Hispasat at 30.0W

[cubatv]

I have a Dish 500 that I would like to use to pick up the Cuban TV and radio stations at Hispasat 30.0W and anything else I can get. I don't want to buy a new dish, I want to use what I have and work around it. I live in North en NJ in Passaic County.
I know I need a standard LNB. Can any one recommend me a good one that will work with the dish 500 and how to mounted to the dish.

Thanks

 

[Mr Tony]

You're going to need a bigger dish. The D500 is too small

You will need a 30" dish and a Standard KU LNB

 

[melgarga]

I hate to discourage anyone from experimenting, but that's a heck of an experiment for one that is new to the realm. As posted, you really dont have enough surface area on a 20" dish to do any real FTA receiption. The DBS services' signals are cranked up compared to the non pay DVB signals. It's how they attempt to compensate for inclimate wx conditions.
Cubavision is very strong here in the Houston area on a 1m Primestar eliptical, and it *might* be viewable on a pizza pan, but I wouldnt try to hit it with that setup first. It's not your average satellite to hit. It is VERY low on the horizon and there are no nearby "reference satellites" to tell where you are in the arc.
Look around, you may come across a Primestar, or unused Hughes, or Direcway dish for the asking. Funny thing is you never see them until you start looking......
Given the difference in size you would even have better luck trying one of the latest gen DBS dishes used for HD and adding a linear lnb, if you can find one somebody abandoned or wont be using anymore. You might even post a wanted ad on Craigslist for your area, you might find exactly what you are looking for for little to nothing.
What type of receiver are you using? Did you spend a lot on it? If buying a new dish ends up your only alternative, it's likely a new dish will be less than what you spent on your STB.

 

[hd fan]

You should talk to another cuban friend of mine who claims a cuban friend of his is able to do this (acctually for 123W for Univision), lol. I of course replied , please give him my cell phone number since I want to learn something new, lol. Obviously , I am still waiting for that phone call, and I will die waiting. Like I said the other day to someone at a cuban barber shop here in Toronto , when it comes to Cubans you better trust nothing they claim, me included. Better to be safe than sorry. I already have ran out of fingers in my hands to count the amount of cubans that lately, for some reason, want to use small Pizza Pan Dishes to venture on the linear sats for free to air tv. And they all have something in common, everyone wants everything for free!!!.

I am obviously cuban , make no mistakes about it. That is how I know, first hand. Here in Toronto , a fixed 80 cm Dish works like a charm for that very low bird. I also tried a 60 cm round Eaglestar Dish and could not get anything at the receiver.

Good luck with your endeavours and Welcome to the Forum. Lots of valuable info and knowledgeable people here, once again, me included, lol.

 

[melgarga]

When I dont have a scaler full of rain water 11884 comes banging in here on a 27x39 Primestar at 87-92 on the Coolsat 6K. With that much signal over the 62-63 threshhold, a 20" pan might catch enough signal to get a lock, but no 'reserve' for bad wx.
I noticed that when the storms were comming in off the Gulf from the east this week, I lost signal way before they got here. Looking at a sat that is 65 degrees around the globe, the signal has a lot more 'atmosphere' to traverse, so rainfade without rain doesnt surprize me. It's considerably further that the nominal 22,000 miles normally traveled.
I'm watching Resident Evil II right now with about a 91 on the meter. I really like that they dont overdub the language on these movies. When the US censors do that it makes the movie even cheezier.....lol

 

[hd fan]

yeah , the same happens with 123W and neighborgs for me , way too much "atmosphere" in their path due to the birds being too low in the sky. It is not the fact that the signal has to travel more but rather the fact that since the bird is so low above the horizon then rain clouds far away from you are still high enough and within the path. I hope you get my picture, is like a triangle with a very short height. I remember I got a lock for the far east and west sats on the birddog right at the lnb with the 24" Dish (60 cm) but it was barely less than 5 quality on the meter. Well I was not trying too hard either but for RTPi at 97W the same 24"dish works quite well even in bad weather due to a stronger signal.

I got it at 91 quality on my Coolsat 6000 even after the 3x4 switch with 80 cm Ariza dish.

Yesterday , mid day, there was a heavy storm here and just fur fun and comparisson I checked the 3 dish systems, Bell , the fixed 80 cm 30W and the motorized 90 cm and Hispasat 30W was the last one to recover from the storm. Well the storm was acctually affecting that direction mostly. I was impressed that WSTV (129W with 1/2 FEC) was holding quite well at 62-63 on my coolsat 6000 (below the usual 3/4 FEC 65 quality thereshold). 82W from Bell came first obviously and I saw no difference between the few QPSK tp's and the new 8PSK signals on that bird. By the time 91 came back , the motorized 90 cm Dish was also working. but again the storm was in the direction of 30W south of me of course.

So many factors fall into play that the recomendation by Iceberg to use a 30" Dish or bigger is the proper one. It makes no sense to have a TV system that will not work when is raining. More likely when the weather is bad you will stay indoors and more likely will want to watch tv , well ... the lucky ones who have a wive or girlfriend will better try to do something else , lol.

Yeah they always subtitle the shows rather than put spanish audio track unless they got it in spanish from the source. I still remember laughing my head off the first night out of Cuba (was in Madrid, Spain) after I turned the tv on and heard Bruce Willis's spanish made version (by spanish I mean not only in Spanish but also using slangs from Spain) since I was used to listen to every US show in their original voice and language. It took me a while to process that and enjoy the US shows over there, it was kind of distracting at the beggining. I have noticed that Kuwait TV pretty much does the same thing with foreing shows (mostly UK and US), they keep the original audio track and simply subtitle the programm. But most spanish speaking countries seem to prefer to change the audio track to the spanish version rather than subtitles. Pretty much like Coffee it all boils down to what you have been used too before.

 

[mikelib]

30º West in Ocean County, South Jersey

After reading this thread and having nothing to do. I decide to see if Hispasat at 30ºW was doable on a 500 Dish, I mounted a Invacom Universal Single Ku 0.3 dB LNBF SNH-031 on the Dish and set it up as per Dishpointer.com.

I managed to get all but one transponder that was originally locked in with my 90 cm motorized system. Here are some pictures of the set up; I had a LOS between the two houses across the street from me. I got all of Cuban and Spanish stations including Zoom, Press TV, and almost all of the Arab stations as per Lyngsat. Love FTA!!

Mike Lib

 

[melgarga]

I didnt know Kuwait TV kept the original soundtrack on some of their movies too. I had to go switch the feed to the other polarity to check it out. An early Patrick Swayze movie was on. Yup, in English w/ Arabic? subs. It does have an irritating freezing motion to it, as does the other KTV channel.
It reminds me of trying to run a video clip on a computer that doesnt have the power/speed to run it. Are they always like that? Even the crawler at the bottom of the screen is affected so it's the entire uplinked signal not jut the embedded content (or possibly my STB?) The screen even flashes to black occasionally for a quater second or so. Maybe they are having uplink/encoding issues tonite. I cant see this being normal, acceptable operation.
So if it will clean up, it looks like I'll have to make provisions for both polarities from that dish too.
Thanks for the tip.

 

[melgarga]

That is very cool Mike! :up:up
The OP will be glad to hear it. He is listed as in NJ as well.The real test is will a sprinkle take it out, or will it hang acceptably compared to your motorized setup. We expect a detailed report from the next few rain events in your locale.

 

[cubatv]

Good job Mike! that was awesome!
Thank you for the pic and the information. I guest I'm going to give it a shot and try to set up my dish 500 but first I have to buy an LNB. I will let you guys know if I have any success.
I will try with the dish 500 and when I can I will purchase a 30" dish. One more question.
Will any fta receiver work? I have the new VS Ultra V2 receiver.
Thanks everyone for your post. You guys are the best!.

 

[melgarga]

Keep in mind you could still have inclimate wx conditions take it out, even if the storms are only east of you, between you and the sat.
If you are going to buy an LNB alone, be sure you can (easily) attach it to the future dish you have in mind.
Ya still need to go 'dishhunting' for a Primestar or equiv. You might be surprized at what you find when you start looking for specific dishes.

 

[mikelib]

That is very cool Mike!

The OP will be glad to hear it. He is listed as in NJ as well. The real test is will a sprinkle take it out, or will it hang acceptably compared to your motorized setup. We expect a detailed report from the next few rain events in your locale.

Oh the weather will take it out as the signal strength and quality diminish fast the bird is very far away. The ERP map on lyngsat has the spot beam from Hispasat for our area as 25 to 33 in dish. My experience with this sat is there are days that I would get it but it would pixalate, I take it to be rain clouds somewhere over the Atlantic. What I am trying to say is the bigger dish is better.

I wish I could understand Spanish the programming looks interesting.

Good job Mike! that was awesome!

Thank you for the pic and the information. I guest I'm going to give it a shot and try to set up my dish 500 but first I have to buy an LNB. I will let you guys know if I have any success.
I will try with the dish 500 and when I can I will purchase a 30" dish. One more question.
Will any fta receiver work? I have the new VS Ultra V2 receiver.
Thanks everyone for your post. You guys are the best!.

I am not familiar with the Viewsat Ultra; it should work well on FTA. I want to tell you that to try and receive Hispasat for your first try will be a challenge as the setup is very sensitive.

My first suggestion if you have not done this before is try and get your true south (TS) satellite first that would be Horizon 2 at 74º west. It has one station on it which is Ohio News Network ONN. The transponder is very strong, check out Lyngsat.com for the transponder information. And check out dishpointer.com for line of sight (LOS), azimuth, elevation and skew. After you lock in ONN, try going to AMC 6, there are two transponders to work with; one is the NBC Mux and a religious station. The trick here is to try and get both at good quality level. If you lock in the religious station at a very high signal level the NBC mux will be very low you need to adjust the dish so that they both come in good. Next swing over to AMC 5 at 79º west, there are some strong transponders there, the trick here is there is a Spanish station very strong with good signal quality (SQ), but it takes time to lock in a picture. For some reason the picture and signal are very slow to show up on the screen this happens some times.

By the way (BTW) you would not have to change elevation setting or skew as these sats are very close. If you become proficient at aligning these sats I would think you would have no problem getting Hispasat.

Good Luck, you will enjoy FTA,
Mike Lib

 

[granadaguy]

Viewsat vs

WOW !!!, I am impressed, locking in Hispasat with a 20" dish, well done.

I do have a viewsat vs in my set up and is doing a so-so job for me ( not very good when you scan for low frequency channels ), but other than that is a decent box .

My next box is going to be a pansat9200 hd with the plus board , looking for a store close by me to check it out (I want to see the az box as well ).
question for Michigan FTA'rs, any stores in the tri-county metro area ?.

LOVE my new hobby.

 

[melgarga]

mikelib wrote:
I wish I could understand Spanish the programming looks interesting.

I'm with ya bro, most of the Tex-Mex I can speak will get your face slapped if used in mixed company.....lol. On recommendation from another member, I've picked up three stations in the Cuba mux that periodicly play movies in English (if originally in english) w/spanish subtitles. It is a hit-n'-miss thing but worth checking out as you surf the arc.
Last night I switched polarity and scanned in the mux with the Kuwait TV channels on suggestion from hdfan above, and watched a very young Patrick Swayze movie in english w/ arabic(?) subs. The motion of both KTV channels is jerky, even today, on my Coolsat. I've not tried them on the other DVB units I have to see if it is a Coolsat only issue. It is really odd that they would intentionally broadcast in such a manner. Check 'em out and tell me what you see.

 

[melgarga]

WOW !!!, I am impressed, locking in Hispasat with a 20" dish, well done.

I do have a viewsat vs in my set up and is doing a so-so job for me ( not very good when you scan for low frequency channels ), but other than that is a decent box .

My next box is going to be a pansat9200 hd with the plus board , looking for a store close by me to check it out (I want to see the az box as well ).
question for Michigan FTA'rs, any stores in the tri-county metro area ?.

LOVE my new hobby.

Granada, that would be a long way from Michigan, or are you talking about the all but forgotten Ford model? They kind of went the way of the Maverick, Pinto and AMCs Matador.
I'd say forget the Panny and save your cash for an AZBox, at least based on what I've read. But if you can get one for pennies on the dollar jump on it.

 

[zamar23]

Hey guys, interesting thread.

Can someone list, what sats & channels are watchable in Buffalo & Toronto area with a 33 - 39" dish on Ku-band east of 61.5W North American threshold given by Lyngsat? I know, some of them are particular zone beams , but what about others?

What about C-band sats in the same east of 61.5W direction?

 

[Anole]

Zamar -
If we don't have an eastern satellite on TheList (we go to 30° - have a look), then take a tour of Mike's site: Global-CM.
He covers a bit more eastward. ( eg: C and Ku Band: Atlantic Region Satellites available in North America )

 

[ken2400]

Thanks for all the photos.
Can you take one more showing how you mounted the LNBF on the dish and what you used?

Thanks

After reading this thread and having nothing to do. I decide to see if Hispasat at 30ºW was doable on a 500 Dish, I mounted a Invacom Universal Single Ku 0.3 dB LNBF SNH-031 on the Dish and set it up as per Dishpointer.com.

I managed to get all but one transponder that was originally locked in with my 90 cm motorized system. Here are some pictures of the set up; I had a LOS between the two houses across the street from me. I got all of Cuban and Spanish stations including Zoom, Press TV, and almost all of the Arab stations as per Lyngsat. Love FTA!!

Mike Lib

 

[Mr Tony]

Hey guys, interesting thread.

Can someone list, what sats & channels are watchable in Buffalo & Toronto area with a 33 - 39" dish on Ku-band east of 61.5W North American threshold given by Lyngsat? I know, some of them are particular zone beams , but what about others?

What about C-band sats in the same east of 61.5W direction?

on KU the only sat E of 30W is the satellite at 15W

C-Band has more and lots are circular polarity. Anole posted the link to Mike's site

 

[granadaguy]

Born in Granada-live in Mi. since 82.

Granada, that would be a long way from Michigan, or are you talking about the all but forgotten Ford model? They kind of went the way of the Maverick, Pinto and AMCs Matador.
I'd say forget the Panny and save your cash for an AZBox, at least based on what I've read. But if you can get one for pennies on the dollar jump on it.

Melgarga, I know all the models your talking about and after what GM and Chrysler have done to Mi in the past year, I like Ford even more....I live just north east of Detroit and that's why I wanted to know if there are stores open to the public for FTA equipment.
Not going to buy either the Pansat or the AZ box just yet ( I'm going to wait till' they get all the "bugs" worked out ), but definitely in the market for hd in the near future.

Zamar, I can pick up signal & video at 27 ( 60 Q ) 45 ( in the 40's Q )& 61 degrees ( 70 Q ). with my 10ft.