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Building a Local Cellular Phone Carrier?

Posted by Cliff on from the if-no-one-else-is-gonna-do-it dept.

Netsuj asks: "I'm doing some work for a firm which operates in B.F.E. Many miles before even arriving, I loose signal on my GSM phone. What is the feasibility of creating a limited-area wireless telephone network? As it is outside the area of repeater technology (I believe), is there such thing as a simple cellular-to-wireline system? What are the possibilities of this operating on a break-even basis for employees (i.e. charging minimal roaming fees)? Any ideas? Sadly, something like this appears to be the only option; contacting any of the mobile network operators in the larger area resulted in absolutely no interest in expanding their coverage." Unfortunately, along with the technical problems, there is also paperwork. What kind of permits and other red-tape-hurdles would be necessary to satisfy all of the lawyer-types?

7 of 57 comments (clear)

  1. Holy shit. by Profane+Motherfucker · · Score: 5, Funny

    You'd better be well fucking financed for this little endeavor. It's no small fucking feat.

    Where the fuck do I even begin? Good christ man.

    1. Obtain license from FCC. Maybe you'll get luck and you can bid on a PCS license, something minor, like an F block. That's the cheap part. Depending on the area, you might get by with only paying a few hundred thousand. Or you might be a black jew from Greenland. Figure on spending a few million on this.

    2. then hire a bunch of squirly fucks to do all sort of gypsy analysis on the area. with that license, it's use it or Lose is, hizzo. That includes all sorts of wacky fucking shit like topographic analysis and god knows what else.

    3. So you'll need to put up a shitload of antenna sites to cover the mandated number of people. each site is pretty cheap at about $500,000. It might only take a a dozen or so, depending on where you buy your license.

    4. Don't forget to hire a law firm to handle all the FCC related bullshit. I bet they're only a couple ten thousand a year.

    I'm not fucking joking about this shit. It's next to fucking impossible to do, unless you're stonecold serious. And if you're asking slashdot, I highly doubt you are.

    Get a satellite phone, or landline.

    Maybe ditch the GSM phone? Analog works just about everywhere. A back phone is about $80 on eBay. Or you can do it the hard way.

    1. Re:Holy shit. by dimator · · Score: 5, Funny

      Profanity is the crutch of inarticulate mother fuckers.

      --
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  2. How many miles? by shepd · · Score: 2, Informative

    5? 10? 15?

    Unless you're talking 40 or 50 miles, I bet if you talk to a local radio expert, you would find that a high-gain directional antenna, properly aligned, plus a repeater, would work miracles.

    --
    If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
    1. Re:How many miles? by ColaMan · · Score: 4, Interesting

      GSM has a hard limit of 35km (22 miles) - after that, you can't compensate enough for the round-trip signal delay from speed of light and data processing.

      The delay is quantiled as a 6 bit number in the GSM data stream. 6 bits => 64 steps (0-63); each step advances the timing by one bit duration ie 3.7 microseconds.64 steps allows compensation over a maximum propagation time of 31.5 bit periods ie 113.3 microseconds ( => a maximum distance of ~ 35 km).

      --

      You are in a twisty maze of processor lines, all alike.
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  3. consider by The+Clockwork+Troll · · Score: 3, Interesting
    You might think about buying an 802.11b-enabled handheld PC (I think the cheapest run about $600), some voice-over-IP server software, and a bunch of commodity 802.11b equipment that you can sprinkle all around BFE.

    Then, get your hands on (or develop if you're so inclined) a voice-over-IP telephone client for said handheld PC and server software.

    Seems like this could work as a poor man's makeshift wireless phone service. Of course I have no idea how graceful 802.11b equipment is about handing off from access point to access point, but it seems a lot cheaper (if less entertaining) than Profane Motherfucker's solution.

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  4. Get one of these by sql*kitten · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Many miles before even arriving, I loose signal on my GSM phone.

    Thuraya phones use GSM by default but will fail over to satellite mode when no GSM signal is available.

  5. Re:Radio instead by EricV314a · · Score: 3, Informative

    You cannot use amature radio licencing or amature spectrum for commercial applications