Range & Coverage Guide

Range is the number-one question I get, and the honest answer is "it depends on your woods." This guide walks through what actually drives coverage — hub vs. gateway, terrain, node count, repeaters, antennas — and how we confirm it on your property before you spend a dime.

Hub or gateway: what the range really is#

Everything runs on the unlicensed ~915 MHz LoRa band, in one of two flavors: point-to-point (a Sensor Hub) or LoRaWAN (a gateway).

• Point-to-point (hub): typically 1/4 up to 1/2 mile straight through the bush, terrain-dependent.
• LoRaWAN (gateway): 1/2 mile, up to 1 mile through the bush — generally about 2 to 2.5x what a hub reaches.

Raw range isn't the whole story, though. The gateway's real advantage is that every node talks directly to it — there's no deciding which nodes repeat for which — so big systems stay easy and consistent as you grow.

My rule of thumb on which to choose: 2,000 taps and under, go with a hub; more than 4,000, go with a gateway. In between, both work, and it comes down to specifics like whether you have power on the property.

Terrain is the whole game#

Range depends on terrain, and barriers are the main thing we plan around. Here's how the common ones play out:

• A ridge between parcels blocks a single point — put a gateway on each side. One 5-releaser bush needed three: one per parcel across the ridge, plus one at the home sugarhouse.
• A road splitting the bush is a common case for a second gateway — you get full coverage plus redundancy.
• A corner in an RF shadow — we've run a Sensor Hub to service a remote corner while the gateway serves the rest of the property.
• A far pump house with no power — a hub is the answer there too: put a hub at the pump house with a small solar panel, and a nearby node that can't reach the gateway routes through it.

As soon as you're out of range, you stand up another gateway and keep going — that's what makes big systems easy. And for the cleanest shot across the home property, mount the gateway high: the gable end of a building, and the higher the better.

Everything we read off a map is a starting point — we always confirm on the ground with a node. More on that at the end of this guide.

How many nodes you'll need#

Rule of thumb is 2 mainlines per node, but your layout drives it both ways. Lines spaced far apart may need one node per line; lines close together (100-150') let a 3-port node cover 3 mainlines and cut your count. Most installs average about 2 mainlines per node with a mix of 1s, 2s, and 3s.

A pump house also typically gets one node of its own, covering vacuum, tank level, and temperature.

Hooking neighboring mainlines to one node#

You don't run wire to the neighboring mainlines — you run 5/16" tubing back to the node like any other lateral, just with no taps: a dedicated saddle in the mainline, an end-of-line hook and T, into the vacuum sensor. If lines are more than ~150' apart, use a dedicated node per mainline end.

We've got thousands of these nodes in the field, and about 75% monitor multiple mainlines with no concerns. The only downside — and I'll be straight with you — is that it's one more line a squirrel could chew.

Repeaters on a hub system#

On a hub system, if a far node can't reach the hub, you turn a node in between into a repeater: remove the cover, flip DIP switch #1 on, power it off and back on, and replace the cover. That node keeps doing its regular job — it works as both an end-of-line sensor and a repeater.

One thing to know going in: hops are limited. Point-to-point is great, but it has limits beyond 1-2 hops. To reach large operations reliably, that's where the gateway (LoRaWAN) comes in — nodes talk straight to it, no hopping.

Repeaters also use more battery than a regular node — there's a full answer on that in the FAQs below.

Antennas and mounting#

A few tips that make a real difference:

• Mounting and line-of-sight. Mount a node on the side of the tree facing the hub or next node — higher up helps.
• Gateway height. Mount a gateway as high as you can; the gable end is ideal. It ships with all the mounting hardware.
• Add-on antenna. For a hub, we can run an add-on antenna mounted very high to reach a distant node.

If you're seeing dropouts or weirdly low signal from a node that shouldn't have a range problem, the antenna itself may be the fault — see the FAQs below for how to spot that and what the replacement part is.

Planning your coverage before you buy#

The best way to plan is to send me a map of your woods. What works well is marking up an onX map — draw your mainlines with a single waypoint at the end of each — and I'll dial in node count and placements and recommend gateway locations. Typically we set the gateway(s) up first, then walk or drive around with a node to confirm coverage and adjust. A quote from a map really represents the worst case.

Two tools help before you buy:

• Coverage Planner — drop a waypoint where a gateway would go and see the expected range across your property (works best on a PC). You can view real sugarbush examples, or upload a KML of your own operation to request a quote.
• Field Tester loaner — no cost. It's a site-survey node with GPS that maps signal strength as you walk the property, confirming your coverage and refining the planner at the same time.

FAQs