Hi. Please be gentle - just a preacher here. We are updating our school church wifi and have FAP433s and 431s. I need to mount one or other on a wall in the church sanctuary about 8 feet high cause it is the only space available. I know nothing about the antenna'd 433's - how to point them or such. Am I best going with one of them, though unsightly, to best cover the space rather than a down pointing 431. Thanks for any guidance anyone can offer.
Cool that you try new ways. With a little bit of background info this setup will work nicely for you.
APs send out radiation in concentric rings around the antenna's long axis. Most often, from 'far' away (far compared to the wavelength, which is millimeters) this looks like a sphere around the antenna. So, pointing the antenna will not have much of an influence regarding the radiation pattern. What you can expect on the other hand is that _behind_ the AP (the faceplate) there will be comparatively low field strength, if only for the dampening of the wall/ceiling/metal housing of the AP itself.
As a rule of thumb, one AP can be sufficient for an area of around 300 square meters (~ 1000 sq ft) if there are no obstacles, like walls, columns etc. The FortiAPs you mention are quite powerful, and I would not mount them too close to each other to avoid interference.
As for the placement, as a first approximation you can handle WiFi radiation like light. For fine tuning, depending on the OS version on your FGT, the WiFi monitor will help you finding the optimal mounting spots, as it shows the field strength the client 'sees' when connected.
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