Faraday panels

I work for my local smallish ISP, one major problem we are seeing and one that is only going to get worse, is interference. The 2.4 spectrum is getting very full, and yes we could use 5Ghz in some places but some of the internet we provide is over 5Ghz wireless so that wouldn't work well in all situations. 

I've heard of WiFi proof paint which blocks all radio frequencys up to a point, but that wouldn't work for what I want since it would block phones as well.

So I was thinking we could make Faraday panels and use them like acoustic panels, to block a chunk of the 2.4 spectrum and put the routers on that channel. 

Would this do what I want and how hard would it be to place them right? Also this would have to be paid for by the customer so It can't be too expensive.

Any thoughts on this?

"some of the internet we provide is over 5Ghz wireless"

What does that mean.

It means that we put wireless radios o the roof that use 5Ghz, and if a router is using 5Ghz it makes problems for their their connection.

you'd be better off bouncing IR beams off a balloon. basicly giving you the same functionality as a satellite but faster since it's closer to the source.

at-least until 60ghz(wigig) radios are made available.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean. Are you saying to use hot air ballons instead of metal towers to hold IR radios instead of 5Ghz radios? I'm not sure how that would work. What is the range on IR and how well would it pass through trees?

your towers are basically broadcasting hi-freqency sound waves so you'd need to cover most if not the whole house for the Faraday panels to have any effect. 

IR is light based so the receiver needs to have a direct line of site to the transmitter. the best way to do it is by using a ballon/blimp as a repeater since it should be cheaper then building small towers.all you should need to do theoretically is connect a IR repeater to a 5ghz radio repeater by lan/coax cable.

the only downside is keeping it positioned correctly in strong winds. but Ir is designed to cover a wider area the further you get away from it so it shouldn't be very hard to do.

satilites are about 22miles up at their shortest distance so I'd say you could get away with 30 miles and still have a good signal if the humidity isn't too high.

LiFi is another option you could look at but I'm not sure if you can buy it anywhere yet.I'm also not sure if the range would be any better.

I don't really know much about WISP stuff (evidently, neither does anyone else :P) but what sort of equipment are you using, and what is your range? Could be that a better solution would be to use different equipment. I'm not sure how blocking a range of frequencies would be any different from using a non overlapping channel, or if it would even be possible to do that without killing your signal.

Just so we are on the same page. The way we deliver wireless internet is we have towers with radios pointing in al directions and then the customer has a smaller radio on there roof. Both use 5Ghz. The radio on the roof has a cable that goes into the house that plugs into a router that uses 2.4Ghz. So yes one option is to use 5Ghz routers on a different channel then the radio. But I'm just looking at different options. So I'm trying to see if this panel idea is even fesable. I realise that not many people would want to paint or wall paper the whole house, but I thought that if you could block enough of the interference to make one channel useable. Then a few panels on the wall would be worth it.

your towers are basically broadcasting hi-freqency sound waves ...

I stopped reading here. Radio waves are electro-magnetic (i.e. light) waves. Radio waves are the lowest frequency waves of light, on the other end of the scale are gamma rays (don't want to be blasted by those). IR falls between radio waves and visible light. Radio towers to not transmit sound waves, otherwise they would be called speakers.

Well the problem is that if you're experiencing interference then that's occurring on the frequency you're using, so you won't be able to block the interference and still keep your signal. You may see some improvement if you put a shield around the back of the antenna so that the side facing the tower is open but signals from other directions are blocked.

true but I was referring to the way the technology was designed not actual radio waves. most wisps use panels that convert vibration into data which is why the antenna they put on your house is a flat panel.instead of a rod like you see on a car or a dish+sensor like satellites use.

What you are describing is a microphone.

more like a microphone speaker combo that can only hear and broadcast microwaves.

the solution i'm suggesting is which is easier to read and filter between the beating of 100 drums and the flashing of 1000+ pen lasers.

The panel idea(if it were to work right) would only be blocking the WiFi from the customers router going out of the house, and the WiFi from other routers coming into the house. It shouldn't touch the 5Ghz that the radios use. I guess what I'm really asking is if you can place these in strategic places, as you would if you we're using sound panels to make a room sound better. Or would you have to cover the whole house to see any change?

If you're already using directional antennas and the area is really noisy on the whole spectrum (I assume you already measured it) then the most feasible solution imo would be to throw repeaters inbetween the links.

Stopping the signal leaving the home is easy, all you need to do is lower the broadcast power so the signal range is isolated to inside the house. If everybody did this then there wouldn't be a problem. Getting your neighbours to do it is a little trickier :P

Yeah that's the other option, if we could teach people the right way to set up their stuff a lot of our problems would be gone. But sadly I don't think that will happen.

It sounds like my idea might not work. Oh well I'm just thinking about different ways to help the problem.