How much loss can you expect in signal between a solid dish and one with holes? Example! Would a 6 ft solid dish be almost as good as a 7.5 ft mesh dish.
Mesh and solid dishes!
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For C band, size matters. Go with the larger dish.
It'll have narrower beamwidth and let you ignore satellites each size of the desired one.
Truth is, I think you want 8' or 8.5' to do a better job, but 7.5' is a good start.
And nobody made a mistake going with 10'.
Then, dish accuracy matters for best efficiency.
There are some very old Fiberglas solids which have sagged.
But there are commercial Fiberglas which are accurate enough to transmit on (very accurate)!
So while there may be some (convoluted) general guidelines, it's probably best to ask here and get feedback from members who've used them.
Not knowing anything about your 7.5'er, it'd be my first choice.
If its thrashed and on a sloppy mount, with an inferior LNBF, the 6'er might have a chance.
It'll have narrower beamwidth and let you ignore satellites each size of the desired one.
Truth is, I think you want 8' or 8.5' to do a better job, but 7.5' is a good start.
And nobody made a mistake going with 10'.
Then, dish accuracy matters for best efficiency.
There are some very old Fiberglas solids which have sagged.
But there are commercial Fiberglas which are accurate enough to transmit on (very accurate)!
So while there may be some (convoluted) general guidelines, it's probably best to ask here and get feedback from members who've used them.
Not knowing anything about your 7.5'er, it'd be my first choice.
If its thrashed and on a sloppy mount, with an inferior LNBF, the 6'er might have a chance.
Thanks Anole! Dont have a bigger dish in mind yet!just curious.If i did find a next bigger size like a 7.5 or 8 mesh!would it be a waste of time to replace my 6 ftr since it will be used for both c and ku.I may get alittle more with the larger dish on the c band but i might lose some of the ku.
Others will argue but my experience shows a 6 foot solid has the same signal as 8 foot mesh, and 8 foot solid equals 10 foot mesh, and 10 foot solid equals a 12 foot mesh. I've connected a couple of C/Ku on a single dish and found the C band suffers considerably. I wouldn't recommend it. One dish for C and one for KU, that's my setup both motorized.
Opinion
Well, it's my belief that a really top-of-the-line 8' solid will equal or outperform what most members get on their 10' dishes.
But that includes a lot of caveats on the little dish,
- C band only, ortho feed, with decent LNBs
- very small subset of 8' dishes (ChannelMaster, Birdview)...?
...and inattention to the 10'er...
- dual band C/Ku LNBF feed
- mesh (some perforated would work better)
And I agree with Nosbod that a dish for each band is usually the better way to go.
It kinda depends on how good it needs to be...to be good enough...for you.
We got members watching C band on 1.0 & 1.2 meter dishes.
What would I suggest in general?
Get a bigger dish and outfit it with a cheap C-only ortho and LNBs
As for Ku, outfit your 6'er with something like the inexpensive LNBF from SatAV...
SL1P: http://satelliteav.com/p/shop/?ws_pid=665&ws_cat=433
or to get rediculous, use the Invacom AF-120 feed and mount an LNB of your choice.
(In another thread, I'm modifying the SL1PLL * to take external feedhorns )
....OR....
Consider a 1.0 or 1.2 meter offset dish for Ku only.
outfit it with something like the SL1PLL
* http://satelliteav.com/p/shop/?ws_pid=1613&ws_cat=433
Well, it's my belief that a really top-of-the-line 8' solid will equal or outperform what most members get on their 10' dishes.
But that includes a lot of caveats on the little dish,
- C band only, ortho feed, with decent LNBs
- very small subset of 8' dishes (ChannelMaster, Birdview)...?
...and inattention to the 10'er...
- dual band C/Ku LNBF feed
- mesh (some perforated would work better)
And I agree with Nosbod that a dish for each band is usually the better way to go.
It kinda depends on how good it needs to be...to be good enough...for you.
We got members watching C band on 1.0 & 1.2 meter dishes.
What would I suggest in general?
Get a bigger dish and outfit it with a cheap C-only ortho and LNBs
As for Ku, outfit your 6'er with something like the inexpensive LNBF from SatAV...
SL1P: http://satelliteav.com/p/shop/?ws_pid=665&ws_cat=433
or to get rediculous, use the Invacom AF-120 feed and mount an LNB of your choice.
(In another thread, I'm modifying the SL1PLL * to take external feedhorns
)....OR....
Consider a 1.0 or 1.2 meter offset dish for Ku only.
outfit it with something like the SL1PLL
* http://satelliteav.com/p/shop/?ws_pid=1613&ws_cat=433
I'd agree with the 'separate dishes for c and ku' but only because I've been lucky enough to have both to try. My big dish , 10' SAMI has ku mesh, and when I have tried it for ku, it worked great. But getting a big dish to track well enough for S2-KU can be tedious. So I just kept the old Primestar dish for ku and it seems to equal what I was getting with a corotor on the big dish. The dish's construction is possibly the biggest factor in how well a 6' vs 7.5' would perform. If I had to choose, I would go bigger though-just the factor of getting more signal to the lnb will make up for imperfections in parabolic shape of the dish. Supposedly the little holes in the mesh are too small to let much signal "leak" through.
The little holes on the door of the microwave oven in your kitchen that let you peek inside had better be too small to let much signal leak through...
I asked myself what's best? Well let's see. How do the professionals do it? I went around town and looked at the cable co. and TV stations. I found none of them have an offset ku dish. Most of the dishes were prime-focus fixed mounts and 15' ~ 30'. The smallest outfit in town has a couple of 10' mesh polar mounts as well as the bigger dishes. But 90 percent of the dishes held dual-orthomode feeds, the others were single orthos and one corotor. The Chap Bullseye II was the most popular feed. They were outfitted with PLL LNBs. I didn't see any DROs. So I wonder if they use this because it's the best or because they need it for compatibility of equipment? But in the end, we consider a more important issue. How much of a hobby is this? and How many dollars do I want to spend? The fun for some people is to see how innovative and cheap you can get and still watch some TV once in a while. Is there a best way? Maybe not but there is "My Way". Always be sure to have some fun, no matter the method you use.
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