Baby Monitor Distance of Use

[maradcliff]

This might be a little off topic, but I am not sure where else to ask. Does anyone know how far a baby monitor will transmit? I am asking because I have livestock in the barn and when the weather gets bad, I often have to put too many animals in the barn, and sometimes they get a little excitable and do some fighting. So, I hear banging in the barn. Often the last thing I want to do in crappy weather is go to the barn at 3am to check on them, only to find the two ponies are wrestling and nothing is wrong. While a video camera would be ideal, the cost is prohibitive. However, I was at a rummage sale and someone had a baby monitor for $5. I asked them to call me if it did not sell. They called and still have it. I suppose I should have just gotten it, but my barn is about 200 feet away. Will the monitor work at that great a distance? Anyone know? This would be a cheap way to at least have soem idea whats going on in there.

Mark

[Edwin Pawlowski]

You should have offered three bucks and tried it.

[Travis Jordan]

If it is a power line carrier system, it should work when plugged into two outlets fed by the same power transformer secondary. Distance wouldn't be particularly important in this case. 200' should be no sweat.

[mark (sixstringtheoryDOTcom)]

Man, either you are the cheapest guy on earth, or you are very poor. Either way I feel for you. In addition to the uncool insult I may have just hailed at you, here are my thoughts on whether the monitor will work for you:

I have a couple of baby monitors. One cheap one and one great model that is no longer made. The great one was made by evenflo. It has been in use for about 19 months now and it works great and goes through 2 floors (2nd floor to ceiling) no sweat. I'd bet that if you could place it near a window in your bedroom that you can view the barn from, and the barn isn't made of dense wood or has an opening (I'm a city guy obviously, so I don't know), then it would probably work.

But if it is a cheap model than it may not. Either way, as the other guy said, you should have bought the thing for $3 and tried it : )

mark

[Gideon]

There is the old empirical test - If they still have the monitor, go over and test it. Have somebody talk to you over the base unit as you walk away listening to the mobile unit. See how far you can walk away before the signal gets too weak. I'm guessing that with a good, unobstructed path you shouldn't have any trouble with 200' distance. We've bought

3 such sets at garage sells for about $3-$6 per set and they all have very good range.

FYI - those old-style 900 mhz video baby monitor systems are extremely cheap these days. More than $5, but still a fairly low cost option to save going out to the barn in the rain. I'd pay $50 for the convenience.