Switch Question

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David J

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Sep 14, 2006
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I have two dishes and two receivers and need to know what kind of switch I should purchase so I can get channels from both dishes on both receivers.

After reading the Switch setups simplified thread, it appears that I should get a 4x4 multiswitch. Will a 4x4 multiswitch work even if I do not have any dual LNBs? If so, where can I purchase the switch?

Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Here is my set up:
Fortec Star, Mercury-II receiver
Traxis DBS-2550 receiver
1 meter dish with Fanchiou Satellite TV, High Stability KU-band Digital LNBF (single output)
10 foot satellite dish, not sure of LNB info but it is a single output and it works when I set my receiver's LNB setting to 5150. (I can get a ladder and look up the LNB info if necessary.)
 

Mr Tony

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a 4x4 wont work as both LNB's need to be duals (or bandstacked LNB's)

unless you overhaul the setup with dual LNB's you wont be able to honestly properly set it up.

Is the KU dish fixed or motorized?
Is the C-Band dish motorized? If so, how is it being motorized?
 

David J

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Sep 14, 2006
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Thanks.

Both the KU and C-band dishes are fixed.

If I need to get dual LNBs to make it work, any suggestions on which to get for both dishes?
 

Mr Tony

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can I ask what sats they're aimed at?

reason I ask is I use to have a fixed C-band dish aimed at G16 for the nets and a dish at G10/18 for the Equity stuff. since they are on opposite polarity (nets from G16 on H and G18 stuff on V) that would work with single LNB's

here is a thread on it from a couple years ago
http://www.satelliteguys.us/free-air-fta-discussion/63099-do-you-think-possible.html

so if all you want is one polarity from one dish and the opposite on the other dish then a 3x4 multiswitch will work fine. If they are the same polarity (and dont need opposite) then there is another way
 

David J

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Sep 14, 2006
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C-band dish is aimed at EchoStar 9/Galaxy 23 at 121 and the channels are 3777 H and 3900 V.

KU dish is aimed at SatMex 6 at 113 W and the channels are 12080 H, 12084 V and 12090 V.

The V channels are the ones I'm most interested in on both dishes and I can live without the H channels.

What is the method when the channels are on the same polarity?

Thanks again!
 

Anole

SatelliteGuys Master
Sep 22, 2005
11,819
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L.A., Calif.
possible hardware

4x4 or 5x4 switch:

I believe this MA/COM dual polarity C-band feedhorn will solve the one problem.
Contact Linuxman; the one in that picture may be available.

Any dual output Ku-LNB should work for the Ku half of the equation.
This one from Sadoun, is a Standard Ku dual output model.
You wouldn't be able to use the Universal model in this configuration.


bandstacked approach:

Here is a bandstacked C-band feedhorn and LNB.
It's also available without scalar.

Scroll about half way down the page for a Ku bandstacked LNBf.
Alternately, the FSS LNB off a Dish Network discontinued Superdish (105° model) will work.
 
Last edited:

Mr Tony

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here is an option...and a question

question is do you think you'd have both boxes on at the same time on the same satellite? If you only have one box on at a time then the below would work..

what I would do (and I have done thins before) is swap out the KU LNB for a dual...on the C-Band LNB get a satellite grade splitter (to go up to 2Ghz or higher) and make sure both ports can pass power.

Take one line from the splitter on the C-Band and one line from the KU into a diseqc switch to the receiver....repeat for the 2nd.

So as long as the C-Band LNB doesnt try and get both polarities at the same time (ie: horizontal on one box and V on the other) you should be fine. That is what I do. I have a LNB split (single output) that I have on G16 for the network feeds. They are on H. ABC HD is on V and that goes to the HD box. Both receivers co-exist just fine as long as I dont have ABC HD on the one box and the nets on the other box at the same time)


C-Band LNB-----splitter-----diseqc port 1 swicth 1
--------------------splitter-----diseqc port 1 switch 2

2 lines from KU into port 1 of the 2 diseqcs.

The KU LNB would allow you to see both polarities just fine then
 

David J

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Sep 14, 2006
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Thanks for feedback, it looks like I have three options.

1. Bandstacked approach - I would need to purchase a bandstacked C-band LNB (about $39), a bandstacked KU LNB (about $25) and a 2x4 or 3x4 multiswitch (about $25), for total of about $89.

2. 4x4 or 5x4 multiswitch - I would need to purchase a dual polarity C-band feedhorn (about $40) and a dual output KU LNB (about $30) and a 4x4 or 5x4 multiswitch (about $60), for a total of about $130.

3. Diseqc switch - I would need to purchase a dual output KU LNB (about $30) and two Diseqc switches (about $12 each), for a total of about $54. (I already have a satellite grade splitter.)

I'm leaning towards the two diseqc switch approach because it costs less and I won't need to receive different polarities from the C-band at the same time.
 

Mr Tony

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Nov 17, 2003
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another option is a dual LNB for KU and a 4x4 diseqc switch

put the splitter on the C-band and run both lines to the 4x4 switch. Hook both lines from the KU Dual to the other side of the 4x4

one switch, 2 receivers and room for 2 more ;)
4x4 switches can be had pretty cheap too
4x4 multiswitch, Electronics, eBay Motors items on eBay.com

thats if you want to expand beyond what you have now....plus the 4x4 switches are usually a little more sturdy

C-band----splitter-output to 13v of 4x4
-----------------------output to 18v of 4x4

KU output 1--------13v+22k side of 4x4
KU output 2---------18v+22k side of 4x4
 

David J

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Sep 14, 2006
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I received the 4x4 switch and the dual output KU LNB today and just finished setting it up.

It works great!

Thanks a lot for your help!!!!!
 

anik

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Aug 28, 2004
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bandstacked approach:

Here is a bandstacked C-band feedhorn and LNB.
It's also available without scalar.

Scroll about half way down the page for a Ku bandstacked LNBf.
Alternately, the FSS LNB off a Dish Network discontinued Superdish (105° model) will work.

I want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly. By "bandstacked" you mean that one polarity is on a low frequency band and the other polarity is on a higher frequency band, correct?

And that would mean that the satellite receiver would have to support a bandstacked LNB, and I'm assuming that not all of them do (or is that an incorrect assumption)?

And, you say there is a bandstacked LNB for C-Band, which I assume fits the standard large dish (I see you can get it with or without the scalar ring) and also one for Ku, which I assume fits any regular smaller Ku dish. But now the obvious question - is there such a thing as a bandstacked combination C/Ku LNB? I would expect such an LNB to have two outputs, one for the C-Band side and one for the Ku-Band side (I note that some non-bandstacked combo LNB's have a built-in 22 kHz tone switch if you want to use one lead to switch between the two) but I wonder why they would make stacked C-band LNBs and stacked Ku LNBs, but not a stacked combo unit - seems like a natural thing to have if you have a large C-band dish.

Reason I ask is because my large C/Ku dish is moveable using a positioner arm, but none of my small Ku dishes are. I was thinking about perhaps using one of those DiSEQc activated positioners but none (yet) will set the skew. I'm not sure if you could have two different movable dishes (one large for C-band and one smaller for Ku band) connected to the same receiver(s) (I'm not going to even get into the issue here of trying to share one or two movable dish(es) with two different receivers, either of which might want to change the dish position - that concept would really make my head hurt).

And speaking of skew, one other thing confuses me. Right now with my large dish, I have to set optimum V and H skew settings for each satellite (via my old analog box which I'm using to move the dish and set the skew), and they tend to differ as you move across the arc (if I recall correctly, there's about a ten or fifteen degree difference in skew as you get out toward the far edge of the arc, though I may be a bit off on that). With the newer feedhorns that don't have the small polarity switch (that little blue box that sometimes decides to go bad during the worst part of winter :() I wonder how you deal with the different skew settings for the different satellites. Do you just pick a satellite that somewhere near the middle of your visible arc and peak on that one and hope for the best on all the others, or is there actually some way to compensate for the changing skew across the arc that I'm not seeing? Or, are those type of feedhorns only intended for use with fixed dishes (a dish locked down on a single satellite)?

Just when I've finally figured out how my system works, something new comes out and I have to ask (possibly dumb) questions to understand the new stuff!
 

turbosat

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Dec 26, 2006
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anik, on those small dishes with diseqc motors, the 'arm' that the dish attaches to skews the dish as it moves east and west. So the entire lnbf/dish is skewing itself, on the ku sats there is only one that I know of, AMC1 that has a skew that is weirdly different from the other sats. I can still pick up most of the tps on it anyway, just not as strong.
 

Mr Tony

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Nov 17, 2003
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I want to make sure I'm understanding this correctly. By "bandstacked" you mean that one polarity is on a low frequency band and the other polarity is on a higher frequency band, correct?
yep

And that would mean that the satellite receiver would have to support a bandstacked LNB, and I'm assuming that not all of them do (or is that an incorrect assumption)?
I thought the same but the answer is they all support bandstacked...just different ways.

is there such a thing as a bandstacked combination C/Ku LNB?
no


As for the bandstacked question, I have the C-Band one. It has 2 LNB LO's
5150 for V
5750 for H

If your box supports that then it works pretty easy. The Pansat has the option but the Coolsat 8000 did not. So I set up 2 satellites...one with 5150 as the LO and one as 5750 as LO

But the Quali only allowed 5150...so we found a way to convert them. Just drop the H transponders 600mhz and change to V and voila..worked great. So a transponder at 4000 H is now at 3400 V

Here is some more info on it from folks recently (including pics)
http://www.satelliteguys.us/free-air-fta-discussion/151368-bandstacked-c-band-conversion.html
http://www.satelliteguys.us/c-band-satellite-discussion/147673-2-c-band-lnbs-6-foot-dish.html
http://www.satelliteguys.us/c-band-satellite-discussion/142224-b1sat-stacked-c-band-lnbf.html
http://www.satelliteguys.us/c-band-...10746-receiver-settings-b1sat-stack-lnbf.html

the bandstacked wont work on analog or 4DTV...only FTA boxes but it works pretty good.
 

Anole

SatelliteGuys Master
Sep 22, 2005
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L.A., Calif.
I've been talking about recycling Dish 121° FSS LNBs since January of 2007.
And certainly wasn't the first to mention it.

JerryT in Florida, put some from Global-CM on his T-90 to get 2° bird spacing.
We have had a big discussion on how best to hook up 16+ LNBs to a receiver.

Every time anyone whines about their crummy old LNB on a Primestar, Tron waves the flag about using a recycled Dish FSS LNB.

There have been numerous discussions about the Dish 105° LNBs, since they have a proper feedhorn for regular dishes.

But, when Sadoun started selling that B1stacked C-band LNBf a while back, you could have bowled me over with a feather!

As for switches, anyone wanting up to 3 LNBs hooked to 4 (or 8) receivers, the venerable Dish Network DP-34 is quality hardware!
Cheap, too.
For four inputs the DPP-44 might be used, but they are still expensive.

I'm not keen on splitters, but those feeding diseqc switches can provide signal for a couple of FTA boxes, too.
 

David J

Member
Sep 14, 2006
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cool

so how did you hook it up? As I posted above or just the C-Band into one side?

I put the splitter on the C-band and ran both lines to the 4x4 switch. I then hooked both lines from the KU Dual to the other side of the 4x4 switch.
 

anik

SatelliteGuys Pro
Aug 28, 2004
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2
U.S.A.
Thanks for answering my questions, turbosat and Iceberg. Real shame they don't make a combo C/Ku unit. I just can't see two motorized dishes (one for C and one for Ku) working out very well.

I'm still wondering about the skew on C-Band, though I'm thinking maybe my original assumption was right - you peak the skew on a satellite near the middle of your viewable arc (or maybe you "closest to true south" bird?) and it's close enough on the rest - it's a working theory, anyway. Even if someday I go to a modern combination C/Ku (non-bandstacked) unit that uses voltage to switch between H and V (like the Ku LNBs), I suspect that it will not give me any way to individually adjust the skew for each satellite.
 
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