Even a hurricane w/ 90mph+ winds in my area didn't blow either of my 2 dishes off my roof. Unbelievable! We've had other near misses in the past few years w/ no problems either. I thought for sure they would get wrecked in this storm.
Ike didn't blow down my dish
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Didn't blow down my dishes either ,because I took them down before the storm and put them in the house. I can't repeak yet because no electricity yet. My dad and mom 's house they left the dishes up and the storm "reaimed" the side sat dish for 61.5 . I had to go over to their house and repeak their dish since they do have electricity. I hope to have the power back tommorrow. I am really missing my hd tv and all the shows I like to watch. OF course I am also missing hot showers and clean clothes too. Don't get me started on the spreadable meat sandwiches I have had to eat since last week. I hope I never see those again.
When Ivan hit in 04, Neither of my dishes were damaged, but mjy 60 foot Magnolia tree was blow down over the top of my back yard gazebo. My privaticy fence was destroyed, MY roofing on my house had to be replaced. MY neighbors 3 pine trees were down laying in my yard. My 12 foot mesh dish was destroyed and the 4 inch iron pipe that it was mounted on was bent, yet both of my dishes mounted on the eve of my house worked fine by generator on my 19 inch tv for the 14 days that I was without electricity. I emphasize with those of you in the Galveston area. I have been there. PS Cox cable was out even longer.
Ike got my dish
The one that was "professionally" installed by E*; but not the 90cm dish that I installed...in fact the wife watched CCTV right up until 4am when the power went out. And is watching it now that power is back on - it didn't even strip the plastic gears in the motor.
Anyway, the E* dish bounced around until it popped open one of my whirlybirds, forcing me to go into the attic to tarp the rain into a plastic tub (no water on the ceiling
). The noise in the attic from the wind was a bit terrifying.
Amazingly the two RG-6 cables attached to the dish kept if from actually flying away - this giving a hint as to just how poorly it been installed. They managed to completely miss the rafters with the lag screws...and the lag screws were only 2 inches long.
Dish has some splainin' to do.
The one that was "professionally" installed by E*; but not the 90cm dish that I installed...in fact the wife watched CCTV right up until 4am when the power went out. And is watching it now that power is back on - it didn't even strip the plastic gears in the motor.
Anyway, the E* dish bounced around until it popped open one of my whirlybirds, forcing me to go into the attic to tarp the rain into a plastic tub (no water on the ceiling
). The noise in the attic from the wind was a bit terrifying.Amazingly the two RG-6 cables attached to the dish kept if from actually flying away - this giving a hint as to just how poorly it been installed. They managed to completely miss the rafters with the lag screws...and the lag screws were only 2 inches long.
Dish has some splainin' to do.
Well here's an impressive one the May 3rd 99' tornadoes in Oklahoma City, I saw many a dish survive an F5 tornado. It was quite something, to see how something that light survived the destruction but a house was just ripped apart. It was almost as bad as seeing this one guys roof with a satellite on it laying on the ground still facing south. I was like guess someone was desperate for tv!
Help?
Unfortunately, Ike does seem to have gotten my dish - at least a little. We just got power back tonight and I get zero signal strength. There was a fairly sizable branch that came down on our roof and then slid into the dish, where it remained until I went up and got it down.
There's no visible damage to the dish and the cable run into the house seems fine. It looks like it's pointing in the roughly same direction as always. I'm assuming that either it's been knocked somewhat out of alignment or something at the dish was damaged during the storm.
Dish Network is saying it'll be over a week before they can send someone out. I installed our old DirecTV dish several years ago and I feel like I should be able to fix it if it's just a misalignment issue. I'm planning to wait until I can get out there in daylight tomorrow with my wife watching the "point dish" screen to check progress.
Any tips? Does it seem odd that I'm getting zero signal while still appearing to be pointed in roughly the right direction? I expected it to still be getting some low level of signal.
The receiver is a VIP722 DVR and the dish reads Dish Network 1000 on the dish itself and "dp plus digital LNBF" on the box at the end of the arm.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. It's been a long week and I'd love to spend tomorrow evening with a cold beer and a working TV. The refrigerator, fortunately, needed no realignment.
Unfortunately, Ike does seem to have gotten my dish - at least a little. We just got power back tonight and I get zero signal strength. There was a fairly sizable branch that came down on our roof and then slid into the dish, where it remained until I went up and got it down.
There's no visible damage to the dish and the cable run into the house seems fine. It looks like it's pointing in the roughly same direction as always. I'm assuming that either it's been knocked somewhat out of alignment or something at the dish was damaged during the storm.
Dish Network is saying it'll be over a week before they can send someone out. I installed our old DirecTV dish several years ago and I feel like I should be able to fix it if it's just a misalignment issue. I'm planning to wait until I can get out there in daylight tomorrow with my wife watching the "point dish" screen to check progress.
Any tips? Does it seem odd that I'm getting zero signal while still appearing to be pointed in roughly the right direction? I expected it to still be getting some low level of signal.
The receiver is a VIP722 DVR and the dish reads Dish Network 1000 on the dish itself and "dp plus digital LNBF" on the box at the end of the arm.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated. It's been a long week and I'd love to spend tomorrow evening with a cold beer and a working TV. The refrigerator, fortunately, needed no realignment.
robwk - what part of town are you in?
Out here in Katy we had 75 mph winds. My dish and my bowtie HD OTA did just fine. They are mounted to the side of the house and are partly protected from the wind.
Out here in Katy we had 75 mph winds. My dish and my bowtie HD OTA did just fine. They are mounted to the side of the house and are partly protected from the wind.
Just outside the SW corner of the loop (Westbury). I think the dish would have come through the wind OK. It's the 5" tree branch that landed on the roof and then slid into the dish that I think was the culprit. The dish is mounted on the side of the roof on the south side of the house.
Do you think the fact that I'm getting zero signal while pointed in roughly the same direction as two weeks ago mean that I should be concerned that the dish is damaged, rather than just misaligned?
And how much harder is it to find the signal on one of these modern dishes than it was when I did it with our old DirecTV dish 5 or 6 years ago? That was fairly easy. But, as I recall, I was getting pretty much instant feedback on the signal strength screen with that system and now I'm reading that I need to allow this one 10 seconds to pick up signal after every move.
Glad to hear you made it through Ike OK. Were you out of power long? Thanks for the help.
Do you think the fact that I'm getting zero signal while pointed in roughly the same direction as two weeks ago mean that I should be concerned that the dish is damaged, rather than just misaligned?
And how much harder is it to find the signal on one of these modern dishes than it was when I did it with our old DirecTV dish 5 or 6 years ago? That was fairly easy. But, as I recall, I was getting pretty much instant feedback on the signal strength screen with that system and now I'm reading that I need to allow this one 10 seconds to pick up signal after every move.
Glad to hear you made it through Ike OK. Were you out of power long? Thanks for the help.
I was surprised but both of mine came though just fine. The wires to the dish are laying on the roof no longer connected to their plastic ties but once power was restored, everything worked fine.
Neighbors next door, their chimney blew down in our yard and many people have roof issues but we lucked out and were protected from the most severe of the wind by the neighbors house. We also had window shutters so I think that helped with water and debre hitting the house.
I just had some tree limbs to clean up and that was about it. I think God must have been looking out for us since have some special needs kids in our family. Most people were not that lucky.
Neighbors next door, their chimney blew down in our yard and many people have roof issues but we lucked out and were protected from the most severe of the wind by the neighbors house. We also had window shutters so I think that helped with water and debre hitting the house.
I just had some tree limbs to clean up and that was about it. I think God must have been looking out for us since have some special needs kids in our family. Most people were not that lucky.
robwk - we had power out for about 24 hours. One of my co-workers lives off Stella Link across the street from Corpus Christi church. She said they lost lots of trees in that area.
You didn't say what dish you have. With the 722 I'm assuming it is a 3 LNB dish.
I'm guessing it is an alignment problem. You got nothing to lose by trying to effect repairs yourself. Check the brackets and mounting hardware for any signs that they are bent. The first thing to check is if the pole is plumbed. Get a level out and lay it against the vertical tube that is connected to the dish. Do this on a couple of sides. If it isn't plumb then you need to knock it back into alignment.
If that isn't the problem then check the alignment screws. Usually when they are tightened down they scratch the paint on the dish enough to leave a mark. If you can see a set of markings on the dish chances are it was knocked off. Loosen the screws and try setting it back where they were prior to the hurricane.
Even if you can get it working, you should have Dish come out and re-peak everything.
The other thing you can do is get a set of cheap rabbit ears or other small HD antenna and use the 722 to pick up the local stations. Buy a really cheap antenna at Lowes or Radio Shack. At least you can watch something until Dish can come out to service your dish. The transmitting antennas are less than 10 miles from your house. Just point the antenna the same direction as the Fort Bend County Toll road. Get into the install menu and scan for local channels. It should find them easily. We are 20 miles from the transmitters and rabbit ears work as well as our OTA antenna outside.
Good luck.
You didn't say what dish you have. With the 722 I'm assuming it is a 3 LNB dish.
I'm guessing it is an alignment problem. You got nothing to lose by trying to effect repairs yourself. Check the brackets and mounting hardware for any signs that they are bent. The first thing to check is if the pole is plumbed. Get a level out and lay it against the vertical tube that is connected to the dish. Do this on a couple of sides. If it isn't plumb then you need to knock it back into alignment.
If that isn't the problem then check the alignment screws. Usually when they are tightened down they scratch the paint on the dish enough to leave a mark. If you can see a set of markings on the dish chances are it was knocked off. Loosen the screws and try setting it back where they were prior to the hurricane.
Even if you can get it working, you should have Dish come out and re-peak everything.
The other thing you can do is get a set of cheap rabbit ears or other small HD antenna and use the 722 to pick up the local stations. Buy a really cheap antenna at Lowes or Radio Shack. At least you can watch something until Dish can come out to service your dish. The transmitting antennas are less than 10 miles from your house. Just point the antenna the same direction as the Fort Bend County Toll road. Get into the install menu and scan for local channels. It should find them easily. We are 20 miles from the transmitters and rabbit ears work as well as our OTA antenna outside.
Good luck.
Yep. I agree it seems like there's a good chance it's an alignment problem. You have to be very close to get the signal. "Eyeball" close is not close enough.
Well, I've managed to get reception back, but only by jury-rigging a solution. It seems that the dish itself remained fixed (i.e. all of the various alignment screws are clearly still in the position they were tightened into when it was installed), but the wind on the dish wrenched the board it's attached to slightly out of line, so that the whole dish is pointed slightly lower than before. I tried to correct by raising the elevation a bit with no luck. So, for now, I've restored signal by bracing the dish back into position with a board run to a fence a couple feet away, but I think that it needs to be remounted in order to really fix the problem.
So the Dish Network guy is coming out on Tuesday and I've got a work-around in the meantime. Thanks for all the help and advice.
So the Dish Network guy is coming out on Tuesday and I've got a work-around in the meantime. Thanks for all the help and advice.
I'm not too surprised... Small dishes don't have as much wind load and my relatives in Spring only lost some roof shingles (i.e. doesn't seem to me like much roof damage in some areas, thus a dish with not a lot of wind load should survive on a roof pretty good unless clobbered by debris).
If you were to tell me a 6-10 foot dish survived on a roof or on a pole supported up the side of a house at various points, then I would be surprised.
Ike didn't get mine either, though lost a ton of shingles. I was pretty amazed when the power came on and all was working.
Here in Beaumont, when power was restored, my dish worked perfectly.
Out of 5 other family and friends 3 worked perfectly, one had to be adjusted 1 inch and one was pummeled be a tree.
Still nothing on my cable modem.
Out of 5 other family and friends 3 worked perfectly, one had to be adjusted 1 inch and one was pummeled be a tree.
Still nothing on my cable modem.
You will be waiting a while on Time Warner cable ARcade. THat is why I use ATT dsl and DISH. My phone worked right after the storm and my internet connection came on right after the lights turned on. THe sat dish was a simple repeak and point and I was back in business. My sister waited a month after RITA hit in 2005. She got her cable back last Wednesday.
