Searching for signal..

[DJ Rob]

I got installed yesterday with Direct.

When watching ESPN HD and CNN HD, the signal keeps cutting out constantly. I went to Lyngsat to find which sat and transponder those channels are on but couldn't find the right page.

Is there anyway to check on the receiver what my signal strength is on these channels?

 

[charper1]

So are you really in Denver, CO or Vancouver, BC

 

[DJ Rob]

I'm at my place in Colorado at the moment. Why do you ask?

I found out why my signal was getting worse and worse since the install yesterday. It appears the bolts on the dish mount were not deep enough to go into any studs. The siding on my house starting pulling out under the weight of the slimline.

Then the dish come down along with the pieces of siding after my first post. I just finished nailing the siding back on. I have a tech scheduled to come back out tomorrow to reinstall it.

 

[DJ Rob]

Dish was reinstalled today.

I'm still wondering if there's any way to know which transponders a certain channel uses?
And yes I'm still in Denver

 

[charper1]

sure channels are assigned to certain tps, but they can & do change from time to time and do not have much bearing to us the end user; as it it a "behind the scene" goings on and they simply map to a "chnl number" were they want the programming to appear.

 

[charper1]

P.S. I was asking if you were in Canada or Denver to determine if maybe you were being effected by a footprint issue or not. Thats all.

 

[truckracer]

some installers just suck.

 

[DJ Rob]

It's all good charper1.

I think I may need to invest in a Birddog or other good meter in case I ever have a problem. My $30 meter I use for Dish/Expressvu looks like it isn't going to cut it on these Slimlines.

As for the installer sucking; he was a nice guy, very customer friendly and I can only fault him for not finding a stud to screw the mounting arm onto.

 

[Zynergi]

Well you metioned a couple things that should have brought a eyebrow up...

Screws not deep enough

Was he not using (6) 1/2" x 2-3" lag bolts or did he use (4) self tapping screws (7/16 x1"), are there 2 monopoles coming off the dish?

Siding

oO Roof/Brick/Pole. A dish, especially a Slimline, should ever be installed on any type of siding or even a fascia board unless you are using one where you can see the rafter and actually use an under eave mount, that is actually attached to the rafter and not the fascia. The dish is just to heavy in weight not to mention the wind load it carries even under a light breeze to install on cosmetic surfaces such as siding.

In a nutshell with a properly installed KA/KU dish, you should be able to rappel from the mast.

 

[DJ Rob]

He only used 2" lag bolts but did have the monopoles on. When the dish started coming out of the siding, the monopoles slid as if the bracket in the middle wasn't made tight enough.

This time he used 3" lag bolts and I suggested he mount it on the corner of the house where there's plenty of thick wood.

 

[DJ Rob]

Well a month later and the dish is starting to come down again. It appears the monopoles were just screwed into the siding again with nothing behind it and the siding has pulled out an inch or two and is warping. Directv wants to charge me a service call to fix it.

I have 4 cables going into a SWM5. Will my cheapie $30 sat meter work on one of those cables where I can get an accurate reading to be able to realign the dish? Which cable of those 4 should I use? Or do I need a better meter because of the KA bands?

 

[Zynergi]

It may be advantageous for you to just install/have it installed on a pole next to the house, pending LOS is available there. Seems to me that you are just destroying your siding keeping it there. Make sure you take some pics, and I would even consider starting a damage claim. Make them correct the installers (2 of them) mistake and put on a pole for free. If for some reason you decide to keep it on the side of the house have them run some small self tapping screw in the mono-pole brackets on teh mast and the slider, along with 1 on the Dish AZ/EL Mount when he rough tunes the dish, then when everything is secure fine tune the dish.

 

[DJ Rob]

I tried to realign the dish with the my laptop and slingbox. The first thing I did was check the mast arm with a level. In addition to leaning down, the last tech mounted the mast where it leaned towards the east.

I called Direct again and this time they told me the install is guaranteed for 90 days. So they are sending a tech back out for free next week.

In the meantime, I got it tweaked as good as I can where the lowest signals I'm getting on the conus birds are 76. All of 99c comes in at 80-86 now. 103c is at 76-the 80s.

Because of the mast being so crooked, I had to adjust the tilt to compensate. It ended up being 10 degrees off what the receiver says it is supposed to be.

A pole next to the house will not work since we have a house in the way we need to shoot over. The dish needs to be about 7-8 feet up.

I guess I need to figure out more options when the tech gets here just in case it can't stay on the house. It seems like the mast arm is staying where it needs to be but the monopole mounts are the ones that pull out. So maybe they just need to be addressed.

 

[mark40511]

DJrob

You got me with that bug icon!