WiFi Ranger Connection Problem

[dewdev]

After owning my Ollie for a few years now, I finally decided to give the WiFi Ranger a try. (It was never used by the first owner.) Even though my Ollie is only 50 feet away from my house router, I could not get the Ranger to acquire my home WiFi. I talked to a fellow Oliver owner, who is/was a electronic/internet expert who has sucessfully used the Ranger in his Ollie and we could not figure out what is up with my Ranger. I have also watched the Ranger video on how to do a Quick Start so I am positive I am using the correct Start procedures. Hull #354 was a demo model for Olliver Travel Trailers prior to being sold to the first owner. I  am wondering if they had used the Ranger and set things up for their use which is not working for me.

I have a phone call into the company but they have not called back yet. I did hear on WiFi Ranger phone message that they did say that sometimes the Ranger will not be able to pick up some signals.

I also noticed that when my Ranger is powered up the #5 light in the upper right corner is lite red all the time. For those that sucessfully use their Ranger is that #5 light supposed to be on all the time the unit is powered up?

Any helpful suggested would be appreciated.

Thanks

Richard

 

[Ray Kimsey]

Good morning,

Yes red light #5 is on. I am actually routing through the WiFi Ranger currently.  Included is a picture of what it looks like when working.

My WiFi Ranger is on a 2020 model. The password for my model after a reset is changemenowXXXX where the XXXX is the last 4 digits of the WFRID.  I would be glad to try to help in any way.

 

[dewdev]

Ray:

Thanks for the information on the #5 light being normally on. That eliminates one more question I have.

I think my next step is to set the Ranger back to the factory settings, try starting it up again and if that does not work then wait for a call back from Ranger people to try and figure out what is wrong.

[Ray Kimsey]

Are you able to get to the control panel web page?  If not, definitely reset to default settings. Let me know if you have any further questions.

 

[dewdev]

Ray:

Yes I am able to get to the Control Panel and have tried to connect to my home internet. It keeps failing. I have sorted using the Core as well as the SkyPro with no sucess when clicking on the "Connect" button.

[Ray Kimsey]

My understanding is the SkyPro is the external antenna and that is what I usually use. The Core I believe is an internal antenna. I assume you see a list of networks if you getting a connect button. 

I have attached some photos of my setup in the control panel. I updated firmware this morning since I was playing with it, so it  may look slightly different, but should work the same. In the main tab you see a list of some neighborhood wifi and my house wireless (RNEM). On the WiFi tab I set up the Wifranger as RNEM-ontheroad and entered information on the order of connection priority. First my home wireless and then my phone. Other wifi connections I have made follow those and I remove them every so often. 

 

 

 

[dewdev]

Ray:

Thanks for posting the Ranger pages. My Ranger is in a 2018 Oliver, so it is a little older (based on the Ranger ID #) but the pages are essentially the same as the ones you posted.

I did make one change on the WiFi tab to match what yours had. I then went back to the Maine Tab and hit connect (on the left side) next to my home WiFi name. When I did that the message under the green Internet tab said "Searching". After awhile it change to "Off Line" so it is not picking up my home WiFi even though it is a strong signal. Thinking that the Ranger did not like my WiFi for some reason I changed to a different Network with a "Open" designation from somewhere near me. Same result, with that one as it tried to "Search" and then went to "Off-Line".

Kind of frustating, but thanks for your assistance. At least I know I am using the correct procedures. 

[dewdev]

I finally got my WiFi Ranger connected to the internet afer working on it off and on for five days trying all kinds of configurations. Thanks to Ray Kimsey and David (GraniteStaters) for your assistance in the correct way to connect.

I was not able to connect to my slow house WiFi internet (provided by my phone company). I also tried to connect to a "Open" web site that the Ranger found and that did not work. For my third try, one of my neighbors let me try their medium speed cable WiFi, but that also did not work. For my 4th try my other neighbor, who had a fast cable WiFi, the WiFi Ranger immediately connected. Now I know that my WiFi Ranger works.

The other lesson I learned about the WiFi Ranger company is that they are very slow in returning phone calls. They are very fast if you go to their Support page and open a trouble ticket, which I did as I wanted to update the WiFi Ranger firm wear. I got an answer to my trouble ticket within 2 hours. That is pretty fast in getting a responce. I responded the the tech's e-mail and asked him to call me back as I had some other questions. He called back within a couple of hours and I asked him a bunch of questions including why I could not connect to 3 sites, but I could to the faster one. He could not provide a good answer as he did not know the WiFi configuration and speed of the failed locations.

Good lessons learned here on how to communicate with the WiFi Ranger company.

[SeaDawg]

Interesting,  as I assume most people buy this add-on to connect to weaker, sometimes slower connections. 

Thanks for all the great reporting. 

[dewdev]

17 hours ago, SeaDawg said:

Interesting,  as I assume most people buy this add-on to connect to weaker, sometimes slower connections. 

Thanks for all the great reporting. 

It may just be my slow house WiFi and may not reflect everyones condition. Others may find it works fine at a CG.

The owner's manual does state that the Ranger may not connect to some WiFi's.

[dewdev]

I have been researching the difference between the WiFiRanger SkyPro V1 (which I have) and the WiFiRanger SkyPro V3 which I can buy. I contacted WiFiRanger and asked about the difference and did not get a good answer. They said the newer V3 allowed for the most up to date firmwear to be installed but did not say what the differences are. (they do not like to give much informaotin as they are now selling a newer model.) 

Does anyone know what enhancements the V3 might have over the V1?

[Hull 812]

Hello Richard

We have the same issue with our Ranger. This weekend we camped in Acton, ME and everyone around us was able to get a dozen or more over the air channels, we had zero. No one had a Ranger the common device was King. Still working on the internet. We had it working once last year.

Brenda

[SeaDawg]

20 minutes ago, Hull 812 said:

This weekend we camped in Acton, ME and everyone around us was able to get a dozen or more over the air channels, we had zero

I thought the wifi ranger was just for wifi, not television signal? 

[Hull 812]

We bought the Wi-Fi booster $799, cell phone booster $699.and the Omni-directional antenna $299. A ton of money for no television, weak Wi-Fi and cell signals. Anyway, we were told this would bring in over the air television, that was important to us. So far we’ve had no luck. The $10 window antenna used to pull in a couple channels in our driveway and once in a camp ground. Haven’t been able to repeat. Did talk to Ranger once after many messages, actually ended up calling sales were there picked right up. They were able to help us with producing a control panel and had television in the driveway only. 
We should be getting the same as neighboring campers. Very disappointed 

[katanapilot]

Did you turn on the antenna amplifier?

[SeaDawg]

I'm "thinking" it's not the fault of your wifi ranger. It's your antenna connection,  your antenna, or not running the amplifier, which requires 110.  

Which tv antenna do you have?

We used to carry a small indoor/ outdoor antenna. It doesn't require a booster,  but it was  pretty lame, without it. 

We've added a different,  stronger antenna, no booster required,  because we seldom have hookups.

[dewdev]

As far as I know the WiFi Ranger is only for internet connections.

I have the Omni-directional antenna and  I can not get any TV reception unless I turn on the amplifier which is located in the attic. Once the amplifer is on, when I scan for TV channels I get a lot of channels when the Ollie is in my driveway. I have never tried it when camping as we are generally doing a lot of other things other than watching TV.

[Hull 812]

Going to try all suggestions. Last year, our first year, we had great weather and didn’t require television. We were trying things out, making sure they worked. This year we encountered several days of rain and thought some local news would be nice. Todays mission is to try and get this all figured out. Certainly appreciate all the help this forum can offer.

[dewdev]

27 minutes ago, Hull 812 said:

Going to try all suggestions. Last year, our first year, we had great weather and didn’t require television. We were trying things out, making sure they worked. This year we encountered several days of rain and thought some local news would be nice. Todays mission is to try and get this all figured out. Certainly appreciate all the help this forum can offer.

It would be helpful if you included in your signature the year of your Oliver and Model so people here could help you solve problems.

My Omni-directional antenna is in the attic (rear overhead compartment) and when you push the button on the plate the light will go on indicating that the transmitter is on.

After doing that, run a scan on your TV so it will find channels that are available in your area. Once the scan is complete, you should be able to watch a TV channel.

Good luck and let us know how you did.

 

[Hull 812]

The amplifier is on and scan finds no channels. Control panel shows we’re connected to the internet. I’m using  Wi-Fi on my iPhone but television will not connect. Signal is strong 

This may sound silly but do you always have to access the control panel?  If that’s the case we will never watch television. It’s the most difficult site to log into and it will not allow us to access using an iPhone.

Thank you all for the help. Going to try and connect with a Ranger Rep. 

[SteveCr]

Hello Hull  812,

I have Hull 806 and had the same issue with the tv antenna pulling in zero channels. I found a work around until I took 806 back to Oliver for annual maintenance. Oliver confirmed what I found....the cables behind the switch in the "attic" were reversed. They corrected the connections on the back of that switch and I now am able to pull in over the air channels with no issues.

(the work around I used before Oliver corrected it was to run a coax from the front of the"attic" switch to the back of the tv....you just have to experiment with the push button switch to determine which coax position to use) Let me know if you want more info.

 

[dewdev]

3 hours ago, Hull 812 said:

The amplifier is on and scan finds no channels. Control panel shows we’re connected to the internet. I’m using  Wi-Fi on my iPhone but television will not connect. Signal is strong 

This may sound silly but do you always have to access the control panel?  If that’s the case we will never watch television. It’s the most difficult site to log into and it will not allow us to access using an iPhone.

Thank you all for the help. Going to try and connect with a Ranger Rep. 

SteveCR likely has the reason you have not be able to get any TV channels.

Hull 812: If you are talking about the Control Panel for the WiFi Ranger, you are confusing the WiFi and the TV. They have nothing to do with each other. WiFi is for getting the internet. The TV has nothing to do with the internet. (unless you are using a Firestick or some other type devise to plan movies that picks up internet.)

[Hull 812]

Spoke to a Ranger Rep this afternoon. He first thought the amplifier was bad. Opened control panel with strong signal.Television had an internet connection but would not recognize it. Reset to factory settings and we now have tv! Haven’t been able to locate over the air channels. Television 50 feet away in the house has 8. Feeling good with what we have.

Thank you for all the help.

Brenda

[BBL]

On 8/30/2022 at 12:59 PM, SteveCr said:

Hello Hull  812,

I have Hull 806 and had the same issue with the tv antenna pulling in zero channels. I found a work around until I took 806 back to Oliver for annual maintenance. Oliver confirmed what I found....the cables behind the switch in the "attic" were reversed. They corrected the connections on the back of that switch and I now am able to pull in over the air channels with no issues.

(the work around I used before Oliver corrected it was to run a coax from the front of the"attic" switch to the back of the tv....you just have to experiment with the push button switch to determine which coax position to use) Let me know if you want more info.

 

Steve,

We have placed our order for our LE II and I am still on the fence about the omni-directional antenna and the "new" placement on the back of the trailer. Is your antenna on the back and are you generally happy with the performance (now that the polarity has been corrected on the amp)?

I have been working in communications all my life and to move an antenna from a perfectly "quiet" area up front to back behind the a/c where motors and fans are running (radio hates motors and fans), and also where the A/C can physically block signals, makes little to no sense. Only thing I can think is that they were trying to cut down on the wire run from the front to the back of the trailer.

I would like to have it in the off-chance that we have weather coming in and there is a TV station close enough to provide weather reports to augment our normal suite of communications devices and weather data.

Thanks for your input.

Brian

[SteveCr]

On 9/1/2022 at 1:32 PM, Brian and Brandelyne Lewis said:

Steve,

We have placed our order for our LE II and I am still on the fence about the omni-directional antenna and the "new" placement on the back of the trailer. Is your antenna on the back and are you generally happy with the performance (now that the polarity has been corrected on the amp)?

I have been working in communications all my life and to move an antenna from a perfectly "quiet" area up front to back behind the a/c where motors and fans are running (radio hates motors and fans), and also where the A/C can physically block signals, makes little to no sense. Only thing I can think is that they were trying to cut down on the wire run from the front to the back of the trailer.

I would like to have it in the off-chance that we have weather coming in and there is a TV station close enough to provide weather reports to augment our normal suite of communications devices and weather data.

Thanks for your input.

Brian

Hello Brian,

My antenna is on the front. We sometimes use the antenna to get local over the air channels...it works fine.

However, an alternative we use more frequently is a Roku stick...using an I-phone as a hotspot. My phone service is through Visible so there is no data limit ($35/m)...works good when there is a connection. Of course, with Roku or other similar devices you can pull in whatever services you subscribe to and all the free streaming channels. The variety is much better than the over the air stations. (For example...YoutubeTV has ESPN and other sports channels).

There may have been locations where I could not get cell service but could get over the air channels but i can't recall. Traveling through remote areas in New England, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, etc....there were plenty of places where neither were available....but not a big deal.

If I had to do it over again I would delete the antenna and probably also the cell phone booster. The cell phone booster is mounted over the dinette and can boost a very very weak signal up to a very weak signal 🙄 ...... if you mount/hold the phone within a foot or so. A more portable booster would make more sense.

Steve

Hull 806