72W, 83W & 91W with SuperDish

[jscud]

Last fall I picked up a discarded Superdish (121,119 & 110) at the dump. It works well enough for FTA, but does not give me as much signal strength as my Primestar dish. The good news is that I found it was relatively easy to add multiple LNBs to the arm.

Through EBay I picked up 2 more Superdish LNBs (each having one DSS LNB and one DBS LNB) for less than the cost of shipping. I bolted the 'new' DSS LNBs on the arm with an angle iron cross piece. The DBS LNBs were removed to allow the proper horizontal spacing. I plugged up the DBS wave guides with styrofoam. One of the DBS waveguides had to be cut off because of space. The 3 satellites I aimed for were AMC6 @ 72W, AMC9 @ 83W and Galaxy 17 @ 91W. I set the dish skew to 110 [(72W skew 0.6 + 91W skew 19.3) divided by 2] + 90. This actually comes out to the skew number for the 83W which is perfect since that is my weakest signal.

First I peaked the dish for 83W. Then slid the 91W LNB horizontally along the angle iron for max. signal. Lastly I adjusted the 72W LNB horizontally for max signal, but I found I also needed to raise vertically a bit. The dish skew setting probably could be off a bit, but at this point I was afraid to mess up the 83W signal. My setup is on a temporary tripod. I had to move the tripod around a few times to catch all satellites. That is the price I pay for living in the woods. After testing this out for a few days, I will permanently mount it on a pole.

Here are the photos. The dish on the right in the lasts picture is my EA 1000.4 dish.

 

[the_man_one]

nice mods

 

[KE4EST]

I like that. I have done a lot of experiments with Superdishes. Mainly cause at one time I had tons of the used things.

 

[kodaz]

i am using one for 125 with the old fss lnb. works fine and i have montana pbs.
They are not awesome, but they work.
the mounts are modifiable. you can take an old dish 500 pole mount and stick it in the super so that you can stick it on an inch and a half pole. (if you were lacking a 2 inch pole.) they are not horrible dishes.

 

[RT-Cat]

Nice setup jscud.
.
Ah, Superdish! For the last 5 days I have been trying to get one to hit 83. That darn fss lnb would only pick up 97 and all those "I can't understand a word they are saying" channels. It would not pick up anything. I try for about 1/2 hour and put stuff away for another day when I can't get things to work. Well on the 5th day and no luck, I tried a little mod also. I took the dual lnb device just like in your picture no.1 off the dish and set a geo sat pro on there just to see what would happen. Turned on the meter and there was signal and some quality! With a little piece of wood, duct tape, and two plastic wire ties I got the lnb locked down. Put the cover on and finished the tuning. Got 50-52 for Tuff, RTV, and PBJ. 70 for WIAA sports. Holds good until Q drops below 40 so it works. Still can't figure why that fss would not work on 83. I have one on 72 for NBC mux and that works great.
.

 

[jscud]

Nice setup jscud.
.
Ah, Superdish! For the last 5 days I have been trying to get one to hit 83.

Thanks. Yes, 83W is a tough one to get. It took me quite a while to find it also. Funny that it was so easy to pick up with my old Primestar dish. The 72W & 91W satellites were a snap with the SuperDish in comparison.

 

[Mr Tony]

very nice

 

[joeroscoe1957]

I got a superdish with 3 lnb's (a stacked fss , a dp dbs & a unmarked lnb) on given to me this week . Was planning to try it on 83w . If I use the stacked fss lnb do I scan 11735 H 4444 or 12865 H 4444 for RTV ??

 

[jscud]

I got a superdish with 3 lnb's (a stacked fss , a dp dbs & a unmarked lnb) on given to me this week . Was planning to try it on 83w . If I use the stacked fss lnb do I scan 11735 H 4444 or 12865 H 4444 for RTV ??

12865 H 4440

 

[RT-Cat]

I got a superdish with 3 lnb's (a stacked fss , a dp dbs & a unmarked lnb) on given to me this week . Was planning to try it on 83w . If I use the stacked fss lnb do I scan 11735 H 4444 or 12865 H 4444 for RTV ??

12865 H 4440

Interesting. I get RTV on 11735/H/4439 and get nothing on 12865/H/4440 ?

RT.

 

[jscud]

Interesting. I get RTV on 11735/H/4439 and get nothing on 12865/H/4440 ?

RT.

Check your settings. I have the LNB set for Single and LO 10.750.

 

[dotbatman]

i am using one for 125 with the old fss lnb. works fine and i have montana pbs.
They are not awesome, but they work.
the mounts are modifiable. you can take an old dish 500 pole mount and stick it in the super so that you can stick it on an inch and a half pole. (if you were lacking a 2 inch pole.) they are not horrible dishes.

How exactly do you use the dish 500 mount and put it on the super dish? I've got a Dish 500 and I don't see any way to easily swap the mounts. None of the holes on the superdish match the dish 500 or the dish plus(? it says "TurboHD" on it)?

 

[RT-Cat]

Check your settings. I have the LNB set for Single and LO 10.750.

Same setting....

 

[kodaz]

How exactly do you use the dish 500 mount and put it on the super dish? I've got a Dish 500 and I don't see any way to easily swap the mounts. None of the holes on the superdish match the dish 500 or the dish plus(? it says "TurboHD" on it)?

I only used the pole connection part!! and put it on the old metal super, not the fiberglass one

 

[dotbatman]

Do you have any pictures? Did you have to drill the holes larger or use washers or anything? I'm working on making this mod right now, and it doesn't seem like it's going to work.

 

[kodaz]

it really is a simple as it looks.

 

[jscud]

Lately reception of the 72 satellite on my multi-LNB Superdish has been iffy. I get a signal strength in the mid 70's, but signal quality of low 60's on the MUX channels. This usually means no video or audio.

I am wondering if my assumption of adjusting the dish skew is correct....setting the dish skew for the center LNB. Is the Superdish skew just used to match the arc of the satellite belt? Does it still correctly skew the linear polarized DSS LNB?

Is it a better idea not to skew the Superdish, but just skew the LNBs since I am not using the circular polarized DBS LNBs?

 

[kodaz]

I thought the DSS was circular, i may be wrong, but it seems like it was. I cant say about skewing to match center lnb, i have always skewed to match outermost lnbs average- with good results.
An exception would be if you were trying to hit bird 97 on a small dish, in that case you kind of favor the weaker signal lnb.

multil lnb setups do benefit from skewing the dish.
circular/linear is not significant when you want MANY lnbz on a dish, skewing becomes important to maximize signal to all lnbs.

somebody jump in if i have this wrong.

 

[i4tas]

you need to skew all 3 lnb's to different skews. Although they all have very similar skews and skewing the dish to the average should do an okay job. I would skew the dish for the middle lnb and have the middle lnb set at 0 skew, then the wing lnbs will need to be skewed to the difference, one will go clockwise from center & the other the opposite.

 

[kodaz]

you need to skew all 3 lnb's to different skews. Although they all have very similar skews and skewing the dish to the average should do an okay job. I would skew the dish for the middle lnb and have the middle lnb set at 0 skew, then the wing lnbs will need to be skewed to the difference, one will go clockwise from center & the other the opposite.

looking back at the pics, i could not tell if they were FSS lnbs . i was not sure.
the above post is 100 percent accurate for linear lnb set up. dish skew is important and so is lnb skew for mulit lnb linear setup, i stand corrected.