Getting back into FTA... in an Apartment

[mediageek]

well, just priced everything out last night. Everything was all good until i hit "Calculate Shipping" (thinking it would be 40-50 bucks) and it was a WHOPPING 90+ bucks, pushing me over-budget.

I was rather upset until I stumbled upon the fact that SatelliteAV is literally located 20 minutes away from me. I'll call them today to see if I can't come down and take a look at the GeoSat package they have and maybe even pick it up (hooray no shipping costs!)

 

[mediageek]

went to satellite av today. i really should've called ahead. They're out of stock of the DSR200C and will probably get them in tomorrow. That place is a busy little bee-hive.

I also got word from a friend who is letting me have a ChannelMaster 1M dish, with a non-penetrating mount. I won't have to buy the entire Package, (I think the ChannelMaster is a little better looking anyway, certainly holds up better to weather.

Hopefully the receiver comes in tomorrow. I'm excited to test it out.

By the way, Satellite AV is having a Special right now, $40 off the GeoSatPro DVR1100C or a free external HD. I think it's only for phone orders, but They're open for another 1/2 hour! Give 'em a call.

 

[mediageek]

Just an update,

got everything a couple weeks ago and tested the receiver out on a pre-pointed surplus dish at work. Worked GREAT!

I went to Frys and bought a Channelmaster Tripod and a pole, although the pole doesn't fit the dish, I'll have to take it back before my 15 days are up. I went to home depot and bought the correct pole and had them cut about 2 ft off (but I'm never going back to that place again. I'll gladly pay 15% more at a local Ace and wait for parts to come in than go back there.)

The reason I cut a couple feet off is that it looked a little too tall to mount the dish on and it might be hard to install as I'm installing it on the bottom floor patio. In retrospect I should've measured the patio height, it would've fit fine and I would have more future flexibility. Another example of measure twice, cut once.

I put together the dish and then the tripod. Nearly stripped the bolts on the tripod trying to loosen them, all's well now though.

While installing the tripod I should've realized that the patio is sloped by about 4-6 degrees (presumably for rain drainage) and this screwed me up when I tried to point the dish. I couldn't get ANYTHING at the proper elevation, but when i got a 5% reading at 97W, I tried raising and lowering the elevation until i got a decent reading and then fine tuned the azimuth until i got a reliable signal of something like 60% on a few transponders. tightened everything up and downloaded the firmware update for the DSR200C. (THANK GOD... i was so sick of rebooting the thing while trying to point the dish)

A day or two later I moved the dish to 99W for the feeds. I notice that some of the feeds are a little weak, I'm fairly sure it's because my dish isn't pointed 100% correctly and because it's probably moving slightly because the tripod is not anchored down yet.

I need to anchor my tripod to a few basalite blocks and plumb it up before I buy a motor.

I've heard that Tapcon screws (and bits) are good for anchoring things to concrete. Is that what i should get?

How should i get it plumb? use shims? Forgive me as I'm not all that handy with building stuff (as the name says, I'm a bit of a geek).

Thanks for the help!

 

[TRG]

I was thinking of getting something like this dish kit and a GEOSATpro DSR 200c and using the flex coax mentioned in Davage's post.

Excuse my stupidity but why does the dish have to be so low? Why not at chest height?

You might want to consider a bigger dish. 90cm is generally considered the optimum size that the guru's around here recommend.

 

[mediageek]

i forgot to mention that too,

i bought the GeoSatPro package that includes a 90cm dish.

 

[TRG]

i forgot to mention that too,

i bought the GeoSatPro package that includes a 90cm dish.

Good choice!:up

 

[mediageek]

any advice on mounting on concrete blocks and plumbing?