Satellite Internet WAN

We need an Internet connection even when RV parks do not have functioning Wi-Fi. So, we have a satellite based system that can connect to the Internet so long as there is an unobstructed view of the southern sky from the dish at the rear of the trailer and the trailer is within the "footprint" of the satellite.

The satellite Internet system consists of:

Internet service is provided by MotSat.

We do not connect computers to the satellite Internet connection directly. Instead, the satellite Internet service is connected to our local area network (LAN) through a firewall/router.

MotoSat DataStorm F-1 Satellite Dish

The MotoSat DataStorm F-1 is a 0.74 meter "self-pointing" dish. The dish is mounted on the rear of the trailer's roof. It contains a GPS antenna for sensing the geographic location of the dish (and trailer); motors for moving the dish vertically, horizontally, and for skewing; and electronics to operate the motors and interact with the dish controller (below).

The dish was physically installed late 2003 by Ground Control. The first two attempts to get it operational in Junction City, Kansas, were failures. I finally got a field engineer who knew what he was doing in March 2004 about three weeks after we picked up the fifth wheel. The hero of the day was Michael Lewis of Impact Wireless in Visalia, CA, who came to Bakersfield, CA, to get us up and running.

The vertical motor was replaced June 2004 by Oregon RV Satellite Service under warranty after the system was out of commission for about a month. In rural areas it can be quite difficult to get repairs.

The electronics were replaced 3 August 2007 as part of an upgrade to the controller and modems listed below. I was so happy with my previous experience with Oregon RV Satellite Service that we went out of our way to get the work done by them.

Our last few weeks on the road we had problems with an erratic receive-signal. It gradually got worse and stopped working about the time we moved out of the fifth wheel. After hours on the phone with MotoSat tech support trying to fix it, I took the rig to Jack's Landing RV Resort in Grants Pass, Oregon (my first solo tow). Rob Chittenden of Advanced Technology Services, Inc. came to the RV park and spent three hours trouble shooting, educating me, and fixing the problem. The amplifier in the LNB apparently was bad; Rob replaced it. The system now works better than ever before; better than new. Thanks Rob!

MotoSat DataStorm D3 DVB Controller

MotoSat DataStorm D3 Dish Controller is the interface between we humans and the satellite dish pointing system. It is a small box that sits inside the trailer and is connected to the dish via a 25-conductor cable.

The controller runs the software that points and stows the dish. We interact with the controller via a web browser. Because it is operated via a web browser, the satellite Internet system can be used with any computer system. For example, we use Apple Macintosh, which is a Unix system.

This dish controller was installed 3 August 2007 by Oregon RV Satellite Service as part of our satellite Internet system upgrade.

HughesNet DW7000s Router

The transmit and receive modems are housed in the HughesNet DW7000s Router. This device is about the size of a cable modem. It is connected to the dish via two RG-6 coax cables. It has one RJ-45 Ethernet connection on the back, which we feed to our own router which then feeds the rest of the trailer via 100Mbit switches.

The DW7000s modems were installed 3 August 2007 by Oregon RV Satellite Service as part of our satellite Internet system upgrade.

Internet Service by MotoSat

Our satellite ISP is MotoSat. We switched from Ground Control to MotoSat on 3 August 2007 when we got our system upgrade.

Speeds have improved since the upgrade, and the monthly fee has gone down. With our old equipment we generally got download speeds of around 500K bps and upload speeds of 30K bps for $99/month. The pre-upgrade upload speed was worse than a dial-up connection.

Since the upgrade our download speed has been a minimum of 500K bps. But upload speed has increased dramatically to 130K bps, and sometimes higher. And the price has gone down $20/month.