Solar Powered 5G WiFi in a Field

[psynegy]

We need to provide WiFi to our PE staff out on our playing fields, but...

 

We have a strange site... Our playing fields are separated from the main school by a massive concrete building - and our playing fields can't be trenched because they're home to a roman mosaic... Which leaves us with not a lot of options for getting WiFi out there!

 

I think we're probably going to have to install a pole mounted solar panel and battery with a WiFi AP and 5G modem.

 

Has anyone ever done something similar? What or who did you use? How has it behaved since installation?

 

I'm very open to other suggestions - unfortunately there's no line of sight to our buildings, so I think 5G is going to be our only way to get connectivity there without having Openreach drop a line (which is potentially possible).

 

The SunMax product from Ubiquiti looks quite appealing, but they don't seem to be available anywhere.

 

Just had thought that it'll probably need planning permission! Sigh...

[steveg]

How many staff will need access?  Is this going to be iPads?  If only a few staff, would it be cheaper to buy iPads that can take a sim and some cheap data plans for them?  

[KSCSIT]

19 minutes ago, steveg said:

How many staff will need access?  Is this going to be iPads?  If only a few staff, would it be cheaper to buy iPads that can take a sim and some cheap data plans for them?  

My thoughts - Might be wayyy cheaper to buy a laptop with 4g SIM slot. Dell do them (or as you say, iPads)

[psynegy]

The 5G signal isn’t brilliant at ground level, I would want to put a decent directional antenna up high which should get us “over the hump” as it were…

 

I think we have around 10 PE staff that would be using it…

[TechMonkey]

Could speak to @Net-Ctrl, I know they have some options.

[Ditto]

This probably isn't a serious option but I discovered this source of solar energy that's quite distinctive.

 

[MatthewL]

4/5G sims in devices will be best option less to go wrong.  You could pole mount something, have a router and/or AP in place, plus your battery, if you are going to put the hardware on a timer so its not sat running all day and overnight killing the battery.  In the winter you might find solar isn't enough.  There are plenty of industrial routers out there that are designed for such thing Peplink, Teltonikta, might not be cheapest but ideal for it.  How far do you want the WiFi to go because that could be the next issue.

[webman]

From my own experience running a Teltonika mobile router in a campervan, it's possible to do it using a small 12v LifePO4 battery that is charged from a solar panel. The router itself is very low power (as a rough guide, mine is about 2W idle and 6.5W (0.5A) max). So with a decent battery, that is a huge runtime already even before you add solar charging. I got mine from Solwise and they do all sorts of devices / accessories you might need.

[Jaan]

When you say there's no line of sight..... could you bounce of a "satellite" LOS AP? so three in total?

 

(Main Building)---(Satellite AP)---(Field AP)

 

The main issue is power i guess.... 

 

also starlink: https://www.spectotechnology.com/product/starlink-mini-solar-power-kit/?srsltid=AfmBOoqi0shChLyHbFEVfuWXCazBzuqHeJQ65P4zyCb6aPiiS8QqLmEp

Edited October 6, 2025 by Jaan

[TronXP]

Is the massive concrete building owned by the School?

[psynegy]

On 06/10/2025 at 10:07, Jaan said:

When you say there's no line of sight..... could you bounce of a "satellite" LOS AP? so three in total?

 

(Main Building)---(Satellite AP)---(Field AP)

 

The main issue is power i guess.... 

 

also starlink: https://www.spectotechnology.com/product/starlink-mini-solar-power-kit/?srsltid=AfmBOoqi0shChLyHbFEVfuWXCazBzuqHeJQ65P4zyCb6aPiiS8QqLmEp

Starlink is definitely a consideration, and I imagine more likely to come "pre-packaged" like this... interesting indeed... Very power hungry though - I think 80-100W just for the dish... Seems like it could be challenging from a pole mounted array...

 

23 hours ago, TronXP said:

Is the massive concrete building owned by the School?

Sadly not... We do some business with them, but it would be quite a thing to get an AP installed on the outside of the building connected back to our network... Though maybe it doesn't need to be back to our network if it's internet access only... Hmm...