A few months behind schedule but it's time! Tuesday is the day.
First priority was getting my subscription dishes set up because I'm paying for that TV so I want it up and going ASAP. And I watch a LOT of the BBC..
I do have the luxury of moving piecemeal so I don't have to be in a huge rush to get everything over there at once. My FTA dishes ARE GOING but it will be a few weeks. There is a KU dish on an HH motor there now which will get me Retro and a few others I like, that will hold me over until I get the other dishes moved.
I also have to get the fence finished on the side where the FTA dishes go, when they were drilling holes in the ground for the fence they hit a gas line and made a HUGE leak that scared the whole neighborhood. That shut down everything for the day and my fence line had to get shifted over which I wasn't happy about.
At least we now know where everything is buried so I won't have to worry when I plant the poles for my FTA dishes. The smaller dishes are going three foot down, the 10' C-band and the 1.8m Prodelin are going SIX FEET IN, I want 5 feet above ground so I need two 11' x 4.5" poles.
Over the years I've suffered a lot of grief from my FTA adventures. Mostly because of poles not put in plumb and or put in not deep enough. For my subscription dishes I got three schedule 40, 3" by 8' galvanized poles. My dad drilled holes 18" from the bottom and put some painted rebarb through so they can not spin in the cement. I had the handyman drill three, three foot deep holes when he was drilling holes for my fence. I had to use a hand digger to make them bigger around so I could get LOTS of cement in.
I mixed up cement till it was like crunchy peanut butter, nice and thick and well mixed so there was no dry stuff in it. I dropped the poles in and I clamped TWO digital inclinometers to the pole at 45 degrees from each other PLUS I stuck some of those needle type inclinometers and a bubble level to the poles and I set them to be PERFECTLY PLUMB. Absolutely dead on, 90 degrees plumb. Each one. Once I got them plumb I just backed off and rested awhile to let the cement set up a little, after about half an hour I checked them again and they were still dead on perfect so I very carefully removed all the levels and meters without disturbing the poles.
Today I went and ran RG-11 end to end and tacked it up properly along the eves of the garage (Yes, it's ugly, it's getting new siding soon). With my very excellent meter I expect that I'll get excellent performance from my dishes and that they will be indestructible and trouble free.
This is exactly the same way I am going to do my FTA dishes. I am taking my time and remembering all my past mistakes and griefs and doing it RIGHT this time. Also I this time I get the luxury of planning out where they go. The mish mash of randomly placed dishes here at my old house are not entirely my doing, my ex started that mess. I just went with it because I didn't know any better. Now I do.
It's really nice when you get a clean slate to work with and you can do it the way you want. And even better after you've learned the hard way what not to do.
My A3 is still on the blink, I haven't had time to try and fix it yet, Brian at Titanium sent me directions on how to fix it but I've been so busy prepping for moving that I just haven't had time. I hope next week I can give it a try because I would like to get back to recording my favorite shows..
There's also my OTA antenna system that I'm going to do as well, I have a matched pair of 91XG's and the fiberglass tubes for mounting them. I just need to get a tower to get them up to 30 feet. I have a pair of thrust bearings for the motor so that should really help as well. And of course EVERYTHING from now on is RG-11. I bought a 1,000 spool of the stuff. There's enough to do everything I will ever think of plus I need to install an FTA system for my dad at his new home. He really, really likes his PBS. He totally digs the Oklahoma feeds.
As the FTA stuff gets moved and installed at my new(ish) home I'll post that stuff. As always, expect massive overkill. Because I can.
First priority was getting my subscription dishes set up because I'm paying for that TV so I want it up and going ASAP. And I watch a LOT of the BBC..
I do have the luxury of moving piecemeal so I don't have to be in a huge rush to get everything over there at once. My FTA dishes ARE GOING but it will be a few weeks. There is a KU dish on an HH motor there now which will get me Retro and a few others I like, that will hold me over until I get the other dishes moved.
I also have to get the fence finished on the side where the FTA dishes go, when they were drilling holes in the ground for the fence they hit a gas line and made a HUGE leak that scared the whole neighborhood. That shut down everything for the day and my fence line had to get shifted over which I wasn't happy about.
At least we now know where everything is buried so I won't have to worry when I plant the poles for my FTA dishes. The smaller dishes are going three foot down, the 10' C-band and the 1.8m Prodelin are going SIX FEET IN, I want 5 feet above ground so I need two 11' x 4.5" poles.
Over the years I've suffered a lot of grief from my FTA adventures. Mostly because of poles not put in plumb and or put in not deep enough. For my subscription dishes I got three schedule 40, 3" by 8' galvanized poles. My dad drilled holes 18" from the bottom and put some painted rebarb through so they can not spin in the cement. I had the handyman drill three, three foot deep holes when he was drilling holes for my fence. I had to use a hand digger to make them bigger around so I could get LOTS of cement in.
I mixed up cement till it was like crunchy peanut butter, nice and thick and well mixed so there was no dry stuff in it. I dropped the poles in and I clamped TWO digital inclinometers to the pole at 45 degrees from each other PLUS I stuck some of those needle type inclinometers and a bubble level to the poles and I set them to be PERFECTLY PLUMB. Absolutely dead on, 90 degrees plumb. Each one. Once I got them plumb I just backed off and rested awhile to let the cement set up a little, after about half an hour I checked them again and they were still dead on perfect so I very carefully removed all the levels and meters without disturbing the poles.
Today I went and ran RG-11 end to end and tacked it up properly along the eves of the garage (Yes, it's ugly, it's getting new siding soon). With my very excellent meter I expect that I'll get excellent performance from my dishes and that they will be indestructible and trouble free.
This is exactly the same way I am going to do my FTA dishes. I am taking my time and remembering all my past mistakes and griefs and doing it RIGHT this time. Also I this time I get the luxury of planning out where they go. The mish mash of randomly placed dishes here at my old house are not entirely my doing, my ex started that mess. I just went with it because I didn't know any better. Now I do.
It's really nice when you get a clean slate to work with and you can do it the way you want. And even better after you've learned the hard way what not to do.
My A3 is still on the blink, I haven't had time to try and fix it yet, Brian at Titanium sent me directions on how to fix it but I've been so busy prepping for moving that I just haven't had time. I hope next week I can give it a try because I would like to get back to recording my favorite shows..
There's also my OTA antenna system that I'm going to do as well, I have a matched pair of 91XG's and the fiberglass tubes for mounting them. I just need to get a tower to get them up to 30 feet. I have a pair of thrust bearings for the motor so that should really help as well. And of course EVERYTHING from now on is RG-11. I bought a 1,000 spool of the stuff. There's enough to do everything I will ever think of plus I need to install an FTA system for my dad at his new home. He really, really likes his PBS. He totally digs the Oklahoma feeds.
As the FTA stuff gets moved and installed at my new(ish) home I'll post that stuff. As always, expect massive overkill. Because I can.
