Did Nextcomm break my 922?

[iammike]

Okay guys, I'm out of ideas and need help.

I sent my 922 off to Nextcomm last week to get the r5000hd mod. I think I may be the first buyer of the 9xx mod. I got it back tonight, and hooked it up and it won't move my bud. I get a message saying "Physical limit of dish has been reached". The only problem is it's no where near the limit. Before sending it last week, I carefully marked all the wires and made a diagram of the connections so I wouldn't have issues hooking them back up. I followed my chart very carefully hooking them back up, but no go. I've triple and quadruple checked all of them and can't find a problem. Just to be sure it wasn't mechanical, I hooked my old Toshiba TRX1520 analog receiver up and it moved the dish with no problem.

At this point, I've done a master reset about 3 times, checked and rechecked wiring, and tried moving the dish from about every screen I can think of. Is there anything else I should try before e-mailing Nextcomm and asking them to fix it?

 

[tdti1]

Damn that sucks bigtime, I did hear about that problem with the 922, a relay or something, could have been them or shipping, to bad... I guess you should contact them asap, also contact ATS and ask about the probem they will no right away what it is.

 

[Shawn95GT]

I got that EXACT same message when I had the 922 slaved to my analog receiver.

Basically I changed sats and it didn't see the counts move so it assumed the dish was stuck.

Maybe they tried looking at a different sat while they tested it and this upset the receiver since they likey didn't have it connected to a positioner.

 

[charper1]

Can you disable the E/W limits and move it manually?

 

[Shawn95GT]

I don't think it's the soft limits on the receiver. I think the reciever just isn't getting the position pulses for whatever reason.

Is the count moving?

Shawn

 

[iammike]

I don't think it's the soft limits on the receiver. I think the reciever just isn't getting the position pulses for whatever reason.

Is the count moving?

Shawn

It moves from 4999 to 5001, but dish doesn't appear to be moving. I've been doing some searches on satforums, and it looks like you're right about it not receiving the pulses. I know the wiring is good, since my Toshiba can move the dish though. I'm guessing there's something shorted out in the 922. There's some posts about a diode getting shorted that can cause this problem. It's in the front of the receiver, but there could also be something near the motor or sensor terminals. The r5000 is installed right next to them.

 

[iammike]

Can you disable the E/W limits and move it manually?

I don't know how to do that with the 922, but the motor appears to work fine when hooked to my old Toshiba analog receiver.

 

[iammike]

I got that EXACT same message when I had the 922 slaved to my analog receiver.

Basically I changed sats and it didn't see the counts move so it assumed the dish was stuck.

Maybe they tried looking at a different sat while they tested it and this upset the receiver since they likey didn't have it connected to a positioner.

Wouldn't the master reset have corrected this if that were the case?

 

[Shawn95GT]

Wouldn't the master reset have corrected this if that were the case?

Yeah, I'd think so .

Shawn

 

[iammike]

I'm at work now, and won't be able to try anything until this evening but I did come across one more thing to try. Someone on the 4dtv forum at satforums mentioned not being able to move the dish due to the parental lock being on. I wouldn't think it would be locked after a reset, but I'm going to look into that. The other thing that was suggested was to disconnect the wires going to the sensor and connect a wire across the terminals. Then you basically tap on the wire while trying to move the dish. I guess the tapping simulates the pulses from the sensor. If the dish moves it means the sensor is bad. I don't think that's the problem, but at this point I'll try just about anything.

The good news is the Nextcomm guys e-mailed me. They said their mod doesn't have anything to do with the dish controller, but they'd be happy to look at it if I want to ship it back to them. While I'm not happy I'm having the problem, it seems like Nextcomm is willing to make it right which is a good thing. Unless I find that I did something stupid hooking it up (wouldn't be the first time), it will probably be going back to them next week.

 

[iammike]

I just finished some testing and here's what I found. I'm getting 0 volts on m1/m2 and 0 on the sensor terminals also. I hooked up my old Toshiba just to be sure I was doing everything correctly, and also to make sure my so-so voltmeter was working. The Toshiba had volts in the 30's on m1/m2 and around 1.3 on the sensor terminals. It had no problem moving the dish.

Nextcomm thinks the error message I'm getting indicates there's no sensor feedback. Based on my meter readings, I'd say that's highly likely. Anybody have any thoughts on other things I could check?

 

[bryansr]

If you have a "reed switch" on your arm you can use a magnet and your Ohm meter to test it by touching the reed sensor wires with the Ohm meter leads and passing a magnet close to the switch and watch to see if the switch opens and closes. If they don't open & close the reed switch went bad.
BryanSr

 

[truckracer]

reset button?

I don't own a 922, I have a 905 (which cannot control a dish) but my analog receiver has an overload protector circuit breaker on the back of the receiver for the m1 and m2 terminals. If the 922 has a reset breaker, check it.
Just a thought-good luck, Trucker

 

[Diamond Jim]

I had an MTS systems once and it lost the E/W limits and the dish would not move. I found out that there were two small buttons hidden, unmarked on the keyboard. I had to press and hold these two buttons and press the east and hold it until the dish stopped, setting the east limit. Then I ran it back west until it stopped and repeated the above and ran it to the west to set that limit. Then all I had to do was program in the satellites.

I am wondering if there is anything like this hidden in the 922 menu? If you haven't done this, try going in to option 6-4-3 and see if you can move the dish manually to set the limits

 

[iammike]

Bryan, Jim, Trucker,

Thanks for all the advice. I'm pretty sure the Reed switch was working fine, as my Toshiba analog could move the dish without issue. I also tried resetting the limits with no luck. Also did 3 or 4 master resets, but that didn't help either. The circuit breaker suggestion sounds interesting, but I don't recall seeing anything that looked like a breaker.

David at Nextcomm has been helping me quite a bit with the receiver, and I pretty much exhausted all of the possibilities that I could try. I shipped it back to Nextcomm for repair Monday. I will say that while Nextcomm may have broken my receiver, they are really trying hard to make things right. David e-mailed me several times Friday and Saturday, and did a trace on a debug recording I made with the r5000 on Sunday. Maybe with some luck I'll get it back late this week or early next week.

Once I get it back and working, I'll post a review.

Mike

 

[Gary Murrell]

Mike I will be ordering a 922 to be modified by Nextcomm soon, I already own a Dish 6000 modified by them, they are a top notch company, if something is wrong they will fix it

-Gary

 

[Shawn95GT]

Gary - what device do you use for playback on your TV? PC? Roku? LinkPlayer?

Shawn

 

[ats7627]

I just finished some testing and here's what I found. I'm getting 0 volts on m1/m2 and 0 on the sensor terminals also. I hooked up my old Toshiba just to be sure I was doing everything correctly, and also to make sure my so-so voltmeter was working. The Toshiba had volts in the 30's on m1/m2 and around 1.3 on the sensor terminals. It had no problem moving the dish.
Nextcomm thinks the error message I'm getting indicates there's no sensor feedback. Based on my meter readings, I'd say that's highly likely. Anybody have any thoughts on other things I could check?

If you were getting 0Volts off the motor terminals with a known good meter, then something is wrong with the receiver. You would not have gotten any voltage on the sensor since it is just a switch (open or close). I can't remember off the top of my head if the 922 has a circuit breaker for the actuator power supply. The GI 650, 550, 450 receivers did. Nextcomm was right about the error message. There would not be any sensor feedback if the dish never moved. Doing a master reset would have reset the E/W limits. The only way to get the dish to move after a master reset is to access set E/W limits via the menu.

 

[iammike]

If you were getting 0Volts off the motor terminals with a known good meter, then something is wrong with the receiver. You would not have gotten any voltage on the sensor since it is just a switch (open or close). I can't remember off the top of my head if the 922 has a circuit breaker for the actuator power supply. The GI 650, 550, 450 receivers did. Nextcomm was right about the error message. There would not be any sensor feedback if the dish never moved. Doing a master reset would have reset the E/W limits. The only way to get the dish to move after a master reset is to access set E/W limits via the menu.

ATS, thanks for the reply. I did try moving the dish via the limits menu, but no go. The limit would act like it was changing, go from 5000 to 4999 or 5000 to 5001 but there was no power on m1/m2. I'm now starting to wonder if I missed something obvious on the breaker question though. Still, the r5000 was acting funny too. I was getting 0 byte recordings if tried to record transport streams. Nextcomm said it looked like I was recording an encrypted channel, but I am subbed to the channel (HBOHD). It's probably just as well that I sent it back. This way they can check both issues at once.

Mike

 

[ats7627]

Mike,

I don't know why but the 4DTV receivers would bump a few digits on the position counter even if there was no sensor connected. Had me going the first time I saw this as I was looking for a problem that wasn't even there. I see you are just down the road from me. I'm in Richmond. Good luck with the repair from Nextcomm.