C-band install - how difficult?

[tonytm]

I picked up a 6' dish and openbox receiver. Everything seems to be working ok, but - no satellites. I used the pointing info from gosatellite.com to get the azimuth and elevation (Galaxy 12 at 133W). The receiver says 41-43% strength and 5% quality, pretty much regardless of where the dish is pointing. If the LNB power is turned off, the strength goes down to about 36%.

After several hours searching for satellites, I'm wondering if maybe something is broken, or if I am in over my head. I talked to a couple of guys advertising themselves as installers and they told me that getting the dish pointed correctly can be extremely difficult. One of them wanted to charge me $500 since he said it could take him many hours. They said that it requires precision and time and if you are off by millimeters you won't see anything. This just sounds wrong to me since the dishnetwork people are typically able to align a dish in a few minutes. What am I missing? Is this something I should be able to do myself?

Thanks for any help!

Tony

 

[Anole]

so many questions; here's a few more...

- what do you have for an LNB?
- you can use the aiming calculator at The List (top of every page, here)
- have you adjusted your LNB skew correctly?
- you are in Seattle ?
- and you want the C-band bird at 133° west?
- do you have a motorized mount or are you setting up for fixed-aim?
- yes a millimeter will kill ya, and yes you can do it yourself.
- DishNetwork is easy to align due to several factors, and we won't cover 'em here.

 

[putney]

Dishnetwork (circular) is easier than linear.

Ploar mount? Start with your true south, skew set to 0.

Strength = Connection(wiring) , Quality = Signal

LNB Power should likely be on.

dishpointer.com is helpful. a cheap angle finder is also helpful.

It's only hard until you get the concept. Then it's pretty easy.

 

[tonytm]

Thanks for your reply. The LNB came with the dish; the mounting plate says 'Digiwav', dual polarization, 13 degrees noise temperature. The box it and the dish came in appeared to have been sitting for a long time. The dish had some rust and was a little dirty.
I believe I have adjusted the skew correctly. It is only 9 degrees here. I've tried moving it around, and adjusting the LNB backwards and forwards.
Yes, I am in Seattle and am looking for 133W. This is a fixed mount.

 

[tonytm]

I looked at a couple pointing websites, including dishpointer.com. They all seem to give the same result. However I found one website that said that the actual pointing angle would be lower than you would expect from the angle calculators. I set the angle using a level and protractor, then tried scanning from there.

 

[putney]

what are the LNB settings in your box?

 

[Mr Tony]

make sure the LNB frequency is 5150 (as this is a C-Band satellite)
also make sure the transponder you selected is active as the SSO has an old list of transponders on there. a very old list in some cases

 

[Mr Tony]

oh let me throw this out there

What channel (s) are you looking to pick up? As you said a fixed mount (so I assume fixed dish) the only thing that I know of on 133W in the clear is EWTN-HD

 

[tonytm]

Yes, the receiver is set to 5150. Yes, EWTN is the channel of interest. According to the EWTN website, their HD channel is at 3904 Mhz. I tried it both with and without a transponder entered. I'm assuming that I should be able to see something on the signal strength bar if anything at all was coming in, even if encrypted?

 

[greg harris]

It would be nice if you could post some clear pictures of the dish and its lnb. This may help to spot a problem.

 

[Mr Tony]

What I would do is manually enter the transponder

3904 frequency
H
4000 polarity

then try and aim the dish

also EWTN is on 91W in SD and about 12 different feeds (with radio broadcasts too) available

 

[billyboy_1]

I picked up a 6' dish and openbox receiver. Everything seems to be working ok, but - no satellites. I used the pointing info from gosatellite.com to get the azimuth and elevation (Galaxy 12 at 133W). The receiver says 41-43% strength and 5% quality, pretty much regardless of where the dish is pointing. If the LNB power is turned off, the strength goes down to about 36%.

After several hours searching for satellites, I'm wondering if maybe something is broken, or if I am in over my head. I talked to a couple of guys advertising themselves as installers and they told me that getting the dish pointed correctly can be extremely difficult. One of them wanted to charge me $500 since he said it could take him many hours. They said that it requires precision and time and if you are off by millimeters you won't see anything. This just sounds wrong to me since the dishnetwork people are typically able to align a dish in a few minutes. What am I missing? Is this something I should be able to do myself?

Thanks for any help!

Tony

Have you tried taking the TV & receiver out to the dish and watching for signal/picture while aligning the dish ?? Thats the only way i've ever aimed one.

 

[Mr Tony]

They said that it requires precision and time and if you are off by millimeters you won't see anything. This just sounds wrong to me since the dishnetwork people are typically able to align a dish in a few minutes

the guy has no clue then. C-Band satellites are not as strong as DBS but you can be more than "millimeters" off and still get a signal. Heck I have one dish I ghetto move across the arc (all by hand)

couple other options
-you wouldnt happen to have an analog receiver do you? Reason is there are a couple analog channels that would be easier to tune in on that sat then you can hone in on the digital feed
-Is there a model # on the LNB? Some LNB's the polarity is off by 90 degrees so instead of 0 skew being 12:00 (if looking at it like a clock) 0 skew is 9:00 or 3:00
-you could do a blind scan if you think you're close and see what it picks up...then go from there

 

[photoman76]

EWTN HD is DVB-S2. A six foot dish might be too small to lock the signal.

 

[mikekohl]

Guaranteed understatement. It's tough to lock on the 133 West HD signal of EWTN with a 10 footer,
while at the same time I have tweeked a 90 cm offset with C-band LNBF and conical scalar adapter
and succeeded in getting the EWTN standard definition MPEG-2 signals on 91 West.
OP should give up on EWTN-HD and find a clear line-of-sight to locate 91 West from his Washington location.

 

[FaT Air]

OP should give up on EWTN-HD and find a clear line-of-sight to locate 91 West from his Washington location.

Agree totally. I can only get EWTN-HD on 133W on a "GOOD DAY", and they are rare. Gotta be a weak sig, as other ([$]all scrambled)TP's on this sat are very strong with my 10 ft BUD and Sathawk, but 3904 H 4000 is a hit or miss at best.

 

[tonytm]

Thanks for all the input - yes, I did try manually entering the transponder info, with the same results. I did have the TV out there with me while I was doing this (so that I could see the strength/quality bars from the receiver), but I don't think it will let me see anything unless I'm already right on the signal. I don't have an analog receiver, but I'll have a look at craigs list. The LNB does not have a model number on it, but it is marked with numbers indicating skew (30-0-30).

In the meantime, I will give 91W a try. I think I can get a shot at it from the middle of the backyard. Wife won't like it, but at least it will tell me that everything is working. Dishpointer says I should be able to see 133W from here with a 120 cm dish but maybe that is assuming everything else is perfect?

I did get some rain water in the RF connector on the LNB before my last attempt, and it may not have been completely dried out.

 

[Mr Tony]

honestly if Mike Kohl says a 6 footer wont work for it, I believe him (he's been in the industry for a couple decades)

 

[Blindowl1234]

I've got an 8 footer and don't get a signal on 133W...Doubt the 6 footer will cut it either....Blind

 

[tonytm]

Just a quick update: after repointing to 91W I had clear signals within a few minutes. I will ask EWTN whether they have any plans to make the HD channel more accessible. For now I'm going to call this success -

Thanks for the help!