Can anyone receive any FTA on AMC-8?

[anik]

Now that all the leaves are off the trees I thought I'd try picking up a satellite that's normally in the treetops for me, that being AMC-8. Lyngsat claims there are channels on 4060H, 4168H, and 4180H. I cannot get any of these at all, absolutely zero quality no matter what I do. But when I do a smart search I pick up several vertical polarity channels, such as 4160V, 4128V, 4035V, 4004V, 3997V, and 3747V, and all of these come in with quality at or very near 99% (and I don't think this is a false reading, when I move the dish slightly in either direction the quality drops in a normal manner, whereas with a false reading it usually just disappears abruptly). The problem with the verticals is that apparently there's no FTA programming at all on them - I don't know what they are used for, but nothing scans in (I get symbol rates, just no programming).

So as you can imagine, I'm wondering why I get such a great signal on the vertical channels and nothing at all on the horizontal. The dish is working perfectly (I get both H and V channels on the other birds) and I have tried adjusting the horizontal skew, with no discernable results. Chances are that the channels that are on this bird are nothing that would interest me anyway, but still, I'd like to know if anyone else can pick up the H channels, or any FTA signals at all from AMC-8.

 

[Mr Tony]

I know Diamond Jim was trying to get the same stuff and was having issues. Hopefully he will chime in

 

[drhydro]

where are you at in the footprint? could it be that you are too far out of the beam?

 

[Diamond Jim]

I've been trying pick up the Alaskan programing on AMC 8 for about a year, with no luck. I to get the verticals, but they come back as "no channels" on the 3618. The footprint say AMC 8 is good for all 50 states. Since there is no analog on it, there is nothing to zero in to to comfirm that you are on it. I mess with it for a while, then I let it go, then I try it again with the same results. If you get anything, let me know.

 

[Mr Tony]

Thanks guys for helping out

 

[anik]

Thanks, that's exactly what happens here also

I've been trying pick up the Alaskan programing on AMC 8 for about a year, with no luck. I to get the verticals, but they come back as "no channels" on the 3618. The footprint say AMC 8 is good for all 50 states. Since there is no analog on it, there is nothing to zero in to to comfirm that you are on it. I mess with it for a while, then I let it go, then I try it again with the same results. If you get anything, let me know.

Thanks for the response - Your experience is exactly what I see. I'm in Michigan so if the horizontal transponders are on some kind of spot beam then it's likely I'd be outside the footprint, but the Lyngsat page doesn't indicate that - however I find it interesting that when I look at the coverage map, it actually seems to show that there are two beams, one centered on Colorado (roughly) that should put a decent signal into most of the U.S., and the other centered on southern Alaska. So I suppose it is possible that they could have "split" programming on the two beams, or even that the central U.S. one is shut off for some reason (by design or by accident) for the horizontal transponders.

I also wish there were either some analog or some (viewable) FTA on that bird; it would be neat to know for sure that I could actually pick up something from that far over in the arc. Anyway, thanks to all who responded.