The
WiFi Opportunity for Hams
Several ISM/WiFi "Channels" exist that are within the US Ham Radio
frequency allocation.
Ham Radio Band: 2390 MHz to 2450 MHz
WiFi/ISM Band "Channels" that fall inside ham radio frequency allocations:
Channel 1 = 2401MHz to 2423 MHz
Channel 2 = 2406 MHz to 2428 MHz
Channel 3 = 2411 MHz to 2433 MHz
Channel 4 = 2416 MHz to 2438 MHz
Channel 5 = 2421 MHz to 2433 MHz
Channel 6 = 2426 MHz to 2448 MHz
Since these are non-licensed or "unprotected" services, there seems to be
little reason why a licensed ham radio operator could not use these "channels"
and WiFi equipment with either very high gain antennas for higher than normally
allowed ISM ERP (Effective Radiated Power) levels, or by adding transmit
amplification to raise the transmitted power up to as much as the 1 KW that
hams are allowed in the US.
There are already WiFi "Range Extenders" (we call them "repeaters") available
which with a high gain antenna would raise ERP above that allowed for unlicensed
ISM users, but still be legal for ham use.
Given the availability of ready-made and relatively inexpensive equipment for
these relatively unused ham radio frequencies, it might be interesting for a
number of hams that are located within a small geographic area to build up a
network of Ham/WiFi linked nodes, and use this to distribute one or more DSL
Internet access links to the whole group. With say ten 1.5 Mb/s DSL links
this could be aggregated to a 15 Mb/s full-period Internet access system for
those who are on the local Wifi/Ham network. If the DSL access is a full
6 Mb/s, then the aggregate link capability would be 60 Mb/s.
The possibility also exists for hams to use Wifi/Ham frequencies for remote
links between repeaters, and for base-to-repeater links. This raises the
possibility of up to 200 high quality voice and control links between your
base station and your mountain top repeater (Voice-over_Internet_Protocol/VoIP
requires 48 Kb/s for full speech bandwidth, and a WiFi 802.11b link has 10 Mb/s
capacity in each direction). With 802.11G equipment the number of possible
voice and control channels goes up to (54,000,000/48,000) or 1125 voice and
control links.
Recent tests in Nevada have proven non-amplified WiFi links of up to 225 miles
length. With just 16 db gain antennas this could probably be extended out to
over 500 miles if a line-of-site path were available. With "Range Extender"
repeaters the distance can be almost any distance you might want.
Given this seeming almost free opportunity, what are you and your neighboring
hams waiting for? For a very few dollars in equipment and some homemade
can-type antennas you could have a full-time ham radio high-speed data network
in your community, and wideband links to your repeaters on nearby mountaintops.
If this doesn't satisfy your need for bandwidth, the ISM/WiFi band at 5.8 GHz
(802.11G & 802.11W) seems to also fall within a licensed ham radio frequency
allocation. ISM/WiFi gear in this band uses 54 Mb/s capacity "channels". I am
not even going to calculate how many voice and control channels you can get
from that bandwidth (you cannot use that much anyway!).