Extending Sense WiFi Antenna Cable

I’d like to physically place my Sense device at the opposite end of the conduit knockout where my antenna is currently installed… The antenna cable is too short… Is there a standard extension accessory that I can get on Amazon or something to extend the length?

Will this work?

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Because Sense hasn’t got a certified accesory cable you can’t officially extend it AFAIK.

“Any” cable (like the one you ask about) should work BUT you will be violating various codes and likely the Sense warranty by using it. I would point to the exposed metal shielding on the plugs as potentially lethal bridges to your live panel.

Something you can do officially is mount the Sense outside the panel:

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Yeah… My panel is on the exterior of my house and gets tortured by direct sunlight most days… I would not feel comfortable mounting Sense on the outside of the panel…

There may be an advantage to putting the monitor in a separate NEMA enclosure that’s got enough volume and air circulation.

FYI: “tortured by direct sunlight” sounds like you might (?) bump up against the 68C (154F) max rating for the monitor environment. The lower bound of 0C (32F) could be an issue if the enclosure is too ventilated and your winters are cold. I’m sure there’s a bit a latitude in those numbers but you may want to measure the temp of your panel at some point. The underside of my attic roof (asphalt) gets to 160F in Summer.

Thanks… I will definitely need to take a temperature reading on one of the hottest days this summer…

Regarding the unsanctioned solution I posted… If I am out of the Sense warranty period, then warranty is no longer an issue… And if I cover the metal shielding with an abundance of electric tape, do you think this solution will likely work? I don’t have the original sense cable in front of me, which is why I ask… Are the two ends of this connector on my amazon link the same connector type on the Sense antenna cable?

For the record:

I’ll let you infer what you will.

You can see how the antenna is assembled in the install manual here:

Original replacement assembly is available here:

I don’t think you understood what I said.

I said I found a directional antenna. I was already using it and it was already working better.

I’ve been using it for years now and the antenna is fine. Sense can’t really deny a warranty unless they can prove that the modification caused the failure. Meaning: if the wifi module burned out, sure they could try and claim that the antenna caused it. The problem is that their antenna is absolutely nothing special so a decent quality brand name replacement antenna made for the same frequency isn’t going to cause any failures.

That being said, I expected the Sense to get more accurate over time. It has in fact gotten worse over time and I rarely ever use it any more because it has gone from being moderately useful to being junk.

I’m normally not a fan of them, but it seems like a cheap WiFi extender that you only connect to the sense meter could help a lot of these issues.

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@Quarky42 I referenced that post and thread to assist @MikeekiM in understanding the details of the antenna cable after cautioning about the issues with the cable certification (because it’s inside a live electric panel).

@ccook In certain situations I would be tempted to do a wifi AP close to the Sense panel. In the absence of Cat cable and a good signal to the AP itself I’d be further tempted to do Powerline Ethernet back to base. And then I would be seduced into posting here about how Sense could be picking up the ethernet packets from such devices … and why not all?

Most the processing it done within the monitor, the bandwidth just needs to be constant and not dropping. Think they require 300mb a day, that’s like .00038 mbps. Obviously a wired AP would be great but many home users cant run cat cable or set up multiple APs. . I am defiantly no fan of a little outlet plug-in repeater type extender that are like $15 but I for this particular application … I would use it. Put it somewhere in the middle, different ssid and only pair the sense monitor to it.

As far as a powerline ethernet … I know some users say these don’t cause any interference with sense. I suppose a data link protocol noise cant be heard by the CTs and Ive seen them work really well. But I have defiantly seen them not work very well, some of the newer arc fault breakers will 100% block the signal from working.

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First I’ve heard of that. I would think arc-faulting is a much lower frequency (2kHz-20MHz) … AH! Yes, in the realm of Powerline Ethernet. Hmmm.

PLC (Power-line communication) is quite fascinating. On long haul wires it seems it goes down to 300 Hz. I imagine Tesla standing under some high transmission lines listening for AOL modem handshakes.

From what I understand several manufactures afci breakers will trip every so often from powerline ethernet and some of the manufactures have started installing a capacitor in it to block “noise”.

Thank you. I thought you were replying to me specifically.

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