topic Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi in Nest Wifi

Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

agresens — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 15:08:43 GMT

I have Google Wifi set up in mesh mode with 4 nodes. It works great!

I would like to set up a SECOND wifi access point, however, for my children's homework. I want to integrate this second wifi access point with OpenDNS to restrict what sites they go to when they connect to this second WIFI hotspot.

I bought a cheap Netgear router for this purpose and connected this to the ethernet port on the main Google Wifi device but that does not provide internet to the Netgear device. I have read that I need "bridge mode" for that but that is not available on Google Wifi when it is in mesh mode.

I have tried the following configurations (the --> arrow indicates an ethernet connection):

Cable Modem --> Google Wifi mesh main node --> Netgear router (does not work)

Cable Modem --> Netgear (in bridge mode) --> Google Wifi mesh main mode (does not work)

Can anyone tell me how I could configure this? Could I purchase another separate Google Wifi hotspot for the homework wifi and then enable the bridge mode on that device to the Google Mesh?

Would this work?

Cable Modem --> Google Wifi (non-mesh) --> Google Wifi in Mesh

Thanks

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

MichaelP — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 19:44:05 GMT

Hello @agresens

I know you tried this already, but this is the one configuration I think you want:

Cable Modem --> Google Wifi mesh main node --> Netgear router

Make sure the Netgear router is not in bridge mode itself, and make extra sure it's WAN Ethernet port is connected to the Google WiFi primary unit's LAN Ethernet port. If that doesn't work, try a different Ethernet cable or connect something else to that cable instead of the Netgear router to make sure that Ethernet connection is good. If it still doesn't work, I'd focus on the Netgear router itself next.

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

agresens — Wed, 27 Oct 2021 21:07:26 GMT

Thanks for the reply. I thought I would need to configure "bridge mode" on the Google Wifi to bridge the Netgear router but that "bridge mode" is not available on the Google Wifi when it is in mesh mode. I will give it a shot though!

Thanks

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

MichaelP — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 13:53:12 GMT

No, the Google WiFi will not need to be in bridge mode for this configuration (and in fact, it can't be since you have a mesh with secondary units). But, the Netgear router will also be a NAT firewall, so the clients on that network will be behind "double NAT". That shouldn't be a problem for this use-case.

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

agresens — Thu, 28 Oct 2021 14:23:28 GMT

Thank you!

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

Jeff — Mon, 01 Nov 2021 20:08:45 GMT

Hey, aggression.

It looks like you and @MichaelP were able to find a resolution on this, but I wanted to just follow up and make sure you were all set. If you need any more help, please let me know.

Thanks!

Re: Adding second Wifi Access Point to Google Mesh Wifi

Jeff — Wed, 03 Nov 2021 21:19:30 GMT

Hi, everyone.
As we haven't had any activity here recently I'm going to go ahead and close the thread. If you have more to add, feel free to start a new discussion.
Thanks