In a caravan, you’ re not likely to have a robot vacuum cleaner, but you will have other devices that can connect to a wi-fi network and which can be accessed or controlled while you’ re connected to the network via a phone or tablet. You’ ll likely have an internet connection to share as well. We will look at some of these applications later on.
CHOOSING A WI-FI ROUTER
There are four types of wi-fi routers that are suitable for a caravan. The first is using your mobile phone as a personal‘ hotspot’. This effectively turns your phone into a miniature wi-fi router. It’ s great because it provides a very quick and easy way to share your phone’ s internet connection with, say, a laptop computer or even a smart TV. It isn’ t very practical for connecting multiple devices, and it is far from a permanent solution, but for a simple setup, it will work very well.
Many caravan power management systems have wi-fi connectivity, such as this Simarine system from Enerdrive.
Powering a 12V wi-fi router from a cigarette lighter outlet.
Another option is to purchase a dedicated portable wi-fi router, such as a Netgear Nighthawk or Telstra Hotspot. These are a great option as they are relatively lowcost, provide a permanent network connection that doesn’ t require you to activate something on your phone, and they are relatively easy to set-up and use. The main drawbacks are that they are limited in what you can do with them, and their tiny internal antennas mean they don’ t have great internet performance in lowsignal-strength environments.
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