Metal 52 AC & hAP - can't connect to some APs

RouterOS Beginner Basics
1

Hi everyone, I’m brand new to Mikrotik and networking in general, but I’m seeking to recreate the Wifi Ranger setup that is popular among RVers by using the Metal 52AC and hAP, which to my knowledge is the hardware sold in the Wifi Ranger kit.

I followed this guide to set it up since as far as I understand, the Groove and Metal are very similar.

The hardware seems to be working fine. If I hotspot my phone and have the Metal connect to it, it works. There are two public wifi networks at this state park. One has a standard WPA2 key, the other has no password and instead has a public wifi sign-in landing page. Both of these show up when I scan, but when I try to connect to either of them, the status says “searching for network” and never successfully connects.

I’ve tried both the quick and the manual ways listed in the guide, and I’ve tried from the browser interface as well as WinBox, but now I’ve hit the point where my (extremely) limited networking knowledge has me stumped.

Any advice?

Edit: While the status never changes from “searching for network”, if I go to the terminal and type “/l” then “p” to check the log, it says

@wlan1: failed to connect, on 2422/20/g(-34dBm), authentication timeout

Does that help?

2

Export your current configuration. /export file=yourfilename then go to “Files” and download yourfilename.rsc to your computer and open it in a text editor. Copy the text and place it in a post using the code display: option.

This will let everyone see how your Metal is setup and may allow someone to advise you as to your problem.

It would also be good to give the signal strength (RX)of the desired AP.