Using a Satellite Dish to Enhance 3G Signal

The inspiration for this project comes from another project undertaken by Duke students last summer: starting an internet cafe in Togo.  The goal is pretty simple, to enhance the signal our modem receives.  A simple fix to this would be even to move the wifi dongle just closer to the tower/in a better line of sight from the tower.  We don't necessarily need the dish and could just use a USB extension to hang the dongle somewhere on the roof of the LYG shop. 

However, we've chosen to go a step further and place the modem on the roof at the focus of a satellite dish that's aimed at the cell tower providing us with our internet service.  This required only some pretty basic stuff, and we got funding for this project from the grant I applied for so we could buy a satellite dish (145,000 UGX/ $58 USD) and 2 1.8 meter USB extensions (30,000 UGX/$12 USD).  The following is more or less a step by step of prototyping:

I underestimated how complicated it is to assemble the frame for a satellite dish.  Much worse than an Ikea bookshelf.

We used the plastic casing that normally points the receiver for a television at the focus of the satellite dish to house the modem and the USB extension.  This way we have an easy thing to clamp onto the holder (which is built to clamp this exact shape) and with some electrical tape and super glue we can seal it pretty well from water.

The glued casing for the modem.

Wrapped with electrical tape to for additional waterproofing.

Mahadi comes to help!

In attaching the satellite dish to the roof, we first nailed a piece of wood to the tin roof (there are wooden beams running under the tin, so each nail ended in a wooden beam) and then nailed the satellite dish's mounting base to this piece of wood.  We didn't use the bolts that come in the mounting kit to attach it because we didn't really have access to the under-side of the roof and nobody was really interested in going to borrow the drill from whoever had it.  It's actually more stable than I was expecting, a pretty solid mounting. 

Our goal.  It's hard to see in this picture, but is in fact quite close to the shop.

Aiming the dish: to maximize speed, the dish should be aimed directly at the cell tower that is your internet service provider.

Installation team! 

Day 2: hooking up the modem.

Where the USB extension passes through the roof.  We wrapped a lot of electrical tape around the wire because even though the part of the roof that we passed it through isn't really sharp (it's kind of a corroded part of the roof, we just hit it with a screwdriver to make the hole), we don't want it rubbing against the side and possibly wearing down.

The modem after being positioned to maximize speed!

The roof is starting to get a little crazy...

We went from averaging about 9 kbps internet speed (which is just unusable internet; most of the time internet pages time out before you can load something) to averaging just over 100 kbps.  The internet certainly isn't as fast as the U.S. or even the research facility near my house, but it exceeds lots of local internet cafes and is certainly usable and solid.