Extend range of mailbox sensor? bigger/longer antenna?

[Ashton]

I recently purchased a Ring Mailbox sensor (https://ring.com/products/ring-mailbox-sensor/) and mounted it to my mailbox... however, due to the mailbox being on the opposite (far) side of the road as my house (there's a massive drainage ditch on the edge of the property so it cant be put on the close side) every time the mail truck comes, it blocks the sensor's reception and thus I get no notification of mail arriving... (to be clear, the sensor works fine when the truck is not there, so it *is* well within operating range)

The sensor uses an external port for the antenna, and my thought is "Can I run an antenna with a longer wire so it's no longer behind the truck when it stops?" but given I know all of like 2 things about EE, I have no clue if this is actually possible or if the added wire would simply cause signal degradation to the point the device doesn't work at all... (it's only running off 3xAAA-batteries so I doubt it has much power) Possibly just a couple feet long so it's at ground-level and transmits under the truck...?

(also, while I could move the receiver closer to the mailbox, its WiFi range is a joke (literally <25 feet), so I'd have to also add a ~$60 WiFi repeater as opposed to a ~$5 antenna... and I don't even know if that would work since it would still be trying to transmit through a mail truck....)

Thoughts? Suggestions?

 

[Nobu]

I recently purchased a Ring Mailbox sensor (https://ring.com/products/ring-mailbox-sensor/) and mounted it to my mailbox... however, due to the mailbox being on the opposite (far) side of the road as my house (there's a massive drainage ditch on the edge of the property so it cant be put on the close side) every time the mail truck comes, it blocks the sensor's reception and thus I get no notification of mail arriving... (to be clear, the sensor works fine when the truck is not there, so it *is* well within operating range)

The sensor uses an external port for the antenna, and my thought is "Can I run an antenna with a longer wire so it's no longer behind the truck when it stops?" but given I know all of like 2 things about EE, I have no clue if this is actually possible or if the added wire would simply cause signal degradation to the point the device doesn't work at all... (it's only running off 3xAAA-batteries so I doubt it has much power) Possibly just a couple feet long so it's at ground-level and transmits under the truck...?

(also, while I could move the receiver closer to the mailbox, its WiFi range is a joke (literally <25 feet), so I'd have to also add a ~$60 WiFi repeater as opposed to a ~$5 antenna... and I don't even know if that would work since it would still be trying to transmit through a mail truck....)

Thoughts? Suggestions?

It doesn't stay flagged until the hub clears it? That's terrible design. :/

You could extend the antenna, but you will have additional losses along the wire, so exactly how much you can extend will depend on the transmit strength of the sensor device and hub.

 

[CHANG3D]

It uses z-wave with a mesh network. You just need some ring lights or whatever "works with ring" z-wave products to hop between the mail sensor and your ring bridge.