payments for payment or cash can be several hundred pounds per day as generally there isnt a nearby cash machine and if there is then it soon runs out of money. Most folk these days carry little cash and they want to keep it for refreshments if they know they cant get more money anywhere.
I could possibly subsidise my costs by letting a few nearby traders access to the network as well.
Would it be better perhaps for duration of usability to convert it to a 12v Starlink or leave it on 240v if it makes no difference.
Are there better power banks out there apart from Anker? I am familiar with them as I have 4 smaller power banks for charging my phones, ipad and led stand lights when I am out and about at events.
I did read the big long thread but it got a bit long winded and technical for me and thats the reason for this thread.
Any thoughts or advice will be most welcome.

Thank you in advance.

We have used Starlink this trip for the first time. Only powered from Afferiy 2300 power bank and 400 watts of portable solar panels.
Absolutely perfect. Drawing around 35-40 watts for starlink so the solar panels even on a cloudy day would cover that.
Not had the need for hook up so far 45 days off grid.
Highly recommend the Afferiy and Starlink

 

[Gromett]

Just been clicking on each of the towers. And 10115 has a cell that points north and has 15Mhz of bandwith. All the others are 5Mhz

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[Gromett]

It's worth using both ie, cat6 router with CA bonding, so you can use both B20 and B3 bonded. Both pointed in direction of the 10567 antenna, depending on elevation may be worth a shot to 7951 too.

I say this as Band 20 only Cells are usually terribly uplinked antennas from Three and EE (both) often with only a tiny "34Mbit" max uplink as thats all they can install. A Band3/20 antenna will at least have a 100Mbit feed (or more). Modern cell towers get a 10G uplink to rest of network. To summarise, just becuase the radio can do 50Mbit doesn't mean they installed a 50Mbit uplink. Back in 3g days (despite 3g supporting 30-40Mbit) some towers only had a 2Mbit backhaul!

Worth playing withh https://www.cellmapper.net/4G-speed -> and you'll see 5mhz of 4g even with BEST modulation and 2x2 mimo = a 50Mbit max throughput, where 15mhz of 1800 gives a max of 115Mbit on 2x2 mimo and 64qam encoding (cat6), and about 150Mbit with 256qam encoding (cat18). Bear in mind if you can pickup BOTH B3 antenna within 30 degrees of each other you may be best aiming between the 2 and trying to bond 2x15Mhz band 3, giving a possible peak theortical of 300Mbit. More likely you'll end up bonding 5mhz of band 20 and 15mhz of band 3, so about 170Mbit possible peak.

The other thing (I can see smarty in use) may be trying another Three band, as I've tested smarty to be "poorer" than 3 business. Sims for this are very cheap on amazon, a lot cheaper than 20/month for smarty but cruicially seem to be better throughput too. But you not hitting any smarty limits at moment, it's pure bad signal today.

May also be worth finding out what network is using that local antenna of yours -> it may not be Three or EE -> The only thing I can say is the Mikrotik survey mode (it's like cell finder I think, it's obvious under LTE mode, but spits out every signal on every frequency beacon it picks up to a gui) will spit out ALL the cell towers it can pickup, not just the ones you have access to.

So the absnwer is YES you want Band 3 or Band 1 above band 20. Band 20 is awful congested, and 3 (or 1) will double your throughput minimum. The long link I mention at the in-laws is dual bonded Band 3 from 5 ish miles hop..

I don't need great speed. Even 15Mbps is acceptable for my uses. But I do like a consistent speed, low latency is also preferable.

Not sure I need to worry about channel bonding etc. I just want to improve the reliability of my signal.

As you say, May be congestion on the backhaul causing my dropouts.

Might end up having to bite the bullet and pay for my starlink all the time.

 

[starquake]

Just been clicking on each of the towers. And 10115 has a cell that points north and has 15Mhz of bandwith. All the others are 5Mhz

DOn't worry about the direction, the ones i'm using in Hornsea point South and I'm 4-5 ish miles north (and cellmapper seems wrong on direction on a few towers I've surveyed too). The gain on the Mikrotik antenna is amazing at pulling in towers allegedly in the other direction from cellmapper. You could possibly bond two band 20, but you may need a different antenna for that (B20).

I'd definitely have a go at trying to get the B3 15mhz from where you are, as it should be more reliable, faster and crucially lower-latency (Band 20 is typical ping RTT of 200-500ms, band 3 you usually can get it down to 50-70ms). Can't guarantee you'll get service, but you can at least disable all band 20 reception on a mikrotik to survey more accurately the other bands

 

[autorouter]

I spoke to a trader yesterday who was using Starlink for payment and he bought a big Anker Solix Power bank and left the Starlink on 240V. He gets about 18 hours use out of it and at a 4 day show can scrounge a 240v socket to charge it up. I like this idea as it only takes about 1 hour to charge it up to 80% but if its on overnight then it will be back up to 100%.

You need to be clear about the difference between power and energy capacity. Energy capacity is how much total energy a power bank can store, and is measured in watt-hours (Wh) or kilowatt-hours (kWh).

Power is how fast you take the energy out, and is measured in watts (W) or kilowatts (kW). Your power requirement is quite low, I think. Maybe 75W to 100W to run a Starlink. The 'power' of the built-in inverter is probably irrelevant, it will be at least 1000W, probably 2000W, so will be easily capable of powering a 100W device.

Power bank batteries come in various sizes, from 500Wh to 2kWh. The calculation is quite easy. If your device takes 100W, then a 500Wh battery will last 500 / 100 = 5 hours.

If you want a power bank to supply 100W for say 18 hours, then it will need a battery capacity of 100W x 18h = 1800Wh.

Many of the power banks can be expanded by adding an extra battery or two, which will then last two or three times longer powering the same Starlink device.

These are back-of-the-envelope calculations, not allowing for conversion losses and inefficiencies, but should be good enough to decide what to buy to solve your problem

 

[matbic]

Mikrotik antenna

Hi I bumped in to your discussion about using long distance LTE as an alternative to Starlink. It’s something I have been considering as I have decided Starlink is not going to work for me - to much power required.

Rather than keep the conversation going on this thread which seems to be about how to power up a Starlink I started a new one on 'Long distance LTE'
https://www.motorhomefun.co.uk/forum/threads/long-distance-lte.302879/

I hope you will join me there as it is clear you have already got much further than me with this and I would very much appreciate any recommendations you may have!

 

[rich432]

You could convert Starlink to 12V for better efficiency, but if the difference is minimal, sticking with 240V is fine. Brands like Goal Zero, EcoFlow, and Jackery also offer good power banks if you want alternatives.