Next G coverage

Hi Jim,
I have a 7db gain aerial fitted to the F250 which gives me 3 to 4 extra bars on the signal meter when we are in fringe areas, but really only extends your range some what. Once you are in isolated areas or even a few kms from town you won't have anything especially some of the areas you are going to, I carry a Telstra Iridium Sat phone which is great, wouldn't be without it, one of our fellow BOG members rolled there BT in Nth West WA on the Tanami I think and the Sat phone saved the day as his wife was traped in an upside down Cruiser.
Hope that's of some help
Eric

Absolutely and totally agree with Eric. Great insurance to have with you.

John

Jim,

I swapped from CDMA to a 6120 Nokia Next G and on my last trip to WA from Sydney ( Broken Hill Norseman Halls Creek ) . I reckon I had twice as much coverage as I ever had on CDMA.

My phone is in a cradle hooked up to an antenna on my bull bar.

I only use a sat phone if going out into the desert without the van.

Cheers ,

Willie .

Jim,

I use an RFI 2.1M long 9DBi antennae which increases my range to the absolute maximum for a stick antennae and I use a 15 element 800MHz Yagi antennae for extreme fringe reception, however both are totally useless once one is out of the footprint of NextG/3G. I've travelled remote regions for years and also carry a Telstra Iridium sat phone. Even this will not give you guaranteed 100% coverage ( I recall standing on a sand dune in the Great Sandy Dessert over a hundred K's from the nearest track and not getting any signal...) but it comes so close as doesn't matter. Now should you never use it, who cares!, but should you really need it, it's paid for in 1 call. If your able to afford it, buy it for piece of mind and sell it off afterwards.It takes up less room than a beer and can be used many times over !

Al

Hi Jim

We got a NextG phone with car cradle and antenna for our recent trip. Reception with NextG only seemed to be in major centres. Really it was useless, as in most cases when in a NextG town, we also had coverage on my GSM phone. We then paid $2,000 for a Sat phone in case of medical emergencies for travel in outback NT. It was a good insurance because we didn't need it. We didn't apply for the Government subsidy as this now needs to be done first (wise move on your part, as it takes some time), although I don't think we meet the criteria. We plan to suspend the monthly payments on the satellite plan until we go away again, but disconnection and reconnection fees apply - I'll find out how much when Telstra finally puts me through the the right section, and this may take days!

I used a Telstra NextG modem for the computer, and when we finally got one that worked, i was able to go on line in towns with NextG. NextG reception was very good at Yulara (Uluru), but no reception of any kind at nearby Kings Canyon. Both of these are major tourism centres for overseas visitors.

You can check where reception is meant to be on the map on the Telstra website:

Site Link

Motherhen

The other option to consider is an HF radio and join one of the HF clubs such as VKS 737. One of the advantages of HF is that it is a 'one to all' system wheras a sat phone is 'one to one' Help may be just down the road.

Listening to the afternoon schedules with calls coming in from all over the country can be interesting and entertaing - our equivalent of bush TV. I only have a basic stand alone set without the fancy features of the new units which include Selcal and Radphone and , I think the latest units have an email facility.

My rig only cost $600 complete with a new whip antenna which has all five VKS bases ansd five RFDS bases purchased through VKS737. The latter is a voluntary organisation that run fives base stations around the country and provide a fantastic service - including emergency message delivery.

Regards John

Gidday Jim,

We did the GRR and down the WA coast last year, and our satphone on a Globalstar (now Pivotel) plan was comforting insurance. Motherhen and others above are dead right - no NextG for days on end in these remote places, where we switched on the satphone btwn 6-7pm each night so family could contact us in an emergency. We also received the govt subsidy, and are on the lowest 2 year plan, costs $35/month for about 5min of calls. If going ahead don’t delay, you have only a small time window to complete the transaction.

Incidentally, from Darwin, across the Kimberly, and down the WA coast, we also carried both Next G and CDMA phones. This was Aug-Dec 2007, and was deliberate, as we wanted to compare coverage. There were many remote settlements where we got CDMA, but no NextG. Eventually, as the cutoff deadline drew nearer, we rolled with the punches and switched the CDMA to NextG when we got to Perth. Even now, (back east) we have differences in the coverage between the 2 NextG phones (both Telstra 'bluetick' phones for rural use). The LG often has minimal signal between towns, where the Motorola has none; but then, much closer to towns, the Motorola will have full signal, and the LG none – how do you figure that?

An EPIRB is inappropriate for a breakdown or such, where no one is at risk, and we'd be loathe to activate it, thus mobilising expensive taxpayer-funded services, when a satphone would get us out of trouble.

Hope this helps

Cheers

We bought a mobile / Satellite phone that works a treat.

We also received the susidy and it only cost us 700 for the phone, and we can turn the sat side on and off as we please.

The company we bought it from is TCS R Direct, and www.tcsrdirect.com.au and they delivered it to us.

The sat phone rates are also really good at 65 cents per 30 seconds, unlike other sat plans at $3 per 30 secs.

good luck with your hunt

Trekker Bob