safetysaurus wrote:
I'm guessing there might be some interference from the device pumping out RF but I think I can separate the receiver antenna enough to help mitigate that issue.
None whatsoever. The problem is that the Pi 3 on-board wifi is pretty useless when you put a metal case around it since there's no direct attachment for an external antenna. Some people say it works okay but you won't get much in the way of Tx/Rx distance. My unit is only 10ft away and it kept dropping its wireless connection.
The solution is to simply use a USB wifi stick -- but the tricky part is to make sure you get a supported chipset for whatever software you're running. And no, the software isn't created equal. Just because XYZ Linux flavor supports it doesn't mean the necessary dependencies will support wireless networking -- from an "always on" point a view.
Flightaware v3 now supports wifi fully but the chipset support is somewhat limited. I got tired of messing with wifi so I just use an ethernet cable. It's 1000x more reliable and no configuration issues to worry about in software. I don't use the other providers so can't speak for them. Pi 3 users of Flightaware v3 say it's working well for them. I'm presuming they don't use a metal enclosure and/or have a USB adapter.
I'll stick with Ethernet.