5 LNB dish weather issues

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spartyinmd

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Oct 25, 2005
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It seems the new 5 LNB dish is very sensative to weather. We had a moderate rain event here in WV tonight and we lost the satellite signal completely for about 20 minutes. When we had the single LNB we had no such problems in light rain events and snow. It this an issue folks have seen with the new 5 LNB dish?
 
The dish has to be tweaked perfectly to get the highest signal for the new the sats and even then your signal will be lost more frequently.
 
Man I really hate when the people at the company never tell you this crap when you sign up. I would have never agreed to getting HD from D* if this was the case. I would have just dealt with the lower picute quality until they got their act together. I may just complain outright and demand the old dish put back instead of having this fixed. I can't believe they are getting away with this.
 
I think you must have some peaking issues, everyone I have talked to and read about say this setup is the LEAST susceptible to rain fade. What is your LoS like as well?

This is not an attempt to defraud or scam anyone; so lets not let the thread go that route. Heck it could even be possible that you may even have some accidentally damaged gear.

I would seek the facts before I started claiming scams; plus anyone that has ever read about DBS knows that rain fade can happen in some instances.
 
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tfoss said:
The dish has to be tweaked perfectly to get the highest signal for the new the sats

True for all the satellites; new and old, on all satellite systems.



and even then your signal will be lost more frequently.

Not true.
 
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I have had my AT-9 up since March. As anyone that follows the news knows we have had incredible rains here in the Northeast lately. I have little to no loss of signal through this time period.
 
My AT9 is mounted on the back of my house....
I have no neighboors to the west of me yet.... so it is an open field for about a mile.

The dish is completely exposed to all the wind/rain/snow

We have had some pretty good storms so far this year, and I have had next to ZERO loss of signal since having it installed in January.

My signal strength on my DTivos is up in the high 90's (like 97-98) for most transponders on 101

On the H20 I am in the upper 70's cracking 80 every once and a while (as we all know the H20 is using some new algorithims or something to determin signal strength)
 
If you read various posts about rain fade you’ll find most everyone says the 5LNB dish is an improvement in rain fade over their previous dish. The ratio of people complaining about something on this (or any) forum is usually huge compared to those praising, so that reinforces the fact. It sounds like your installer may have overlooked something in the alignment or mounting of the dish. Call them up and get it fixed, they owe it to you at no cost.
Bob
spartyinmd said:
Man I really hate when the people at the company never tell you this crap when you sign up. I would have never agreed to getting HD from D* if this was the case. I would have just dealt with the lower picute quality until they got their act together. I may just complain outright and demand the old dish put back instead of having this fixed. I can't believe they are getting away with this.
 
I have only had rain fade with my AT-9 once since it was installed in march. And it was a complete deludge of rain for 5 min that caused it. It does much better than the other dishes for rain fade. I will not let them replace it with a slimline for anything.
 
PSB said:
Have a look at this soloution to Rain Fade!

WORKS GREAT!

http://www.satelliteguys.us/showthread.php?t=33137

I disagree...
I have use this product and have found it to not help much at least in my situation.

Keep in mind, rain fade is caused by storm clouds being between your dish and the actual satellite, not by rain hitting your dish.

Unless you can control the weather, you will have rain fade from time to time.
The AT-9 appears to be a bit better with rain fade, probably because the over all surface of the dish is a bit bigger. :eureka

Jimbo
 
I know when it is going to downpour by rain fade. When the storm is coming from the SW and it is heavy the rainfade will start about 5 mins before the rain.
 
I make it through Arizona monsoons and dust storms with less than a 3% "failure / fade" rate that lasts any more than 2 mins, and that is with the smaller PhaseIII.

If you are getting fade every time and that long with an AT9 I would get the signal strength / peak checked. I would possibly recommend the same of you are talking about a PhaseIII.
 
Well considering I am the one also having problems with pixellation of my DC locals it probably was my installer who said...it is happening all the time and D* knows that it is but won't tell customers....I have a good feeling that the situation is the Dish alignment. I also notice on my HD receiver the SD channels (101 degree) that they are all 50's to 60's so that may be a big issue. I have a feeling the tweaking of the machine is WAY off. THe regular SD receivers are all low 90s but the HD one is not..it has that low band thing on the back of the box...not an installer so have really no idea what it really does. They (D*) are coming out Saturday due to the pixellation issue so I will alert the guy to this problem as well.
 
There have been many posts about miss aligned AT9 dishes, but very few about increased rain fade. You probably have a slightly miss aligned dish I haven't had any rain fade since Feb on my AT9, but North Texas is in a drought.
 
spartyinmd said:
Well considering I am the one also having problems with pixellation of my DC locals it probably was my installer who said...it is happening all the time and D* knows that it is but won't tell customers....I have a good feeling that the situation is the Dish alignment. I also notice on my HD receiver the SD channels (101 degree) that they are all 50's to 60's so that may be a big issue. I have a feeling the tweaking of the machine is WAY off. THe regular SD receivers are all low 90s but the HD one is not..it has that low band thing on the back of the box...not an installer so have really no idea what it really does. They (D*) are coming out Saturday due to the pixellation issue so I will alert the guy to this problem as well.
Sounds like you have a H-20 ?
The H-20 sat signals generally are a bit lower than most other receivers.
Numbers in the upper 70 and low 80's wouuld be considered acceptable for that receiver.
IF you are not using the H-20 then they hopefully will be in the 90's or possibly upper 80's.

Anyway, 50's and 60's is too low regardless of different receivers.

Jimbo
 
It is funny I just had that same problem with pixelation and bad rain fade. I then had the installer come back out, I got a different one this time, and he said the first installer did a very sloppy job. He remounted the dish, put 3 stabilizing arms and I am now in the high 80's low 90's with the H20 and high 90's on my other boxes. Just have them come back out and take a look. I am very happy with the AT-9 now that it is setup correctly.
 
Yeah I have a sneaky suspicion that teh installer just was rushing the job when he came out the first time.

And yes I have an H20. Since I have the other D15(???) receivers those are relatively high in teh low 90s and high 80s but the H20 one are ridiculously low. I noticed that right away as I had D* in my apartment complex before getting it in my new home (The only option was D* in my apartment complex...yes it was a ritsy place :) ) so I definately knew something was really wrong. Hopefully tomorrow when the guy comes out it will be all better.
 
Also just so you know probably what is happening is that the installer is trying to peak it for the ku band and not the ka. I believe the ka band is not as wide as the ku. But it could be the other way around, I can;t remember. In either case though, if the installer does go for the wider 101 band then your HDs will be off, and the signal on the h20 will be in the 50's while the others are in the 90's. It was the exact same situation that I had.

I hope that it works out for you and let us know how it goes.
 
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