Silly Wok-Fi build. It works!

[Pano]

If you have never heard of Wok-Fi it’s the practice of building Wi-Fi extender antennas from Asian cookware, sieves and the like.

Out in the barn there is a seismometer that needs Internet access to upload data. Rather than run a lot of CAT5 underground it’s linked with a Wi-Fi extender to the house network. Easy. But out there it’s at the edge of its range and likes to complain that it is "too far from the router."

So I kludged up this monstrosity. Just two aluminum pie pans glued together. Not parabolic at all, and it even won’t focus light. I poked the antennas through the back side and pointed it at the house.

It works! It gives me 12dB gain on average. Can’t quite believe it. Perhaps there will be a more elegant solution in the future, but for the moment I’m happy.

 

[rayma]

Excellent. And you had pie, too.

 

[billshurv]

Over here used to be pringles tubes.

 

[Pano]

I remember the Pringles tubes. Never build one that I can remember.

 

[rayma]

Over here used to be pringles tubes.

Aren't those made of paper?

 

[billshurv]

foil lined. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantenna although the pringles tube wasn't actually much use.

 

[rayma]

Nah, THIS is a cantenna.

 

[billshurv]

🙂

 

[mhenschel]

Aluminum pie plates are amateur stuff.
The pros cultivate close acquaintance with a pastafarian (Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster) who doesn't mind lending out their headgear.

Actually, I used mine as reflectors in a custom lighting fixture.

 

[StevenCrook]

If you bend the handles of the colander down you can tuck your ears in them, it makes it more stable and won't fall off while you're on the loo...

That said, we should all bear in mind that:

I don't advise a haircut, man. All hairdressers are in the employment of the government. Hair are your aerials. They pick up signals from the cosmos and transmit them directly into the brain. This is the reason bald-headed men are uptight.