btw: I haven’t followed this long and excellent sounding thread. But just FYI - I discovered that the current code base was transmitting at a lower power than I thought, so soon (I’ll release the build next week) you should be able to get a few dBm more power.
You’ll definitely want the ‘router mode’ feature before permanently installing the router nodes. That will definitely be done in the next few weeks.
Also - I haven’t carefully checked what radios you are proposing but the new sx1262 based TBEAM I bet has quite a bit more range than the more common old design (just based on the data sheets). However, I don’t think anyone has rigorously tested this theory(?).