We wish to thank all the people who worked towards getting our mobile phone cell installed. Particular thanks needs to go to Kelli from our local Federal MP’s Angus Taylor’s office who has been fantastic in sorting out a number of issues.
Problem #1 – Latency
We are currently getting significant latency issues which is causing phone and data drop-outs as well as apps not loading properly. It looks like this a result of the vegetation which has grown up in front of the satellite link dish…. particularly it has been getting worse as the spring vegetation growth has taken off. The dish is aimed low to the horizon and this was always going to be a problem. We think the dish should be mounted higher on the existing tower. The problem gets worse in cloudy weather which pretty much confirms this problem.
Problem #2 – Low Power, very small coverage area
The cell has VERY poor coverage. Depending on the geography the cell only goes 1-2 kilometres.. Only a short distance away from the tower in the main historic part of town where the Caretaker lives as well as the campgrounds and accommodation the reception is extremely poor.
The tower is in a strategic location and should cover a huge black coverage hole in the Southern Blue Mountains. The area needs this coverage to support emergency services. Particularly important here is the control of bushfires which can start in this area and then escalate and slam into South Western Sydney. This happened in 2019.
The photo below shows the existing microwave tower at Yerranderie. Right up the top on the right is where they installed the new mobile phone cell aerial. Down the bottom is the massive new 30 panel solar cell array and heaps of battery capacity. In the bottom right is the uplink-downlink satellite dish.
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Just 970 metres away in downtown Yerranderie, the reception is either one bar or nothing out in the open and mostly no reception at all inside the buildings. This includes the Caretaker-Manager’s residence and it is concerning that he may not be contactable in an emergency if he is inside one of the buildings.
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….and here are the technical readings out in the open at the campground.
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If the low power and transmission distance is not a fault, maybe we have either a Picocell or Microcell installed. If this is the case it has been an extraordinary lost opportunity to “fill in” a massive black reception hole in the Southern Blue Mountains.
