Site survey question

[thedishking]

Hello!

As I am doing the survey for my C-Band antenna, I need some confirmation from the professionals.

I am working on installing a 2.4m Orbitron in a very restrictive space. Restrictive from an HoA perspective, LOS to the arc, etc.

My question is I can barely see a bird with regard to elevation; If I can see it with an angle finder, can I consider that the center of the antenna?

In other words, need to install a high pole to see the center of the arc. As I stand on a ladder, I can clear the obstructions if I am 10' off the ground with my inclinometer. Can I confidently install my antenna where the mount will be 10' off the ground, opposed to the bottom of the dish being 10' off the ground?

I think the mount being centered on the bird is acceptable, but I wanted to confirm with the community.

Thank you for your help!

Travis

 

[Titanium]

The line of sight to the satellite would be established from the bottom of the reflector. Any shadowed surface will not be reflecting any signal.

Also remember that trees grow...

 

[KE4EST]

The entire dish needs to be illuminated. Otherwise you could get away with C-Band on a 10 inch dish.

 

[ancient]

I have found that this sort of question is best answered during the solar outage periods that happen twice a year, in spring and fall, on the day and minute when the sun is directly behind the satellite relative to your location. Trouble is you have to be exact, you cannot be a minute early or late, and you can't be more than a day or two early or late or the sun's position won't be exactly behind the satellite. If it's cloudy those days or if you can't be there at the exact time, it doesn't work. But at that precise time, all you have to do is see if the sun will expose the entire surface of your dish, with no shadows. Unfortunately the spring solar outage was about a month ago, and the next one doesn't happen until autumn. The exact dates and times depend on your location.

Sometimes you can use the moon in the same way. It will almost never be as exact as the sun, but if it is only a little lower in the sky than the satellite it's useful. As long as it's lower than the satellite then you know that if it illuminates your entire dish area with no shadows, you're good. The page at Place satellite dish using sun or moon may be helpful but note that it says, "To display java applets (and the two applets in this page) you must download the java virtual machine at http://java.com".

 

[harshness]

When it comes to HOAs, out-of-sight trumps line-of-sight most every time.

 

[thedishking]

Thank you for the replies. I will take a few more measurements with inlinometer etc.

Appreciate the help!

Travis