Hello,

I am using TL-WR941ND and want to turn off the antennas in order that the router may not emit radiation. The model does not have a way to switch off the antennas.

From what I understand, a router with the antennas removed manually will emit more radiation at close range than a router with antennas on, because it seems that the radiation field will be more focused at close range, although it will be weaker at a longer distance.

If I open the case of the router and cut the wires of the antennas at the places where they are attached to the internal part of the device, will the radiation be totally removed, or will it become stronger (more focused) at close range?

If new firmware is installed in the router, will it have the option to turn off the radio signal from the antennas?

If you're using OpenWRT already, you can disable the radio.

nitroshift

A person who repairs routers once told me that turning off the WiFi prevents any data from being transmitted, whereas the antennas continue emitting radio waves without data.
Do you know whether the DD-WRT firmware can disable the radiation completely, or will it only turn of the transmission of data, whereas the antennas will continue emitting radio waves as usual but without data?

Hey there.

Could you please explain what you're trying to do?
If you're on your way cutting wires to prevent the router from sending, I get the feeling you're pretty close to wrap yourself in thin foil like Charles „Chuck“ McGill does o_O.

I have a TP-Link 4900 which is wall mounted 10cm away from the back of a cheap Toshiba flat screen TV. It's not the wireless broadcast of my router that conflicts with that TV but the CPU. When I get the routers CPU to 100% (a simple bash loop counting to infinity is enough) I see the signal quality meter of the TV decrease to 15% and experience MPEG artefacts all over the place down to completely shutting down the signal and blacking the screen out. When the CPU stops counting, signal quality gets back to previous high value and everything is fine again.

There's no difference between attached antennas and detached antennas.

I ended up wrapping both, the router box as well as the back side of my TV in thin foil. Now everything works like a charm.

Here's what the thing looks like:

The thing is: Maybe there are better ways then cutting antenna wires?

Regards,
Stephan.

Thank you for the explanations. I am trying to remove radiation from the router, since some sources say that that it is harmful to be very close to a router all day long. There may be better ways than cutting antenna wires.

Do you know what metal the foil should be made of? One source said that some metals can reinforce the radio waves instead of removing them.

The radio transmitter in a wifi system is pulsed on only when there is something to transmit, either data or a "beacon" packet which are transmitted 10 times per second to announce the name of the network. 

The transmitter is not on all the time.  The network could not work in that case because the receiver is only usable while the transmitter is off.

It will not transmit anything ever if you disable wifi completely in the software.  Even stock firmware should have this option.

Most channels in the 5Ghz range emit 100 Milli-Watt (mW) of power, which is much less than a typical cell phone when we have it held against our head.

In the 2.4Ghz range channels typically emit 1 Watt of power.

Simply disabling Wifi will do the job you need.

(Last edited by davidc502 on 29 May 2017, 23:11)

Thank you for explaining how the router works and what amount of radiation it emits. I had previously thought that antennas continue emitting signals without data after turning WiFi off in the software.

Can you explain why the receiver is usable only when the transmitter is off?

If Wifi IS NOT disabled, SSID broadcasts only happen every so often, so this means the transmitter is not on all the time. In other words, the transmitter is on when data is being transferred back and forth. If you're not transferring data between clients and the wifi router, the transmitter isn't emitting radiation all the time anyway.

maybe the radio doesn't get disabled if you use luci to disable wifi interface because it sets option disabled '1' only for wifi-iface.

add option disabled '1' to wifi-device section too

It receives and transmits on the same frequency.  So while a packet is being transmitted, the strong local signal would overpower any signals from other wifi devices.  The receiver will receive a copy of the transmitted packet, which isn't useful so it is just switched off while transmitting.

That may be true. You can wrap your router in an aluminum thin foil to ground.

OTOH, I don't know if the total transmission power from thousands of satellites hovering above the earth with their antennas pointed to earth and millions of radio stations is more of a concern than the power emitted from your WiFi router. In this case, you may also wanna coat your room and/or whole house with a heavy led pain and be sure to ground it too. This way, radiation from any radio sources, including satellites etc., won't be able to penetrate into your room or whole house, respectively. Please be sure to read all warnings on any led base paints. Failing that, perhaps moving into a cave may be safer!

BTW, did you also take into consideration that any electrical wiring inside your house also radiates electrical waves that may be harmful to one's health?

A cave means a lot higher natural radioactive radiation usually. Turning off the radio at least saves energy.

All electronic devices apparently emit radiation. But it is so small that there is no concern about that. The reason why some have been concerned about WiFi routers is because they have antennas designed to emit radio waves.