Is the status light on your Tailwind controller not showing the nice, pure green status light that tells you from across the garage "yep, I'm online"? Is it showing offline? Maybe a solid yellow or flashing red?
If your Tailwind won't actually connect during setup, try bringing it closer to your WiFi router and run the setup again. If you continue to get errors like incorrect password, try restarting your phone, your router, and obviously make sure the password is correct.
If your Tailwind keeps falling offline it could be a sign of poor WiFi signal strength or integrity (signal to noise ratio). This is most likely the cause for your connectivity issues. It's not the only one, but it's the most likely. There can even be reasonable WiFi signal strength, but interference by other equipment can cause connection problems.
You can actually see the RSSI signal strength (an indicator of WiFi signal strength) of your Tailwind controller right in the Tailwind app (assuming of course that it is actually online). If you are the device owner, just tap on the gear icon to the right of your controller in the "My Devices" screen.
At the top of the next screen that comes up, you'll see technical information regarding your controller, including the RSSI signal strength. Again, you will only see this if your controller is online.
Here is an article explaining RSSI values https://www.netspotapp.com/what-is-rssi-level.html
If you're seeing RSSI values in the -80 to -90 range, please consider relocating the Tailwind controller to a slightly different location. Ideally you would like RSSI values that are in the -40 to -79 range. There are a few common culprits for WiFi connectivity problems:
1) WiFi signal just doesn't reach the exact location of the Tailwind controller with enough signal strength. We recommend purchasing a WiFi extender and placing it in a location that receives a decent WiFi signal from your router, but is still reasonably close to, or in your garage so it can also reach the Tailwind controller.
2) Many LED light bulbs emit excessive electromagnetic interference. If one is near the controller it could cause problems
3) Some garage door openers themselves (and the radios inside them) can block / interfere with the signal. For example, the garage door opener body is metal. If the Tailwind controller is mounted on the side of the garage door opener that is opposite from the WiFi router, the metal body of the opener can act as a shield.
4) The presence or absence of your car can have a profound effect on the WiFi signal. Some customers have reported "I have great WiFi in my garage", but when they moved their car they discovered it dropped dramatically.
5) Our homes are getting more and more WiFi devices in them. You may want to check the DHCP settings on your router. People are often surprised to find out just how many WiFi devices are actually on their network, and in some cases, the number of IP addresses available is simply not enough and needs to be increased - especially when you have guests over for a party!
A simple test to determine if it is a WiFi signal integrity issue is to simply bring the Tailwind controller into the house, closer to the WiFi router / access point and power it back on. If the Tailwind controller connects and stays connected at a location that is closer to the WiFi router and the app is reporting a much better RSSI signal strength, you can be reasonably certain the connectivity issue is caused by either a lack of WiFi signal strength at the original mounting location, or interference from other devices. A WiFi extender would most likely solve the problem.
Comments
4 comments
This article seems to be missing something. Let me write it for you:
Because we know that wifi can be unreliable, and we have basic common sense, we have included the option to use a wired Ethernet connection and bypass all the problems with wifi. To use it, all you need it a cat5e or better cable that runs from the LAN ports on your home router, to your garage, where you plug it into the Ethernet port on the Tailwind, and it will automatically establish and maintain a highly reliable connection.
(Of course, if you DON'T have basic common sense, and have made this device capable of working ONLY with wifi, well, then I guess you can't add that to the article just yet, until you come to your senses and add the Ethernet option. Not that I'm holding my breath, since if your designers were foolish enough to not include it from the start, they probably aren't all that smart. Either that or it adds 15 cents extra cost to each unit, and that would cut a percentage point off your profits)
Thank you for your feedback Fred. Actually during our initial design steps we always talk with potential customers and get feedback from them. I lead the design of the system and received the feedback directly from customers. We asked them if they wanted a wired ethernet port and in our initial design reviews we did build one into the product. Customers answered "YES" that they did want an ethernet port. Then the next question on the survey was "Do you currently have an ethernet cable running to your garage door opener? If not, would you be willing to install one?".
Not one single person in our survey answered "YES", which made the ethernet port a "nice to have" option and certainly an occasional person may actually use it. If 1 customer out of 10,000 customers actually has an ethernet cable at their garage door opener, it simply doesn't make sense to put an ethernet port on the controller.
The ethernet port was removed from the design based on this feedback.
Helpful article, thanks. I didn't know the RSSI readout was available, that is a nice touch (as well as the uptime counter, which I also hadn't noticed).
You might add the suggestion of a wifi extender as a solution. And unless I am mistaken, the Tailwind unit does NOT need to be on the same network as one's phone. That means a plain old extender (with a different network SSID)--very cheap--will do, you don't need the fancier mesh. That worked like a charm for me (24 hours in :) )
Hi Erik,
Glad the WiFi extender worked for you, and generally speaking as long as it is on the same LAN it can work locally even without an internet connection because your router assigns all the IP addresses, even to devices connected to WiFi extenders.
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