Every year we spend two weeks at a campground in Myrtle Beach. Our favorite site is located along the southern edge of the campground, which means we are farther from the campground’s wifi access points. Unfortunately, our site is far enough away that the access points are almost unusable.

My family’s entire media diet consists of on-demand internet video from providers like Netflix and Hulu, as well as a local media server for content we own. An inconsistent internet connection can quickly put a damper on vacation movie nights.

For the past few years, I have solved this “problem” by bringing a few routers and connecting one to the closest campground access point and using another to create a new wifi network for our site.

My Current Process

When we first arrive, I spend an hour or two getting the wifi set up. This can be broken down into a few steps:

Step 1: Set my laptop in one corner of the camper, run WifiInfoView for a few minutes, and write down the SSID and signal strength of the strongest open wifi access point. Repeat for the other 3 corners and pick the best corner/access point combo.

Step 2: Manually configure a Netgear WRT54G router running custom firmware DD-WRT to wirelessly connect to the campground access point using wireless client mode.

Step 3: Share the internet connection from the WRT54G with our Netgear R6300 router by connecting the WAN port of the R6300 to an open LAN port of the WRT54G.

This process is obviously not for the faint of heart. My in-laws vacation there several times a year without me; there’s no way they would have the patience (or desire) to go through this every time. We can’t reuse the same settings every visit either because we don’t always get the same site, meaning last time’s “best” access point may be too far out of range for this site.

There are definitely some flaws in the current process. For example, I don’t test the speed of the access points; I only consider how strong their signals are. It’s possible that certain access points are more saturated by traffic or are broadcasting using older hardware with less throughput. Also, as campers leave and new campers arrive, that introduces physical changes to the wireless landscape between our camper and the campground access points.

Now sure, I could re-run the test every few days to make sure I am still using the strongest access point. I could also include a speed test at each of the four corners to test which access point is fastest. However, each step requires additional work, and this is supposed to be vacation after all!

A New Idea

The more I use my existing process, the more it drives me to want an automated solution. This summer was the breaking point. We registered a little late for vacation and our favorite site was taken, and the only available site was the one furthest away from all of the access points. I was able to set up a usable connection, but I had to run the tests twice because none of the results were satisfactory.

So then, how can I solve this problem? I’m a programmer; this kind of thing should be right up my alley. Using conventional routers is probably out of the question because writing custom code that runs on routers is often more trouble than it’s worth. That means I need to use some small computer like a Raspberry PI. For now, let’s just call it “the new device”. Here are the requirements for the new device:

Requires no human interaction.
Anyone staying in the camper should be able to plug the new device into power, wait a few minutes, and enjoy their newfound internet.

Adapts to changing network conditions
New campers arrive every day and could end up parking between our camper and the access point. Campers leave every day, which could now expose a direct line-of-sight between our camper and a stronger access point. The new device would need to regularly monitor the strength of all available access points, and adjust itself accordingly

Provides a separate subnet
I regularly bring a small Raspberry PI powered media server with a portion of our movie collection on it. As such, I don’t want everyone on the campground to have the ability to tap into that media server, so the new device’s network needs to be on its own subnet.

Provide an interface to manage settings
The new device would still need to operate as a regular router, and would need some type of admin screen to configure things like the local wifi SSID, local wifi password, IP range, etc. I imagine this would be a web interface like most other routers. It could also show the various metrics being collected, like the current “best” access point, how frequently we switch access points, which access points are strongest right now versus over time, etc.

The Plan

After I gathered my requirements, I spent some time brainstorming, and I came up with a (probably over-engineered) solution:

Use a Raspberry PI and two external USB wifi cards. Write some custom code to monitor for the best open wifi network, connect to that network, and provide internet through our own private wifi network.

According to the specs, the Raspberry PI 3 B+ has a dual-band (2.4ghz and 5ghz) wifi card already built-in, which is perfect for broadcasting dual-band wifi at the camper. I could get two additional USB wifi cards, one for regularly evaluating the open access points and the other for maintaining a persistent connection to that best network. Since I’m not worried about the device being pretty, the USB wifi cards could have large external antennas which would help increase its range.

The reason for having two external wifi cards is that it would allow for one wifi card to regularly evaluate all available access points without disrupting current internet activity. If a better access point is discovered, then the other external wifi card would connect to the better access point at its convenience. The system could store all of the past test results and use those results to make more educated decisions when picking which campground access point is the best choice.

With this plan in mind, I purchased the following gear:

• Raspberry PI 3 B+, power cable, heat syncs, case (CanaKit has a nice kit on Amazon here). The PI needs a micro sd card as well, but I already have a spare Sony 64GB micro SD card so I will use that.
• Two high-gain USB Wifi antennas from Ebay

When they arrive, I’ll start configuring the system. I’ll publish a followup post outlining the specifics once I have worked out all of the kinks.

In the mean time, I’d love to hear your thoughts on this project. Is there already something out there that does all of this? Is this a complete waste of my time? Leave a comment and let me know what you think!