DirecTV Slim Line in Florida for FTA, need help

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Technojunky

Technojunky

SatelliteGuys Pro
Original poster
Sep 3, 2005
190
5
Jensen Beach, FL
I have an old Slim Line dish and I have a FTA receiver. I got as far as putting my own LNB on the dish at 18.5 inches, and the rest is lost knowledge on my part. So I have questions.

What satellites can I get on the slim line in Florida?

What do I set the dish at to start looking?

I have the LNB at the same distance and angle as the LNB that direct TV had on the dish.

I was hoping I could find actual movies or old TV shows to watch , even PBS would be great.

Can anyone assist me in locating a decent satellite to watch?

I have two receivers, the newest one had HDMI, I think it say Amiko, or something like that. That is the one i am trying, I also have an old Pansat 350.

Thanks for any help. Joe
 
What I need help with is understanding the rotation on the slim line, and what it has to be at for my use as FTA. I adjusted the angle for 56 degrees for 91W, but that might not be the best for my location. The dish is on the side of my house that is east, and I can point north and south from east, but not west. So someone who has used a Slim Line successfully is who could help me most. My zip code is 34957 on the east coast of Florida.45 minutes north of West palm beach, if any of this helps anyone help me,.
 
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The best bet it to use a 36 inch round dish for good results if not. Keep your dish at 90 do not skew the dish. Rotate your lnb if you have the correct one for FTA use like a standard lnb. Use an lnb holder with a standard lnb or if you can find a an old Dish Network super dish lnb. I started out with a slimeline dish they were alright until I got a 1 meter.
 
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If the dish is located on the east side of the house and can only point from north to south, it can't be aimed at anything further west than 180° (true) so even SES-2 @ 87W (194.5° true) is out of range. Moving the dish to the south wall could solve that problem if that's an option.
 
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I don't think you will be able to get on that size dish because the PBS channels on KU are dvb-s2 and that dish maybe to small to receive the but you can try 125W otherwise until you can find a bigger dish most of what you are looking can be received OTA but that's no fun lol
 
The most reliable channels would probably be the religious/international stuff on 97w (some interesting stuff even i you're not of any particular faith), NHK on 103w, and if you're really lucky, maybe PBS on 87w. For now, I'd say try to get a lock on 97w even if you don't want the channels there, since it's relatively easy to receive. From there you can tweak the LNB position on the dish until it's as good as possible, rescanning for weak transponders and retweaking the dish. Once the LNBF is in the absolute best position, then go for another satellite (87, 91, 103).

Whenever the budget allows, I'd say get a 90cm dish on the south side of the house. For a while I had mine set up for 103/97/91, then got some skinny LNBFs to get 103/99/95/91. The motor was temperamental on the taller pole, but the wife disapproved of having multiple dishes on the balcony.

125W (too far west where your dish is) has PBS East/West, Create, World, and First Nation Experience

103W has NHK (Japan travel/news/documentaries), Russia Today, COZI (older TV/movies), and four time zones of NBC
99W has JBS (Jewish Broadcasting Service) and Infowars
97 has mostly international/religious, some stuff in English. Some of the religious channels have non-religious shows that are still good to watch. It's good during the Olympics if you want to watch sports instead of human interest stories.
95 has CGTN/CCTV with some stuff in English, some in Chinese with English subtitles
91 has ABC NewsOne and occasional news/sports feeds
87 has Louisiana PBS, The Patient Channel, and some CNN feeds
 
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The problem with getting a big dish is that it has to be mail ordered and the shipping is usually a lot. If I can get a dish in West Palm beach, that is a 45 minute drive, and i can do that. I ordered an LNB that will fit the arm on the Slim Line, I hope it will work. It is this LNb off of ebay. LINEAR DUAL LNB FSS SATELLITE LNBF FOR VIEWSAT PANSAT One of the earlier posters mention putting the dish at 90 and leaving it there, The Slim Line has a lot of adjustments, One is to turn the dish from side to side, another is to twist it, and the only one I understand is elevation. I'm not sure what to do with the other adjustments, so he mentioned to keep it at 90, which adjustment should be at 90? It has been many years since I used FTA, but that is not as much of an issues as the slim-line dish. I will see if I can get a 40 inch dish from West Palm beach if I can't get the Slim-line to work.
 
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Technojunky said:
The problem with getting a big dish is that it has to be mail ordered and the shipping is usually a lot. If I can get a dish in West Palm beach, that is a 45 minute drive, and i can do that. I ordered an LNB that will fit the arm on the Slim Line, I hope it will work. It is this LNb off of ebay. LINEAR DUAL LNB FSS SATELLITE LNBF FOR VIEWSAT PANSAT One of the earlier posters mention putting the dish at 90 and leaving it there, The Slim Line has a lot of adjustments, One is to turn the dish from side to side, another is to twist it, and the only one I understand is elevation. I'm not sure what to do with the other adjustments, so he mentioned to keep it at 90, which adjustment should be at 90? It has been many years since I used FTA, but that is not as much of an issues as the slim-line dish. I will see if I can get a 40 inch dish from West Palm beach if I can't get the Slim-line to work.
Click to expand...

You can get a 90cm GeoSat Pro dish for $100 which includes shipping. Or a 76cm Winegard dish for $59 shipped.
 
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The Slimline is a poor choice to start with as it is set up to work with three orbital slots (it isn't a true parabola). Same with the DISH 1000 or 1000+.

FTA isn't a lock with a smallish prime focus dish. Do you want to watch TV more or less reliably or do you want to spend hours of your time trying to make something work occasionally?
 
Look up ottawaoctane on youtube, he had successfully locked on 125w pbs feeds with a 60e dish from shaw direct. Maybe you could give it a try with the slimline and a good ku lnb. I had 77% quality on my geosatpro 90cm dish in canada.
 
you can definitely use a Slimline dish but you won't have much margin for deteriorated reception conditions such as heavy rain (meaning you will lose reception from time to time).
From your location, if you can't aim west of true south, I'd try 30W Hispasat. Not much in English there but Cubavision is worth it for the movies (usually in original audio with subtitles).

If you move your dish so that you can aim further west, then the satellites mentioned in previous posts are definitely worth a shot.
 
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Technojunky said:
The problem with getting a big dish is that it has to be mail ordered and the shipping is usually a lot. If I can get a dish in West Palm beach, that is a 45 minute drive, and i can do that. I ordered an LNB that will fit the arm on the Slim Line, I hope it will work. It is this LNb off of ebay. LINEAR DUAL LNB FSS SATELLITE LNBF FOR VIEWSAT PANSAT One of the earlier posters mention putting the dish at 90 and leaving it there, The Slim Line has a lot of adjustments, One is to turn the dish from side to side, another is to twist it, and the only one I understand is elevation. I'm not sure what to do with the other adjustments, so he mentioned to keep it at 90, which adjustment should be at 90? It has been many years since I used FTA, but that is not as much of an issues as the slim-line dish. I will see if I can get a 40 inch dish from West Palm beach if I can't get the Slim-line to work.
Click to expand...

I have this exact setup and I have done some experiments with it. Forget the "twist" adjustment, just leave at 90 degrees. The LNBF that you ordered is the same one I use and fits perfectly on the dish. I was able to get the majority of the channels on 89W from New Mexico with solid quality. However, we seldom get rain or bad weather here so your mileage may vary - However, my main dish is the Winegard 76cm and I can get everything on any satellite that I want to see, so you may want to consider that. However, since you are in FL, a larger dish may be necessary due to footprint issues. I am pretty much in the sweet spot of the footprints so I can get away with using smaller dishes including the slim-line.
 
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I have this LNBF, and I am not sure what to set the FTA Amico to for LNBF. The frequencies don't make too much sense to me. I will set the dish to 90 as suggested. I have a simple tone type sat meter, but it isn't helping so far, as I think I don't know exactly what I am doing. So this is a KU lnbf, and it will only get KU satellites as far as I know. Which of them with some decent content is the strongest, so i know which direction to point the dish. Also, what do i set the LNB as. I have a choice of Standard, USER,, and one of two others. Thanks to all who help. Joe
upload_2018-12-4_16-27-0.png
 
Technojunky said:
I have this LNBF, and I am not sure what to set the FTA Amico to for LNBF. The frequencies don't make too much sense to me. I will set the dish to 90 as suggested. I have a simple tone type sat meter, but it isn't helping so far, as I think I don't know exactly what I am doing. So this is a KU lnbf, and it will only get KU satellites as far as I know. Which of them with some decent content is the strongest, so i know which direction to point the dish. Also, what do i set the LNB as. I have a choice of Standard, USER,, and one of two others. Thanks to all who help. JoeView attachment 136212
Click to expand...

It sounds like you have an Amiko receiver. Set the LNB to Standard (10750 is the starting frequency). I would start with 97W, it is a very strong satellite with many different high-powered transponders :)

I've never had much luck with those simple tone signal meters. If you are able, take the receiver outside with a portable TV. You can make your adjustments a lot more easily.
 
comfortably_numb said:
It sounds like you have an Amiko receiver. Set the LNB to Standard (10750 is the starting frequency). I would start with 97W, it is a very strong satellite with many different high-powered transponders :)

I've never had much luck with those simple tone signal meters. If you are able, take the receiver outside with a portable TV. You can make your adjustments a lot more easily.
Click to expand...

Can't set it to standard and get 10750, but in universal I can set the start to 10750, but then it has a second, not sure if I have to set that. I can set the elevation to 53.2 per the dish pointer, and it shows which way to point, but I get nothing above a small yellow level. I put the dish even with the arm that holds it up, and tightened it. I am using the elevation guide on the dish, but I went from 50 to 55 and never saw the level pick up. Could there be something you are taking for granted in my ability, or understanding that you might have to mention?
 
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