We’ve previously listed causes of bad cell signal on our blog, but cellphones.org have put the info into a great graphic. Nice to see repeaters listed first in ways to improve reception!

A summary of the causes of bad cell reception:

• Large distance from the nearest cell towers, found in rural areas and offshore
• Signal blocked by large structures – large buildings, mountains, tunnels, trees etc
• Construction materials which block cell phone signal
• High density urban areas have many low powered towers which emit weak signal that cannot penetrate buildings
• Network congestion – poor signal during times of unexpected network load such as large conferences, music festivals, local emergency situations etc.

A Recreational Vehicle on the move can have significant cell reception problems depending on the location its traveling in. A good way to minimize dropped calls & increase reception to cellular phones / broadband data cards is to install a Cellular Repeater Kit in the coach.

A Cellular Repeater Kit will allow you to make calls when very little cell phone signal exists. This booster will also reduce dropped calls and increase internet speeds. We have had good success with Wilson Electronics Repeater kits customized for use in Motorhomes & RVs.

Wilson Electronics is well regarded in the industry because of their high quality.

Cell Phone Boosters or Repeaters are very simple to setup and they do not require expert installation. A Repeater kit consists of 3 major components; an external antenna, an amplifier or booster and an internal antenna that gives cellular coverage inside the RV.

Kits can range from $300 for a single-phone style amp to $600 for a more powerful amp that can support multiple cell phones and/or broadband data cards. A few of these kits are listed below.

Single Cell phone use:

http://www.repeaterstore.com/products/Wilson-841233-Wilson-841233-Mini-SignalBoost-RV-Kit

Multiple Cell  Phones or Data Cards:

http://www.repeaterstore.com/products/Wilson-841295-Wilson-841295-Ambulance-and-RV-Repeater-Kit

After purchasing and installing our repeaters, a lot of customers ask why repeaters aren’t more commonplace. Almost everyone has experienced cell phone problems, whether it’s a dropped call while you’re driving, or poor reception when you call home from the supermarket to check whether you need to buy milk. Dropped calls and poor reception mean dissatisfied customers and lost revenue, so why aren’t network providers scrambling to install repeaters on every street corner?

To explain why, I’ll have to give a little background on how cell phone networks are licensed to use their frequencies. The FCC (the Federal Communications Commission) is in charge of designating and selling licenses for the frequency spectrum that cell phones use. The FCC has two main frequency ranges that it has licensed networks to use, one is around 850MHz (the “Cellular band”) and another is around 1900MHz (the “PCS band”). Each one of these “bands” is then subdivided into smaller frequency “blocks” and sold to networks. The 800MHz band is usually shared between two networks (usually Cingular and Verizon), and the 1900MHz band is usually shared between six networks (usually T-Mobile, Sprint, Verizon, Cingular and a couple of regional carriers).

Have a look at the diagram below to see what the FCC licensing scheme looks like.

As part of their licensing rules for these cellular frequencies, the FCC requires that networks only sell and use equipment that works on their specific frequency “blocks”. However for technical reasons it’s very difficult and expensive to create repeaters that only cover these smaller frequency blocks. You’ll notice that all the repeaters we sell on our site cover an entire frequency band, and never just a frequency block. If networks were to start installing repeaters wherever they could, they’d be flouting FCC rules and would probably get slammed with a big fine. Moreover, Sprint would hardly want to install a 1900MHz repeater that would also improve the reception for all the other networks that share the band and with which it competes.

Since networks can’t install these repeaters or even make a little cash selling them to their customers, they don’t promote them at all. By contrast, in Asian countries like South Korea repeaters are installed in every apartment complex, shopping mall, and even on street corners. Unless the FCC makes an exception for repeaters, it’ll be a while before we see similar market penetration here in the States. With no network backing, the repeater market in the US is developing as people learn of the products through word-of-mouth and as manufacturers like Wi-Ex, Wilson, TelecomTek and Spotwave gradually promote their products.

The majority of our customers visit RepeaterStore looking for a solution to their own, very specialized, cell signal problems. A common situation is a home or office with few or no signal bars and frequently dropped calls. Whether or not a repeater can help in this situation depends on the cause of the problem – which you the customer can usually determine quite easily.

Poor cell phone reception is an ubiquitous problem across the United States, and the causes of bad signal fall under two categories: localized poor coverage due to building materials or destructive interference, and geographical distance from or obstacles between your phone and the nearest cell tower.

Let’s deal with the latter first. Say you live in the middle of a desert, miles from a town or major road. If you are physically too far away from the nearest cell tower, and have to drive a couple of miles to get a signal, a repeater is unlikely to be able to help you, because it cannot create a signal where one does not exist already. Similarly, if you live on the side of a mountain, and the cell tower is on the other side of that mountain, a repeater is not likely to able to pick up a strong enough signal through that obstacle to improve your coverage.

So geographical reception barriers are often insurmountable. Fortunately, they are relatively rare. The cause of your bad cell signal is far more likely to be due to the construction materials used in your home or office, or destructive interference from the buildings around you. Cellular signals have a hard time passing through metal and concrete within the walls of your home. That’s why you might gain two or three bars of signal by hanging out of an upstairs window. Obviously, you can’t make all your cell phone calls like that (!), but you can set up a cell repeater there, magnifying the good signal to an internal antennae within the walls of your house and bypassing the ‘blocking’ effect of the building walls. Many buildings also use a wire mesh in their construction called a Faraday cage. This mesh blocks external static electricity fields, meaning that cell phone signals cannot get through.

Destructive interference runs along similar lines and is a particular problem in built-up areas. If you can’t get a signal in your Manhattan apartment, it’s obviously not because Cingular/Sprint/Verizon etc coverage is poor there. In cities, cell signals will be reflected from walls and other barriers and many separate signals will be found traveling in different directions. These different signals will interact with each other and some of these can be diminished in strength, which results in weaker cell signal for you. Luckily in these cases you will probably be able to get a reasonable signal nearby, and so again, a cellular repeater is an excellent solution. This article from slate.com has more on bad cell reception in city apartments.

A good rule of thumb is the following: if you can get a signal outside your home or office, but not inside, the problem is likely to be one of localized bad coverage which can be improved by a cellular repeater. Everyone’s situation is different though, and if you have any doubts, contact us to discuss your case in detail.