Channel-Width Reuse

Ada re-derives this chapter’s own numbers step by step, at full precision

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Ada ADA · CALCULATION AUDIT

Channel-Width Reuse

Bonded channels, DFS timing, and 6 GHz room, ~3 minutes

An installer wants maximum per-link speed and sets every access point in a 5 GHz plan to 80 MHz, then finds only two or three non-DFS 80 MHz channels exist because UNII-1 and UNII-3 together give just 9 twenty-megahertz blocks. Dropping to 40 MHz roughly doubles the independent-channel count and restores reuse in the dense site. This audit asks the question that reuse trade-off invites: exactly how many non-overlapping channels does each channel width leave in the 2.4 GHz, non-DFS 5 GHz, DFS-inclusive 5 GHz, and 6 GHz pools?

Companion to the chapter Wi-Fi Bands and Channels — every number here comes from that chapter.

2.4 GHz reuse

The planning set has three non-overlapping 20 MHz channels: 1, 6, and 11.

20 MHz plan: 3 / 1 = 3 reusable channels
40 MHz plan: floor(3 / 2) = 1 full bonded channel

5 GHz non-DFS pool

UNII-1 contributes 4 channels and UNII-3 contributes 5, so the non-DFS pool has 9 twenty-megahertz blocks.

80 MHz plan: floor((4 + 5) / 4) = floor(9 / 4) = 2
40 MHz plan: floor(9 / 2) = 4

5 GHz with DFS

Adding UNII-2A and UNII-2C gives 4 + 4 + 12 + 5 = 25 twenty-megahertz blocks, but DFS channels require the availability check first.

80 MHz plan: floor(25 / 4) = 6
DFS check: about 60 s before transmit

6 GHz room

The chapter’s ~1200 MHz figure gives the upper-bound width math before local rules, power class, and client support narrow it.

1200 / 20 = 60 blocks; 1200 / 80 = 15
1200 / 160 = 7.5, so 7 full 160 MHz channels

Width planning is integer arithmetic: count the 20 MHz building blocks, divide by the bonded width, then round down because a leftover block cannot form another independent wide channel.

Every number above is taken from the chapter’s own channel-width example and re-derived step by step.