Known issues:

The experienced issues when traveling on trains is the frequent interruption of the signal strength and poor availability of the internet.

Reasons:

• Train passenger wagons have an important degree of shielding for electromagnetic waves due to their metal construction.
• Train wagons have coated windows in order to prevent heat loss but these are also blocking radio waves to penetrate inside at the same time.
• Even laser treated windows completely bounce off all signals arriving at an angle of less than 45°.
• Operator antennas are mostly concentrated in densely populated areas and along roads but rarely close to railway tracks.
• Even on the most favourable railway tracks in Europe between Brussels and Antwerp or Ghent travellers are continuously interrupted when using the internet.
• The above mentioned reasons combined with the decreased data ratio due to the speed of trains, create a very poor availability of the internet inside train wagons.

Solutions:

• The HAM INTERNATIONAL “GSM CONNECT” amplifiers pick up the GSM signal outdoors on the roof of the wagon, amplify it and distribute it inside with small antennas in a DAS configuration.
• The HAM INTERNATIONAL GSM amplifiers have been tested by Notified Body No. 2758 Labo Denayer to be in conformity with the harmonised standard EN50155 for temperature class OT4 (-40 to +70°C) and to be RAIL CERTIFIED.

Click here for the rail certification DOC.