How do I test baby monitor range in a loft conversion on a three-storey terrace?

Why is a loft conversion a harder radio path?

A loft bedroom adds a third floor and usually a tight stair, steel, and a hatch or fire door. The path to the back kitchen is loft → middle landing → ground-floor hall → rear wall. BT groups wall material, thickness, dampness and how many walls sit between the units; floors are extra solids on that same list of obstructions.

BT's Video Baby Monitor 6000 sheet quotes 250 metres outdoors and 50 metres indoors. Those are line-of-sight product figures, not a loft-to-garden measurement. Which? walks through three rooms and then outdoors — a useful method, not a three-storey terrace map.

How do I test loft-to-kitchen and loft-to-garden?

Keep the camera in the loft sleep space, a metre from the cot, cable out of reach. Walk the parent unit the routes you will actually take.

1. 1
   Loft landing Baseline outside the loft bedroom door, stair hatch or fire door as it will be at night.
2. 2
   Upper stair and half-landing Pause on the flight down to the middle floor. This is the first stacked-floor stop.
3. 3
   Middle-floor lounge or front room Stand where you actually sit. A pass here is common and does not finish the test.
4. 4
   Lower stair to the hall Second flight. Log the foot of this stair separately from the middle lounge.
5. 5
   Back kitchen Sink, then a metre from the fridge and microwave (BT's interference list). This is the loft-to-kitchen result.
6. 6
   Patio, then far fence Only start the garden once the kitchen result is written down. Patio and end-of-garden are two stops, not one.

The Lullaby Trust still wants the baby in the same room as you for the first six months. A loft camera does not replace that, and a long range test does not move the cot into a loft to 'get signal'.

Which routes should I write down?

What if the lounge works but the kitchen does not?

That pair of results is typical on a long terrace: the middle-floor room sits under the loft, the kitchen sits at the far end of the ground floor. Do not average them. Placement changes that do not move the cot:

• Aim the camera toward the stair, still a metre from the cot, rather than into a chimney breast or a water tank.
• Retest with the loft door closed, then open. Night-time is usually closed.
• Hold the parent unit at hand height on the lower flight — a pocket against your body is an extra barrier.
• Move the parent unit a metre from kitchen metal before you decide the third floor is 'too far'.

How is this different from a two-up two-down test?

A standard terrace walk is one stair and one floor. A loft conversion adds a second stair and a second floor, often with extra timber, steel and a tighter well. Reuse the stair stops (top, half-landing, foot) on both flights. Do not treat a first-night 'upstairs' test as a substitute — that walk usually stops on the middle landing.

Does loft range change safer-sleep rules?

No. The Lullaby Trust says there is no research showing monitors help prevent SIDS, and that a monitor never replaces supervision. Room-sharing for six months still applies if the baby sleeps in the loft — the parent stays in that room, and the walk-test is for later trips downstairs.

In shortIn short: camera in the loft, parent unit down both flights, then kitchen, then patio, then far fence. A middle-floor lounge pass is not a kitchen pass and not a garden pass.