118.7 satellite

jordae

Active SatelliteGuys Member
Original poster
Sep 4, 2005
17
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does anybody know if i can catch the 118.7 bird in hawaii?if so with what size dish?we currently are using the 121 sat with a 0ne meter dish.I hope the 118.7 is stronger then 121.thank you.
 
Hawaii

I can see 129 with 1 meter dish, average TP signal is 70%. I could never get 121. On 110 TP 3 is difficult to get only 40% signal, TP 10 is 46% and will go out with clouds. Is this the same for others in Hawaii on 110?
 
jordae said:
does anybody know if i can catch the 118.7 bird in hawaii?if so with what size dish?we currently are using the 121 sat with a 0ne meter dish.I hope the 118.7 is stronger then 121.thank you.


The dish Network business rules say that Hawaii, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and US Virgin Islands can not support the 118 sat location. currently the 118.7 signal is not available oustside the Continental US.

later
 
the dishnetwork business rules;also say we can not get the 129 but i got it,i also got the 121 and i will get the 118.7,even if i have to go to the middle of the ocean.
 
jordae said:
the dishnetwork business rules;also say we can not get the 129 but i got it,i also got the 121 and i will get the 118.7,even if i have to go to the middle of the ocean.

Satellite Footprints are not equal and omnidirectional from every bird. On the contrary, they are built with specific footprints in mind.

Just as 61.5W is much easier to receive from the West Coast than 148W from the East Coast.

You cannot pick up anything you want just because you can see it in the sky. If that was the case, many of us in the lower Southeast US should be able to pick up some European HD since we technically have a line of sight. Remember, it's 5k airmiles from the East Coast to Hawaii. It's less than 3,000 miles across the pond.
 
what are u talking about?dishnetwork offers programing to hawaii so if you have a signal from that bird i don't see why they don't want to turn it on,by the way i'm subscribe to the voom channels of the 129 and i can watch them it just that some of my friends can't get theirs turned on.
 
[Just as 61.5W is much easier to receive from the West Coast than 148W from the East Coast] 61.5w is for the east coast and 148 is the west coast
 
What's being said is, there are a lot of factors that need to be considered.

One of the most important factors is the type of antenna being used to transmit the signal to earth. Just like radio stations may use an omni-directional (360 degrees) antenna to broadcast to a wide area, some stations may use a directional to target a certain geographic area, as well as a partial omni-directional antenna, such as some stations on the gulf coast will use at night to broadcast northward with a strong signal, but a weaker signal to the south so that they do not interfere with stations in Mexico. Although satellites generally broadcast to a fairly large section of the earth (like the U.S. mainland), some satellites have some transponders that are broadcasting to a specific location (single state), and if you are not in that location, you will not pick up that transponder, even though you may pick up another transponder on that satellite.

The second issue would be power of each transponder, as well as your distance from it. As you get further away from that satellite that is orbiting about 22,250 miles from earth, the signal will get a little weaker, then when you try to pick it up on the opposite coast, you are even further, then cross the Pacific and the distance increases more; but then your elevation setting will also change and eventually you are pointing your dish through the earth to get the distant satellite which won't work. (The satellites follow the curvature of the earth.)

In both cases, you may be within the primary target area and have no problem. But as you get to the edge of the target area, the signal will decrease, and as stated - light clouds may block the (weak) signal. All of the above is also dependent on if you can draw a straight line from your dish to the satellite without having to go through a building or mountain.

It's very unlikely a satellite company will guarantee a signal on the outside edge of the effective footprint of the satellite signal. However, that doesn't mean some customer service reps wouldn't sell/turn-on the service. Turning on some of the services/programs would be a hit and miss, but most importantly, probably wouldn't be good company practice.

I'm in the middle of the U.S. and do not have any problems picking up all of their satellites. However, some transponders are not pointed to me, so I either pick up a very week signal from them, or in most cases, no signal at all.

Reading all of the terms and conditions and other propaganda, there seems to always be an exclusion for HI, AK, and PR; and I believe it to be based on what the "effective signals" are for each area.
 
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jordae said:
what are u talking about?dishnetwork offers programing to hawaii so if you have a signal from that bird i don't see why they don't want to turn it on,by the way i'm subscribe to the voom channels of the 129 and i can watch them it just that some of my friends can't get theirs turned on.


You clearly don't know the history of Echostar 5 and that its footprint is off by 20 degrees . If there ever was an Hawaiian lobe its now somewhere half way between Honolulu and Japan giving some whales a great signal. Further research makes it appear that there was never a Hawaiian lobe on E5, which is why it was replaced by E8/E10.

If you cannot understand that all satellite footprints are not created equal, just ask those in the USA that recently lost BEV 82W when an old Directv satellite was moved into replace it.

61.5W which was used for Voom was a tricky reception shot from the West Coast, but very doable. The inverse, 148W from the East Coast has a MUCH WEAKER SIGNAL on the East Coast.

You are approaching this as the satellite has a antenna on its bottom side transmitting out every way equally towards the earth.

Again, I am just saying that no matter how big of an antenna you want to put up, if 129W doesnt have a footprint over Hawaii (and I dont know how strong that footprint is) then you will never get it.

However, I assume that there is some type of signal there - just don't confuse the fact that you can get any of the dbs satellites just with a big enough antenna.
 
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jordae said:
[Just as 61.5W is much easier to receive from the West Coast than 148W from the East Coast] 61.5w is for the east coast and 148 is the west coast

Again, Voom had 61.5 and nothing else. It was for the USA. It's tricky to get on the West Coast, but if you have a line of site, the signal is there.

On the otherhand, 148W is the inverse. Its a low line of site, but even if you have that line of site, the signal level is 40 points lower than 61.5W on the West Coast.
 
nice drawing,i guess u didn't understand what i said.I HAVE THE 129 programming on my tv i used a 90 cm dish my signal is 73-80 on all transponders and i know about footprints of satellites. All maps ,footprints,drawings(sorry i still like your drawing) don't mean anything to me my job is to get a signal period.My original question was about the 118.7 bird to begin with not the 129.Gotta get back to my kung fu channel,thank you.
 
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