In construction, no competent builder pours the slab or raises the frame without first establishing solid foundations. Soil is tested, footings are engineered and the site is set out with care because everything that follows relies on that early work. Wireless networking is no different. A physical RF site survey is the foundation upon which a stable, high performing Wi-Fi environment is built. When we survey properly, the design, deployment and support rest on something solid. When we skip it, we invite structural cracks such as coverage holes, roaming failures and interference that will haunt operations for years.
At Gamma Solutions we specialise in Distribution Centre and Warehouse solutions. We treat warehouse Wi-Fi as mission critical infrastructure, not office grade convenience. The technology may be the same but the design intent and acceptance criteria are different. Our approach is engineered for consistent performance under load, at operational pace, in environments where access points are often ten metres above the slab and devices operate one to two metres from the floor.
The House Build Analogy
A predictive design is like an architect’s drawing: necessary, informative and an excellent starting point. But plans do not replace soil testing and footing inspections. In the same way, a desktop RF model cannot replace walking the site with instruments in hand. RF behaves differently in a live environment compared with paper. Metal racking, refrigerated rooms, forklifts, pallet stacks, people and neighbouring networks all shape the radio landscape day by day.
Warehouse Grade vs Office Wi-Fi
Office Wi-Fi can tolerate occasional jitter because it supports email, browsing and meetings. Warehouse Wi-Fi underpins inventory accuracy and throughput. Scan to screen latency must remain in the low hundreds of milliseconds, roaming must be predictable at walking and forklift speeds and coverage must persist through steel, foil, liquid loads and seasonal re-stacking.
Design criteria are therefore different. We prioritise capacity on 20 MHz channels, prune minimum data rates to prevent sticky clients, shape cell boundaries for fast roaming and select antennas and remounting positions that deliver energy to devices near the floor. Mounting height changes everything: vertical beamwidth, downtilt, Fresnel clearance and angle of incidence. What behaves acceptably at three metres can misbehave at ten without deliberate engineering. Gamma Solutions assumes mission critical from day one because a best effort design is an operational risk.
Why a Physical Survey Changes Outcomes
A physical survey validates assumptions and reveals realities that no model can. It measures attenuation through actual building materials, maps reflections from steel and glass, uncovers co-channel interference and measures real world noise floors and device performance. It also captures operational factors such as shift density, scanning patterns, trolley routes and seasonal stock that alter roaming and capacity.
What We Measure and Why It Matters
During a proper survey, both pre deployment and post deployment, we measure:
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Signal coverage and signal to noise ratio
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Channel use and airtime contention
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Retry rates and roaming behaviour along user paths
In warehouses we pay attention to rack absorption and shadowing, RF behaviour of coolrooms, reflective surfaces and transient interference from machinery or radios. These conditions determine not just whether a device can connect, but whether it can roam quickly, maintain low latency for telnet or RDP and deliver reliable barcode transactions at operational speed.
Capacity, Not Just Coverage
A survey anchored in capacity is like engineering footings for actual load rather than footprint. We design for the number and type of clients, their duty cycles, their channel width capabilities and peak concurrency. This ensures channel planning reduces contention, transmit power promotes clean boundaries and data rates avoid sticky clients.
Striking the Right AP Density
In Wi-Fi, more is not better. Too many access points create overlapping cells, interference and wasted airtime. Too few create black spots and poor roaming. A physical survey ensures the balance: enough cells for robust coverage and capacity but few enough to keep contention low and roaming smooth.
The Risks of Skipping the Foundations
When RF foundations are ignored, the outcome resembles a house built on poor soil. Floors (applications) creak, doors (sessions) stick and cracks (incidents) spread. In Wi-Fi this means dropouts in known hotspots, slow logons, high retry rates, scanners clinging to distant APs and roaming delays that disrupt workflows. The hidden cost is rework such as truck rolls, emergency APs and ad hoc channel changes that rarely fix the root problem.
A Methodology That Works
A solid process usually includes:
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An on site design survey (AP on a stick) to validate predictions and test antenna height and downtilt
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Spectrum analysis to measure noise and non 802.11 interferers
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Post installation validation to confirm coverage, capacity and roaming along production routes
For handheld scanning we target primary coverage better than -65 dBm with SNR above 25 dB, using 20 MHz channels and a plan that ensures fast roaming.
Deliverables You Can Build On
A survey should deliver annotated floor plans, heatmaps, a channel and power plan, a bill of materials, risk register and commissioning checklist. These are the RF equivalent of an engineer’s drawings, providing accountability and making future upgrades safer.
Cost and Value
Surveys are not glamorous but they deliver the best lifetime value. They are a small fraction of the cost of ownership compared with devices, downtime and rework. Poor design drives up costs through redundant cabling, oversized switches and extra APs that add contention. A good survey prevents these issues and pays for itself many times over.
A Case Example
One distribution centre skipped the survey and deployed from a desktop plan. When racking filled and a neighbour lit up Wi-Fi, scanners failed in aisles and coolrooms. Ad hoc APs were added which worsened contention. A later survey revealed the true causes: shadowing, reflective multipath and channel overlap. Remounting APs, re planning channels and tuning power fixed performance but at far greater cost than a survey.
If you would never build on untested ground, do not deploy Wi-Fi on untested RF. A physical site survey is the foundation for design, installation, optimisation and support. For warehouses where APs sit high and devices work low, Gamma Solutions closes the gap with evidence-based design. Strong RF foundations are not a luxury, they are the only responsible way to build.
Take Action: Build Your Network on Solid Foundations
A reliable Wi-Fi network is only as strong as the planning behind it. At Gamma Solutions, we treat warehouse Wi-Fi as mission critical, not best-effort convenience. A physical RF site survey is the proven first step to ensuring your network can handle the demands of today and tomorrow.
📞 Ready to secure your operations?
Contact our team today to arrange your RF site survey and discover how we can optimise your wireless infrastructure for maximum performance and reliability.
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