1.2 meter dish for Intelsat 21 C band in North Georgia?

[Skywave]

Hi, first post here. Since we lost Al Jazeera, I'm looking for alternative international news on FTA. Intelsat 21 at 58 west looks promising with France24, DW, NHK, etc. on C band. My problem is my best shot at it is in a 7' strip between my house and a fenced property line. I could probably squeeze in a 1.5 or 1.8 meter dish if I have to, but if I can make a 1.2 meter offset dish work acceptably the yard will work better. LyngSat shows me in the 41.3 dBW zone, reasonably close to the 43.3 contour line. Neighbring sats are at 55.5 and 61w, at 39 dBW and 35 dBW respectively, so a little better than standard 2 degree spacing with somewhat weaker signals

I'm an FTA newbie, with only a fixed dish 97w Ku system under my belt. So I'm curious if anyone has tried a 1.2 meter dish with 58 west C band or if anyone has any informed opinions about the feasibility of this.

 

[T4Runner]

Welcome to the forum! I too started as you are, and you will find most here did also. I tried the 1.2m dish converted to use for C Band and I was constantly losing my quality and dropping the picture except for a very few channels. I was always trying to figure out if it was weather, birds, satellite, uplink, etc. But it was never enough. I finally added a 7.5 ft mesh and BANG! Started receiving almost everything with it finely tuned from 58W to 139W.

One of the many problems is the satellite broadcast signals are changing from DVB S to DVB S2 and without a bud you are not going to be happy. Frustration is coming...

If you don't have the C Band dish yet, look for as big a dish as you can squeeze into your spot. I'm looking for a 10 ft..


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[Magic Static]

to the forum Skywave. You might get NHK with a good receiver ok, but like T4Runner said, you won't be satisfied. So unless you can score a 1.2m for free to play with, I wouldn't want to spend a lot of money in the deal. When faced with ground restraints I opted to go up

 

[Skywave]

Thanks guys T4Runner, I hadn't even considered the DVB S2 issue. A 6 footer should fit, I'll have to go out there and get some accurate measurements and draw it up. I will have to be a little more careful as to the precise location and make sure to get it high enough for the bottom of the larger dish to see over the fence. So yes Magic Static, up is the word. Nice set up, by the way!

 

[danristheman]

My advice would be ind the most ku band sats that you can find then go to C band. find the arc first.

dan rose

 

[northgeorgia]

Great advice above. The only thing I can add is that in our area, I used a 90x99cm miniBud and unreliably received these signals on different dates on 58W Intelsat9 (Recommended size 130+ cm):

$Caracol Nacional (Caracol mux 3787 H 7405) 65Q
$Caracol Alterno

ENLACE (TBN mux 3925 V 6619) 50Q
TBN-EJTV
Ocasional
r-Enlace Radio
r-Maratonica

NHK mux - 5 channels (4040 H 26590) 30Q
2 channels English (one in HD)
2 channels Japanese (one in HD)
$Premium
r-Radio 1&2, Radio 3&4, Radio 5


$Travel and Living (2 ch) (3880 V 27688) 50Q
$Discovery Brazil (2 ch)
$Discovery Kids Br (2 ch)
$Discover Health (2 ch)
$LIV Brazil
$LIV Brazil Dig
$TLC Brazil
$TLC Brazil Dig
$Animal Planet Bra (2 ch)
$Civilization (ESP (2ch)
$Civilization (PRT (2ch)
$Civilization Eng/
$Civilization (SPN
$Science (ESP
$Science (PRT
$Science (ESP) Dig
$Science (PRT) Dig
$Science English/E
$Science (SPN) Cas
$Turbo (ESP
$Turbo (PRT
$Turbo (ESP) Digit
$Turbo (PRT) Digit
$Turbo English/Eng
$Turbo (SPN) Cast/
$IS-9(signal 1) d


As you can see, only TBN and NHK and only when things were just right. Most of the time, I wasn't able to tune in anything on this one.

 

[Skywave]

Great advice above. The only thing I can add is that in our area, I used a 90x99cm miniBud and unreliably received these signals on different dates on 58W Intelsat9 (Recommended size 130+ cm):................................ As you can see, only TBN and NHK and only when things were just right. Most of the time, I wasn't able to tune in anything on this one.

Hello, northgeorgia, I'm in the Athens area. Thanks for this. Looking at the maps, Intelsat 21 may be a few db stronger than 9 was, but only a few. I'm going to try to squeeze a 6' into the space, but this will literally be a game of inches. I need to get out there this weekend and do some measuring. If I conclude I can't get a 6' out there I may play with a 4', the failure fall back would be to get a strong motor or a multi lnb bracket and use the 4' on Ku, since the only Ku I have up is a Winegard 75cm fixed on 97w.

 

[northgeorgia]

No problem. Bigger is usually better when it comes to C-band, but not necessarily true for Ku-band I'm in the Mall of Georgia area, so not too far away.