Twinhan problems

[icedown]

I've looked through quite a bit of stuff on this forum dealing the the problems with twinhan 1020a card but I'm having a problem I couldn't find. No matter what, my card always shows 80% stregth, 0% quality. Now, I'm new to the whole c-band. but I am sure I'm on my due south satellite. I have a signal meter that is going nuts. I've put every channel in for every satellite close to it but I never see any change. I even pulled the feedhorn/lnb off and sat it on the ground pointing down and the signal stayed the same.

Here's my setup:
10' Sami
Norsat 8515 LNB
Chaparral Super Feed
No actuator, just a threaded turnbuckle (This is only going on 1 sat when I get it running)

This is the second card with the same result. I've been messing with this on and off for about a year and I'm really getting annoyed at it. Any Ideas. I've tried downloading the latest driver for the card but all they do is lock the computer solid during install.

 

[Anole]

If your LNB wasn't plugged into the card, you'd probably show 0 signal.
Now, when you are actually on a satellite and locked, you'll have some sort of Quality reading.

What are you doing to control the polarity servo on your feedhorn?

Have you selected a transponder with known activity to use for testing?

Did you take into account the local magnetic variation when aiming for your True South bird?

Like you, I started FTA with a USB receiver, and it was a serious uphill battle to get the 100 problems solved!

 

[B.J.]

I've looked through quite a bit of stuff on this forum dealing the the problems with twinhan 1020a card but I'm having a problem I couldn't find. No matter what, my card always shows 80% stregth, 0% quality. Now, I'm new to the whole c-band. but I am sure I'm on my due south satellite. I have a signal meter that is going nuts. I've put every channel in for every satellite close to it but I never see any change. I even pulled the feedhorn/lnb off and sat it on the ground pointing down and the signal stayed the same.

Here's my setup:
10' Sami
Norsat 8515 LNB
Chaparral Super Feed
No actuator, just a threaded turnbuckle (This is only going on 1 sat when I get it running)

This is the second card with the same result. I've been messing with this on and off for about a year and I'm really getting annoyed at it. Any Ideas. I've tried downloading the latest driver for the card but all they do is lock the computer solid during install.

One thing that comes to mind is that if you are using the program that comes with the Twinhan is very user unfriendly, and the more friendly shareware programs are a bit complicated for first time users. I'd really suggest starting with something simple to get started. Basically, two programs, TSREADER and THMOVER.
THMOVER is a program that can help you search for a satellite. Basically, you put in the freq and SR of a KNOWN 24/7 transponder (that's most likely an issue, as you probably are looking for a non-existant transponder). Anyway, THMOVER will control a diseqC motor, but can also be used just to monitor while you move your dish manually.
Once you find the transponder, you can check to see what's on it with TSREADER. TSREADER can also be used to play the channels if you load up VLC on your computer.

Anyway, THMOVER is at:
Downloads | DVBApps
TSREADER is at:
COOL.STF
and VLC is at:
VLC media player - Overview

I really think that these 3 programs are the easiest way to get started with the Twinhan. After you find the sat, you can experiment with other programs for display, but I know of very few people who actually use the program that comes with the Twinhan.

HOWEVER, as said above, you're probably trying to tune a transponder that doesn't exist. It might help if you indicate what sat you're on, and what transponder you're trying to lock. Also indicate what LO freq you're using (should be 5150 for C-band).

EDIT: And yes, I agree with the previous response that I don't see how you're controlling polarity with your setup. You might need to get an old analog receiver to do that.

 

[icedown]

Well, lets start with polarity. I cannot adjust polarity. My feed horn does not work like that. It's one polarity only.

I can post the link yet so you have to google for "Chaparral Super Feed" It should be the first link.

As far as mover program or diseqC, I use a threaded turnbuckle. I don't have an actuator. I've programmed all the transponders i can find that are vertical polarity. My goal is the NOAA feed on AMC2.

Yes, when i unplug the LNB, signal drops to 0%, but shouldn't it have a different signal level when its sitting on the ground facing down too? Nothing I do changes the signal level even though my signal meter does.

I've been getting the values I'm putting in for the satellites from lyngsat. I'll try TSREADER. For due south I'm trying to lock Galaxy 17.

 

[B.J.]

....

As far as mover program or diseqC, I use a threaded turnbuckle. I don't have an actuator. I've programmed all the transponders i can find that are vertical polarity. My goal is the NOAA feed on AMC2.

Yes, when i unplug the LNB, signal drops to 0%, but shouldn't it have a different signal level when its sitting on the ground facing down too? Nothing I do changes the signal level even though my signal meter does.

I've been getting the values I'm putting in for the satellites from lyngsat. I'll try TSREADER. For due south I'm trying to lock Galaxy 17.

Ok re polarity. One thing though, if you're powering this with the Twinhan, you might want to set it on Horizontal, even though the transponders are vertical, becaues the Norsat LNB probably works better at 18V.

Make sure your LO freq is set on 5150.

Re the mover program, I understood that you had the turnbuckle, the reason for the mover program is that most receivers don't have very good signal meters, and/or the meters don't stay on, but the THMOVER program works well for finding signals even though you aren't using it to move the dish. Basically it just gives you an improved signal meter.

Relative to vertical transponders on G17, some of them have changed parameters. I just looked, and 3740V has an SR of 27800, not what's listed in Lyngsat. 3820V3000 should work as listed, as should 3860. I didn't find anything on the 3940V, it's probably occasional video. 4020 has an SR of 27800, not what's listed on Lyngsat. Anyway, try some of those.

Relative to the vertical transponders on AMC2 once you get there. I just checked, and at least the first 3 listed in Lyngsat are currently active. I wasn't able to tune the 4th one.
I WAS able to lock the NOAAPORT transponder at 3956 V 6349. I assume that's what you're looking for. TSREADER might be useful for that as well, as it will rebroadcast the IP data over a network for you.

Re levels, that isn't unusual, particularly if you aren't on an active transponder.

Good luck.

 

[icedown]

Tried the THmover, same result. I'm not able to lock anything. I've got a cheap radioshack signal meter also. Even when the signal meter shows 0, the thmover still shows 80. i can remove the turnbuckle and lay the dish to point at the ground and it still shows 80. WHen i would click lock check. The signal and quality would bounce around and but no lock on anything you listed. I've moved around the sky searching around at each place my analog signal meter showed. and still nothing

 

[B.J.]

Well I can't think of anything other than you being way off on the aim. If you're seeing strong signals on the RS meter, this is the one time that having a blind search receiver helps a lot, because it probably means your on a sat, but the wrong one, and a blind scan can tell you which way to go. One thing you might try, is to go to the Naval Observatory site, and get a listing for what azimuth the sun is every minute of the day, ie
Sun or Moon Altitude/Azimuth Table

then go to one of those Az/El sat tracker sites, and find out what azimuth G17 is from your location. Then find out from the USNO site what time of day the sun is at the same azimuth as the sat.

Then wait for that time of day, and line up your dish so that the shadow of your feedhorn is about centered on the dish (assuming it'a a prime focus). But after getting it close to centered, you can probably wait 10 or 15 minutes then try finding the signals again, searching only by varying your axis elevation (I assume that you've already set the declination close to where it should be).
I guess I'm also assuming that you have a polar mount too, because you never really said one way or the other. It sounded like you did, and the turnbuckle just took the place of the actuator. I used to do this with a fixed dish, but actually had an actuator there, but turned it with a battery powered hand drill.
But anyway, you might indicate how you set declination and axis elevation, and what angles you used, because it really sounds like you're way off on aim. And that's the big problem working with only a Twinhan, because it's generally in a desktop computer that you can't take to the dish, and you really need to be able to see the signal meters while you are out at the dish moving things around.

You also might try plugging in some freqs of satellites one or two slots east and west of G17, because you're probably on the wrong sat.

 

[icedown]

Ok, i'm gonna try the sun thing tomorrow. I do have my computer right next to the dish. Not only have I tried putting in values for different sats, but I have also moved around to several different places in the arc that the RS signal meter shows a strong signal with no luck either.

It is a polar mount. I used this web site to get my angles.

http://www.satellitehelp.com/installation_index.asp#Mounting_The%20_Feedhorn

Here are the coordinates of my dish

36.4750
-90.5796

here are the angles I used.
Latitude 36.5
Polar Axis 37.19
Declination Angle 5.15
Apex Elevation 47.66

​

 

[B.J.]

Ok, i'm gonna try the sun thing tomorrow. I do have my computer right next to the dish. Not only have I tried putting in values for different sats, but I have also moved around to several different places in the arc that the RS signal meter shows a strong signal with no luck either.

It is a polar mount. I used this web site to get my angles.

C-band Satellite Installation

Here are the coordinates of my dish

36.4750
-90.5796

here are the angles I used.
Latitude 36.5
Polar Axis 37.19
Declination Angle 5.15
Apex Elevation 47.66

​

Running out of ideas here. Your angles are correct provided you followed the graphic at http://www.satellitehelp.com/images/angle.gif , one of the images on that site. I was expecting that you might have confused elevation with the latitude angles, which are 90-elevation, but your web page has it correct, and it also uses the good modified declination numbers. So if you did that, you should be on or very close to the arc.
Unfortunately, it's starting to look like a problem with the card, unless you didn't use the proper 5150 LO freq, but most software programs would have given you an out of range error.

I once had problems with my Twinhan by having loaded the drivers twice, which confused the software. I don't think that's your problem though, because I THINK that the symptoms I saw were that software gave me errors saying that it couldn't see the card. But my solution, just in case, was that I completely removed the Twinhan software, drivers, AND directories (at the recommendation of a Twinhan engineer), then reloaded it, and all was well.

One thing about the Twinhan, (and other cards), is that it doesn't like it when you have 2 different programs trying to control it. If I accidently do that, sometimes it will crash the computer or the program, but other times it just won't tune the card properly. So you might check to see if perhaps you have 2 different programs trying to control the card at the same time.

I seem to remember that my original card just had the TV program on the disk, but I later upgraded to a later version of software which in addition to the TV program also had a VisionData (might be called TwinhanData) program, which was supposed to turn the Twinhan card into a NIC for transponders like the NOAPORT (it is one option for that, but isn't really necessary). After I loaded that, there was some kind of Winmanager program in the task bar, which selected between the TV program and the data program. I seem to remember some conflicts with locking transponders with TV viewing programs whenever the Data program was running in the background. I've since disabled the data program, since TSREADER does everything it did.
But you might check your task list to see if there are any other Twinhan processes running before you try running any of the programs your searching for sats with.
Did you check the coax to the lnb to make sure it is providing 18V at the lnb?
You might try switching card slots in the computer. Sometimes there are conflicts.
One last potential problem.... I noticed that with MY Twinhan card, that if I am using a SATA hard drive in the computer, that it shuts down the Twinhan card. I could be tuned to a sat channel on the Twinhan, then try copying a file from a EIDE drive to the SATA drive, and the Twinhan card would act like it wasn't seeing the satellite. So if your computer has a SATA drive, particularly if it's a drive that the Twinhan program is using, you might try replacing that with an EIDE drive. I never did figure this one out, and pulled the SATA drive out of the computer, and now use it in an external USB enclosure.

Otherwise I'm out of ideas.

 

[icedown]

Well this is the 2nd twinhan card, in the 2nd computer. I also had an even cheaper card in there at one point, it would do the same thing except it would stay at 5%. The coax I pulled of off one of my old Wild Blue setups, it was working. The lnb is brand new. I'll check the voltages and the coax again to make sure.

This isn't the first place i've came for help but every one else has stalled out too. Considering my signal meter is showing a signal and my card is not, first instinct is that it's my card. But 3 with the exact same problem?... I've already spent over $1000 on this setup. It just so damn flustrating that no matter what I do, NOTHING changes. I don't know how many days i've sat out there under that dish with my computer working on the alignment. I've pulled the dish down several times to verify that the feedhorn is centered. I've even flipped the lnb the other way to try with the same result.

I've searched for people who used to install these things, all of them are gone. I just don't know what to do.

 

[starman345]

Does someone close to you have a fta set top box you could borrow to do your dish setup? Setup is tough with a dvb card. I've done it but its no fun. If you can't locate a box you could get a Coolsat 5000 on Ebay for $50 or less, it would simplify setup a lot and you could keep it in your setup, just loop through the box to the card, blind scan with the box and tune the channels with the card.
It is much simpler when you can blind scan a signal then go to Lyngsat or here and identify it and know for sure what satellite you are on, then you can go from there.

 

[SpiffWilkie]

Your up near MO, eh? If you were closer, I'd come out and give it a shot with my receiver.

 

[B.J.]

... I've even flipped the lnb the other way to try with the same result.
...

I'm not familiar with that single polarity feedhorn. I assume there is one orientation for horizontal, and another for vertical. Are you sure you don't have it the wrong way? You might try picking up a Horizontal transponder. For example 4040H 27800 is a good transponder to try of G17.


Also, not sure if you said what OS you're using? I use my main 1020a on Win2000, but have my 2nd one on an XP computer. Both work fine, but there are lots of problems people report with VISTA.

 

[icedown]

If you can come up here, I'll pay your gas and $50, and if you can lock the dish on AMC2 or figured out what is not working, i'll pay you an extra $100, Once I know the damn thing is pointed right for sure, trouble shoot it from there. My biggest flustration is that there are so many things that could be going wrong, but I don't know enough about the satellite stuff to troubleshoot it good.

 

[gabshere]

i'm a pretty good ways from you but i also think a STB would help.
but if no one offers i will try to help

 

[icedown]

Well, I got some help from a guy named Zack who I found on the AV satellite page under installers. I pulled the lnb off and checked voltages and verified angles the night before he came over. Once we got his stuff hooked up and swung the satellite back up into position. 2 turns of the turnbuckle and his system showed 100% signal 100% quality. We hooked it up to the computer and it finally locked on. Now i'm messing with getting the data processed. Don't know really what did it. Maybe some little adjustment I made checking what you guys said to finally did it. Thanks guys for all your help.

 

[starman345]

Glad you got it running.

 

[lonewolf85]

Well, I got some help from a guy named Zack who I found on the AV satellite page under installers.

icedown just to let you know I was the one that came over and helped you. I guess in all the excitement I forgot to menton that I was a member here. I really don't know what got it going eiter it seemed really to easy. Anyway it was nice meeting you and I wish you luck in all your future projects.