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  1. GrumpyGuy

    Here is some humor to brighten your day

    Consider my day brightened, Ice! ... but note that the pubic servant's identity remains private, while private citizen's full name and age is made public - a sign of the times, I suppose. Here is another sign of the times:
  2. GrumpyGuy

    Ingenious or idiotic? You decide

    ...very carefully. Even if the main body of ice is 5 feet thick, there are going to be thin spots, most notably near shore, and it is all prone to being shoved around by shifting winds. The force generated by the wind blowing over vast expanses of ice is tremendous. Earth or ice, something...
  3. GrumpyGuy

    Ingenious or idiotic? You decide

    I've never tried to track the arc from an ice shanty, but I can testify that lake ice moves. They probably need to tweak the azimuth every time the wind changes directions.
  4. GrumpyGuy

    Mounting on top of a roof

    My preferred solution for roof mounting utilizes a vent sleeve. They are typically used to weatherproof roof penetrations for sewer vents. Here are two views of the same installation - one as seen from above the roof, and one from below:
  5. GrumpyGuy

    Spark Gap

    It might be worth pointing out that concrete is actually a better conductor than most soils. The Ufer Ground - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia@@AMEPARAM@@/wiki/File:Nuvola_apps_ksim.png" class="image"><img alt="Stub icon"...
  6. GrumpyGuy

    Capital Gains Tax and the Dishes You Left Behind

    I took the all the FTA gear. I left the second-story roof mounted Dish 500 and 1000 ft. of coax (in the walls.) The increase in basis should save me enough to buy a couple of nice dual LNBFs. Not a bad trade off IMHO. If I understand correctly, losses by calamity can be used to raise basis...
  7. GrumpyGuy

    Capital Gains Tax and the Dishes You Left Behind

    Today I discovered something in the tax code that may be of interest to other satellite hobbyist / homeowners. In certain situations, the Feds demand capital gains tax when you sell a home:rant: Some home-related expenditures can be used to reduce the taxable gains, but others are forbidden...
  8. GrumpyGuy

    BLSA, help request, database file downloads from SatcoDX

    Quote from the BLSA readme.txt (Version 1.1) file: "3) If you have access to DC2 and/or DVB databases in CSV format, save them on top of the dc2.csv and mpg.csv placeholders. Otherwise visit SatcoDX.com and download *.BLSA for the satellites you're interested in..." I've poured over...
  9. GrumpyGuy

    AMC6 OK today?

    The mux transponder is very low for me today, hardly even there. Last night it was fine. Other known active transponders on AMC6 seem to be unaffected.
  10. GrumpyGuy

    I need a weak circular signal

    Anole brings up some good points. After sleeping on it I decided to strike some of my suggestions. I would stick to flat, solid, non-conductive, non-porous materials securely but temporarily fastened to the face of the LNB cover - e.g. plastic cut from discarded household items. Multiple...
  11. GrumpyGuy

    I need a weak circular signal

    Another option might be to artificially attenuate the signal from a strong beam with a physical obstruction of some sort - foliage, plastic, glass, a coarse metal lattice, etc. Not sure what you are up to, but there might some advantage in having the ability to vary the strength of the signal as...
  12. GrumpyGuy

    Are you approachable as a SatelliteGuy?

    Don't you know that's illegal? If you can't get all of my favorite channels, why bother? Ever heard of Dish Network? Are you trying to contact aliens? ...and that is how GrumpyGuy got his name.
  13. GrumpyGuy

    Sadoun Shipped FAST

    I ordered a Gbox V3000 from Sadoun 3:30 PM yesterday. It arrived 19 hrs. later, at 10:30 AM today - 190 miles, via UPS Ground, to the back roads of Amish Country, two weeks before Christmas, in a snowstorm - I'm amazed. The box is darn cold. To avoid condensation I'm letting it warm up before...
  14. GrumpyGuy

    "pirates" take european parliment seat

    Until someone can convince me I was born with a right to be entertained, let them lock-down their content in any way they see fit. If I don't like the terms, they keep their product, I keep my cash - no harm, no foul, liberty and justice for all.
  15. GrumpyGuy

    How do you deal with snow

    The average winter here features about 130 inches of snowfall. Never have much trouble with accumulation on offset dishes, I just mount them high enough keep them from being buried. My 12 foot Orbitron deep dish is another matter, but I can often clear it without even going outside. While...
  16. GrumpyGuy

    Accuracy of elevation scale on 33" dish

    Kooguy, are you sure the LNBF is in fact a UNIVERSAL, and not the more common STANDARD type? Even with 16 degrees of skew error, if everything else were correct, I would expect Kooguy to have seen at least some rise in Q - perhaps not enough Q for a reliable lock, but at least something. But...
  17. GrumpyGuy

    Accuracy of elevation scale on 33" dish

    I feel your pain, Kooguy. Yesterday I was doing a site survey at a friend's place. I knew I would not be able to get a full view of the arc from any one spot on his property. With compass and protractor I found a spot where a dish would just barely see 74-125 ... maybe. It was going to be tight...
  18. GrumpyGuy

    Home built Non-Pen Mount

    Great idea ... very elegant.
  19. GrumpyGuy

    CBC Radio on Anik F1R C, Encrypted

    This mux includes a feed from CBC to Sirius, complete with station I.D.s by CBC on-air personalities, indicating "You are listening to Sirius channel 137." Speculation: Sirius' is paying the CBC to provide this "ready to air" programming. Sirius' business model is, in part, based on customers...
  20. GrumpyGuy

    CBC Radio on Anik F1R C, Encrypted

    Anik F1R C band (107.3°) 3970 H, SR 2620 As of yesterday afternoon, PowerVu encryption has been applied to the following CBC Radio feeds: 1TCEN/1TATL SIRIUS RADIO 3 SIRIUS RADIO ONE Bummer.
  21. GrumpyGuy

    what is this dish

    Yup, those are fine dishes. Great find, Cruzin! Here is an installation guide for that family of CM dishs. Here is an old thread showing what I did with a .9 meter version of that dish, still holding up just fine. ...and a spec sheet for the 1 meter version, attached.
  22. GrumpyGuy

    Identify this LNB

    Thanks for your input, guys. I feels like a few Norsats I have ... very dense with a thick white ceramic-like finish, but it could be from another mfg. Guess I will just have to play with it a bit.
  23. GrumpyGuy

    Identify this LNB

    Wish I had photographed the dish before tearing it down, but ... The LNB/feedhorn combination in the attached pic was mated to an off-white fiberglass dish measuring 1.26 meters wide X 1.36 meters tall with a short focal length. Until recently it was used to provide in-store music at a True...
  24. GrumpyGuy

    Are we FTA folks insane?

    From the outside looking in, most hobbies are at best pointless - "That's great, Uncle Joe. You sure have collected a lot of stamps. Now what?" No doubt many of us spend more time working on our systems and scrounging hardware than we do watching television - last time I sat down and watched...