General FTA question?

[someftaplz]

I have been reading about FTA so I decided to throw my hat into the hobby. Since I am a newbie I am having a had time putting all the FTA things together. I need some pointer so I can make baby steps. I have purchased

1) Sonicview 360 elite
2) Fortec Star 31"/80cm dish
3) Dual LNB
4) triplett- satellite signal meter

I followed most of the suggestion on this website and did some google search for other trouble shooting tips but after 3 days of playing around. I am ready to ask for help. I am trying to point the dish to the satellite 97 W. I got the Azimuth and Elevation from satellite calculator. I am getting 61% strength and 0% Quality.

First I am not sure how to use satellite signal meter correctly. Here is what I am doing

1) Adjust satellite elevation per specification on the dish. Hook up the satellite signal meter. Move the elevation adjustment until the needle moves to 100.

2) I am not sure all the correct value after selecting 97 W satellitte. I have no clue about transponder, frequency, universal and etc

I just want to watch one channel from 97W so I can learn how to setup FTA. I would greatly appreciate if someone can point me in the right direction. Thank you in advance for all the help.

 

[WSInternational]

Welcome to the forum.


1. What type of dual LNBF are you using? Do you have a model number or if you can get the frequencies off of it, that would help. Just want to make sure you are using a linear LNBF and need to know if it's standard or universal so you can type in the correct LO frequency into your receiver.

2. Can you put a small screen TV out there by your dish? If you can do that, it would make it much simpler, specially if it's your first time.

3. You need to make sure you are using the correct transponder frequency, symbol rate, and polarity and make sure it's not a dead transponder. Get on 11836/20765/V.

4. Make sure you have the correct LNBF LO frequency in the receiver.

5. Get your look angles from Satellite Finder / Dish Pointing Calculator with Google Maps | DishPointer.com

6. Make sure you adjust the LNBF polarity.

7. Start pointing the dish at the azimuth and elevation you that you got from dishpointer.com and you should see signal coming in.

Make sure you use RG6 cable, and you should be good to go!!!

Azimuth is the turning of your satellite dish East and West or Left & Right. This is the same as your compass reading. Make sure when you look on your compass for the proper degree, that your compass is away from your satellite dish. Remember, metal can throw off the reading on your compass so be very care full.

Elevation is how high up the signal is coming from. You can usually measure your elevation based on the degree markings on the back bracket of your satellite dish antenna. Make sure you don't tighten the bolts too much to leave room for play in case you need to fine tune your antenna with your signal meter. Once you fine tune to the highest possible signal, you can tighten the elevation bolts.

Skew or Polarity is how much you turn your LNBF. Standing in front of the satellite dish, looking at the dish, if you have a positive Skew angle you want to turn your LNBF counter-clockwise. If you have a negative skew angle, you want to turn your LNBF clockwise. Usually, in the East coast USA you have a positive skew and in West coast USA you have a negative skew.

 

[turbosat]

What kind of lubf you have? If it's a standard lnbf, you have to 'set it up' in your receiver. Follow the menus for antenna setup, and use 10750 as your LO freq (local oscillator). Check to see if ANY transponders are already listed for that satellite in your rec. If not, you should add a couple, check The List, top of page for some active TPs on 97. I would pick a vertical and a horizontal freq and aim your dish to where you think 97 is at your location, then run blind scan. Remember, your lnbf has to be 'skewed' for your location if you are not using a dish motor. The dishpointer sites will give you skew for each satellite for your location. Once you enter an active transponder freq and find it, your meter should sound off. You need to get both signal strength and quality to find/display channels. Takes patience that first time but you can do it.

 

[ikki]

I love those pictures. If someone had those when I first goto into this hobby life would have been much easier.

 

[WSInternational]

Made them about 5 years ago....

 

[meinename]

Gotta love people typing out an answer before you even get done.
WSI = Wow That needs to be sticked! Or a page to link to would be awesome as well!
==================================================

What is that one channel? try to find it on SatelliteGuys.US - TheList
That way we can focus on getting just that channel.
Knowing that will tell us what frequency, polarity, symbol rate the transponder is.

Look at the LNB for a sticker. Should have a number right after L.O., usually 10750 or 9750/10600. You tell us what it says.

That meter will help you with the initial aiming part. The knob 'til the meter squeals and the turn it back 'til it's quiet again. Now when it squeals as you're moving the dish about, you'll be on -a- satellite. A satellite, not necessarily the satellite we want.

We can continue after you report back which channel and the L.O.

 

[Keith Brannen]

Just a word of caution on the elevation scale, I have two Fortec Star 80cm dishes and neither one was accurate, one was about four degrees off (had to raise it up an additional 4 degrees). So when you think you have the azimuth correct, you might want to (slowly) raise and lower the dish to try and find the signal. Good luck!

 

[alemmoe]

I was in your shoes last summer. I bought two Sonicview 360 units,a Hot Dish 90 and a Invacom quad motor for my roof. I spent over 30 hours on the roof in evenings after the roof cooled down. My problem was that the Blind Scan was in operative on my units. Help from sonicview was non existant . They are still in the closet,where I put them. They are use less for finding a bird. I couldnt find any person to pay to come out and catch a bird.
I gave up and got a GloryStar System from Satellite AV and Love it, because of their simple instructions and teriffic Support. Their units are super friendly for a beginner and their Blind Scan works .
I get Galaxy 19- 97W and Amc 4 -101 on one Dish. I dont know if your Fortec Star will work for that System.

 

[someftaplz]

Wow, this is awesome that so many of you responded to my initial post. Thank you everyone.

Here is the specification for the Dual LNB.

Sadoun - Standard FSS Dual LNBF KUL2
I/P: 11.7 - 12.2 GHz
O/P: 950-1450 MHz
L.O.: 10.75 GHz
Noise: 0.4 db

meinename - I wanted to see CBC Canada, or BBC UK, but I wanted to start with 97 W just to get my first channel under FTA. A small step.

 

[FTABman0]

Just a word of caution on the elevation scale, I have two Fortec Star 80cm dishes and neither one was accurate, one was about four degrees off (had to raise it up an additional 4 degrees). So when you think you have the azimuth correct, you might want to (slowly) raise and lower the dish to try and find the signal. Good luck!

Agree there 100%!! 3 years ago I had mine (80CM) set up to the letter and it was still not hitting the entire arc correctly, dish was right on the money scale wise but really it was about 3 degrees off the elevation scale as pointed out by our fellow member Iceberg!

That can throw a normal FTA guy off not knowing that but a newbie!?!

Great point on the Fortec Star Dishes Keith!! :up

For all new guys getting into this hobby here is some rather required FTA reading. The tip of the Iceberg is very informative and helpful reading put together by Moderator Iceberg.

Forgot, someftaplz To The Satellite Guys!!

B~Man

 

[B.J.]

Just a word of caution on the elevation scale, I have two Fortec Star 80cm dishes and neither one was accurate, one was about four degrees off (had to raise it up an additional 4 degrees). So when you think you have the azimuth correct, you might want to (slowly) raise and lower the dish to try and find the signal. Good luck!

Those Fortec dishes have a few different offset angles, and the mount used with each dish has to be specific to the offset angle, and/or connection geometry for that dish, and yet it seems like at least at the one main Fortec dealer, they seemed (not sure if they still do or not) to sell the fortec dishes with different mounts. I know that when I bought my 90CM, I had the option of either a "pole mount" or a "u-bolt" style mount (I think that was the name). For me, the pole mount seemed to match the dish well, and the elevation scale was pretty close to being correct. However I've seen posts from dozens of people who bought the U-bolt option, and almost every one of them reported that the elevation was off by 5 degrees. I'm convinced that the U-bolt mount was a generic mount, not matched to that dish.
On the other hand, I've also seen several posts from people using other Fortec dishes, such as the 80CM, and for the most part, with those dishes, people find the pole mount gives them incorrect elevations.
Anyway, I may be wrong, but it sure seems like the fact that 2 mount options were available to be used with all sizes of Fortec dishes, made me think that they were just generic mounts, not matched to the dishes.
However, the other possibility is that because the LNBF arm on the Fortec dishes is so flimsy, that the elevation error is not due to the mount, but instead due to the LNBF arm getting bent, either during shipping/handling, or due to the weight of LNBFs like the Invacom. It is pretty clear that if the LNBF arm is in the wrong place due to being bent, that you'd find the sats (at lower S/Q) at a different setting on the elevation scale. I read one post from a fellow who was finding sats WAY off the theoretical elevation, and he posted a picture, and it was clear from the picture that his LNBF arm was bent probably 6 to 8 inches higher than the position it was supposed to be in, and when he bent it back to where it was supposed to be, he got signals at nearly the correct setting, and got better results on the sats he was getting, because he wasn't at the focal point of the dish.
Anyway, it's not unusual for these Fortec dishes to give incorrect elevation readings. If you read the dealer Forum, probably more than 50% of the posters report the readings being off by ~5 degrees.

 

[AcWxRadar]

Welcome to the forum.


1. What type of dual LNBF are you using? Do you have a model number or if you can get the frequencies off of it, that would help. Just want to make sure you are using a linear LNBF and need to know if it's standard or universal so you can type in the correct LO frequency into your receiver.

2. Can you put a small screen TV out there by your dish? If you can do that, it would make it much simpler, specially if it's your first time.

3. You need to make sure you are using the correct transponder frequency, symbol rate, and polarity and make sure it's not a dead transponder. Get on 11836/20765/V.

4. Make sure you have the correct LNBF LO frequency in the receiver.

5. Get your look angles from Satellite Finder / Dish Pointing Calculator with Google Maps | DishPointer.com

6. Make sure you adjust the LNBF polarity.

7. Start pointing the dish at the azimuth and elevation you that you got from dishpointer.com and you should see signal coming in.

Make sure you use RG6 cable, and you should be good to go!!!

Azimuth is the turning of your satellite dish East and West or Left & Right. This is the same as your compass reading. Make sure when you look on your compass for the proper degree, that your compass is away from your satellite dish. Remember, metal can throw off the reading on your compass so be very care full.

Elevation is how high up the signal is coming from. You can usually measure your elevation based on the degree markings on the back bracket of your satellite dish antenna. Make sure you don't tighten the bolts too much to leave room for play in case you need to fine tune your antenna with your signal meter. Once you fine tune to the highest possible signal, you can tighten the elevation bolts.

Skew or Polarity is how much you turn your LNBF. Standing in front of the satellite dish, looking at the dish, if you have a positive Skew angle you want to turn your LNBF counter-clockwise. If you have a negative skew angle, you want to turn your LNBF clockwise. Usually, in the East coast USA you have a positive skew and in West coast USA you have a negative skew.

WSIATLANTA

What an ingenious and very awesome animated display you posted for dish alignment and LNBF alignment axis! I really like it very much! What program did you use to create those images?

Very well done!

RADAR

 

[Mr Tony]

very cool pics/animation WSI

 

[Keith Brannen]

Agree there 100%!! 3 years ago I had mine (80CM) set up to the letter and it was still not hitting the entire arc correctly, dish was right on the money scale wise but really it was about 3 degrees off the elevation scale as pointed out by our fellow member Iceberg!

That can throw a normal FTA guy off not knowing that but a newbie!?!

I discovered it as a newbie myself setting up my first dish on then G10R (now G18 -123) and could not get a peep of a signal using one of the Equity transponders (also didn't realise at the time to stop and do a blind scan). It was only when I checked a transponder from the list on another satellite close by that I saw a signal quality and was able to compute a correction (and even though I was on the wrong satellite, I'm sure you can imagine my elation at getting that first signal). I was 4 degrees off in azimuth and 2.5 degrees in elevation off, but after peaking it was closer to about 4 degrees off in elevation. The next dish I installed (and every one after it) I only used the elevation as a guideline and scanned for the satellite (slowly) using a grid pattern with changes in azimuth and elevation.

 

[Keith Brannen]

Anyway, it's not unusual for these Fortec dishes to give incorrect elevation readings. If you read the dealer Forum, probably more than 50% of the posters report the readings being off by ~5 degrees.

I agree that the factors you mention may account for the incorrect elevation readings, and another would be if your pole is not plumb. Both of my Fortec 80cm dishes are the pole mount and not the u-bolt (I think that option is for 90cm and higher?).

Having added multiple LNBs, brackets, etc., I have not noticed any loss of signal, or had to correct the elevation due to the added weight, so, fortunately for me, the arms have been fairly sturdy.

Only problem I've ever had has been with my "disaster" dish (if anything can go wrong, it has with that dish, including it sailing off a low slope roof on a next to windless day). I noticed it losing signal during the late winter/early spring and had to keep lowering the elevation a touch. It was only when I kept comparing it to a dish pointed 2 degrees different that I realised something was really wrong. On examining the arm, I noticed a bulging just past the bend heading towards the LNB, and found no hole had been drilled to allow water to escape, which, naturally, had frozen and bulged and bent the arm! Took it down, lined the arm up against another dish of the same brand and re-bent it, and everything is now fine (and I also drilled a hole in it). As I said, it is my "disaster" dish...

 

[cruzin]

you may have to plug in a channel on bird 97. add the transponder 11.836, vertical, with a symbol rate of 20770. when you are plug that in your satellite set up under manual transponder scan that may help you. I do not have a receiver like you have but I have to think they are all about the same.

 

[Sadoun]

Those Fortec dishes have a few different offset angles, and the mount used with each dish has to be specific to the offset angle, and/or connection geometry for that dish, and yet it seems like at least at the one main Fortec dealer, they seemed (not sure if they still do or not) to sell the fortec dishes with different mounts. I know that when I bought my 90CM, I had the option of either a "pole mount" or a "u-bolt" style mount (I think that was the name). For me, the pole mount seemed to match the dish well, and the elevation scale was pretty close to being correct. However I've seen posts from dozens of people who bought the U-bolt option, and almost every one of them reported that the elevation was off by 5 degrees. I'm convinced that the U-bolt mount was a generic mount, not matched to that dish. .

B.J. Your analysis is accurate.

The Pole-Mount was designed for the 80cm dish.
The U-Bolt mount was designed for the 90cm dish.

However, the two mounts are interchangeable between the two size dishes. But the elevation angle will be off little.

Current 80cm Pole mount bracket:


Old 90cm U-Bolt bracket:


New 90cm Pole mount bracket (also this dish has a different LNBF arm than the old 90cm dish):

​

Re 80cm dish LNBF Arm:

The arms are rarely off. When I get a chance, I will measure the nominal distance
between cap #5 and #5 on the arm and report back. That way, you can compare the distance on the LNBF arm you have with the nominal distance to determine if the arm is bent or not:

 

[B.J.]

I'm not sure how useful the following might be, however I once decided to attempt to figure out how to determine if the LNBF was at the proper position, ie whether the arm was bent. The determination turned out to be a gross approximation, because there are unknown variables, however I put together a short on-line calculator which at least should tell you if your LNBF is at least close to being in the right place, ie within an inch or two.

BJ Offset Angle and LNBF Position Calculator

Basically to use the calculator, you attempt to measure the focal length, normally the distance from the bottom edge of the dish to the LNBF face, but sometimes this value is published in the dishes specs. If the LNBF arm is bent, this value usually doesn't change much, since the bend is usually about where the center of the parabola {elipse} would be. The second measurement is the rim to rim height of the dish, in the same units.
Hit calculate, and the calculator will generate an offset angle and a parameter which is the distance from the lnbf face to the TOP rim of the dish. This last parameter is what you use to determine whether your LNBF arm is bent. If this number is off by more than an inch or two, I think that the lnbf is probably not at the focal point.
Again, it's just a crude approximation, mainly because the true center of the paraboloid is not necessarily at the bottome rim of the dish, but it's usually close to being at that location.

 

[someftaplz]

Thank you for all the reply and valuable information in helping a newbie.

I did not have very much time to play around with the dish setup this week. I have posted a few picture on here so you know how my dish is setup outside. My backyard directly faces due south and the sky is open without any large trees obstructing the sky except for my back fence. Any suggestions? Will this setup cause any problems? Do I have to mount it on the back wall?


On the setup menu of the sonic view. Is this value I put in?

Tuner ID - Tuner 1
Satellite - Intelsat AM5
LMB Type - Single
LMB Frequency - 10750
22Khz - off
LNB Power - off
Transponder - 11713
Search Options - All
Network Search - ON
DiSeqC - NONE
Motor - disable

Thank you for all the reply and response.

 

[Lak7]

Transponder - 11713

Lyngsat shows that TP Freq is not currently active

Take a look here, see if your TP list has a match to one here...
SatelliteGuys.US - 97.0°W Galaxy 19 Ku

The receiver's Quality Meter only "Lights Up" if the Transponder selected in the receiver's setup menu is Active / Live / Hot.