Looks like it's getting close to sun fade time. Noticed the shadow of the feed near the center of the dish today.
Sun Fade Time
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Billy,
Thank you for posting this! I really wish that many others will go outside and check this phenomenon out!
For anyone who has a lot of trees or buildings around their proposed dish farm/dish installation and want to determine their LOS, this is the time to do so. DO NOT pass up this opportunity!
It is a major learning experience! Great information for you to utilize.
Sun Outage Calculator
RADAR
Thank you for posting this! I really wish that many others will go outside and check this phenomenon out!
For anyone who has a lot of trees or buildings around their proposed dish farm/dish installation and want to determine their LOS, this is the time to do so. DO NOT pass up this opportunity!
It is a major learning experience! Great information for you to utilize.
Sun Outage Calculator
RADAR
Radar you'll probably laugh at me but I have been checking that out for many years. I always remember thinking that when I saw that shadow in the center of the dish that it would'nt be long before it started getting warm out. The funny thing for me is that with my old 11 footer that I have not used for 15+ years, I have not witnessed a sun fade in the now digital era I was used to seeing the sparkilies start in and get worse and worse til the picture was gone (analog days) and then slowly get better and better til the picture was clear again.
Billy,
I absolutely dont laugh at this technique. I would like to see more FTA'ers use this valuable tool. It is so accurate, and even though it only ocurrs twice a year, it is still a great tool!.
Everyone should take advantage of it when the time comes. Many are concerned throught the year about occlusions for their LOS. This is the time to dispel their concerns or reinforce them.
Since this opportunity only comes twice a year, it is a treat!
RADAR
The Sun is your Friend!
I was never able to lock on to Hispasat @30w, until I used the shadow at the proper time of the day! This
method made me realize how much "out of adjustment" my mounts were!
What a feeling, when that bird lit up for me! I was then able to find other sats in that vicinity too.
That trick initially came in very handy for me, when I was looking to set up my first motorized dish. I studied the
sun's path and watched where all the shadows fell for 3 days, until I decided on the ideal spot!
I am able to scan the arc from ISS-901 thru AMC-8 (18*W to 139*W) with only a few power lines to look through.
For what it's worth, I recall hitting a website that had a calculator for using the moon to locate sats, but I can't
remember who or where it was.
Use the Force, Luke!
I was never able to lock on to Hispasat @30w, until I used the shadow at the proper time of the day! This
method made me realize how much "out of adjustment" my mounts were!
What a feeling, when that bird lit up for me! I was then able to find other sats in that vicinity too.
That trick initially came in very handy for me, when I was looking to set up my first motorized dish. I studied the
sun's path and watched where all the shadows fell for 3 days, until I decided on the ideal spot!
I am able to scan the arc from ISS-901 thru AMC-8 (18*W to 139*W) with only a few power lines to look through.
For what it's worth, I recall hitting a website that had a calculator for using the moon to locate sats, but I can't
remember who or where it was.
Use the Force, Luke!
Not only this problem, but we are apparently just ending a major solar flare period. Been giving OTA and radio fits this week.
Unfortunately, they predict this anomaly to continue and grow worse for the next few years. That is just a prediction, not a known fact. However, NASA and other scientific establishments are agreeing that this is a definite possibility as it is a cyclical pattern that has repeated about every ~22 years (I think I got that right). But, this anomaly is not the same thing as the sun fade that occurs twice a year when the sun happens to align with the satellite arc and the sun's radiation, noise and what not overpowers the transmitted signal from that satellite for a few minutes each day for a few days. The solar activity that you are referring to, Turbo, actually "KILLS" or has the possibility to kill a satellite completely. Possibly making it a useless piece of space junk if the emission hits that satellite at just the right time and with a strong enough energy volume.
It can also disrupt the electrical grid and cause brown or black-outs. Like the one that took out the grid for a large portion of the NE USA and SE Canada. There were some speculations that the solar activity was responsible for that. That was a HUGE outage. But, they also thought it could have been a switch failure as well. Theories go both ways.
It has one positive perk, though. The Aurora Borealis will be beautiful!
Something to take in consideration when using this program is that if you put in a small dish size you will get a longer list with a large time window for the outage. This is because with a smaller dish you have a larger main lobe antenna pattern. So if you go out the first day and the first minute it will not be the precise center. If you enter a huge dish size like 10 meters then you will get a short list of two or three days with a two minute window that should give you the exact center.
HUH?
Forgive me for being a bit clued out about this. Is this a way to aim my dish perfectly because the sun will be right "behind" the satellite I am aiming at?
Please enlighten me as to the procedure!
Forgive me for being a bit clued out about this. Is this a way to aim my dish perfectly because the sun will be right "behind" the satellite I am aiming at?
Please enlighten me as to the procedure!
Roger,
This is more of a tool for a "site survey" rather than precise pointing. On the day/hour/min the sun is behind a given sat you want to receive, just look around. Anywhere there is direct sunlight that spot is a potential location for a dish. If your dish is already mounted, you can watch for shadows from trees etc, that may explain why certain sats don't come in.
This is more of a tool for a "site survey" rather than precise pointing. On the day/hour/min the sun is behind a given sat you want to receive, just look around. Anywhere there is direct sunlight that spot is a potential location for a dish. If your dish is already mounted, you can watch for shadows from trees etc, that may explain why certain sats don't come in.
Forgive my ignorance on this, maybe I am too "new school" but what will this tell you that an a compass, an inclinometer and knowing the locations of the birds won't tell you 24 hours a day 365 days a year? Is there something I am missing other then an interesting technique?
Kjlued,
This is just a verty interesting technique with a great advantage. You can immediately detect any possible occlusions, like tree branches, without measuring each leaf or twig. The technique is not so much for the purpose of aiming at the satellite, it is to determine the prize locations to install a dish in your yard so that you don't have to trim trees or remove objects or relocate the dish after you have it set. Especially important when installing a motorized dish. So... It is basically a "slick" time saving method to determine where you should install a motorized dish for the best performance.
RADAR
Should be starting in the next day or two for most of us in the states. Already helped me figure out where to put a dish for 30w 
The calculator printout of my location shows the sun fade starts here on thursday 03/03/2011 and will last until 03/08/2011.
Ok I'm planing to evaluate the ends of my arc, 30w to 137w, to see if I can go a few sats either way. With the sun at the tree line, how much of the sun should I see to declare that location good? The sun is quite large compared to a satellite that would just be a tiny speck if you could see it.
If you run the calulator for each satellite, it will give you a list of the optimum time and dates for each satellite, which will be at different times of the day for each sat.
Since it gives you a range of dates, if you can pick the very middle date then that is when the satellite should be directly at the center of the sun's disc. Remember that if you have deciduous trees, and you are in the northern climes, you will have to factor in the leaves come spring and summer. So you kinda have to guess if it might be blocked by green growth. A summer breeze will sway the limbs in the path and you'll get blips in your signal. Best if the sun is well away from any tree limbs at all so that the whole sun is visible.
I know that for those of you who have not tried this technique yet, you will be very suprised as to how high the sats really are in the sky.
RADAR
I may have seen a few issues yesterday as I was watching 97W & 99W cband. I'm guessing it was maybe a half hour or so several channels were way down, even lost a few....minutes later they were back. If it wasn't solar it was something in the air lol...Blind
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