Echostar 18 Launch Approx 4:15 EDT June 18 2016

Why does it matter?

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I was just curious. I have never in the decades I have used satellite equipment ever heard anyone refer to 131W as "the 131W." Just curious, everyone I have heard speak or write has just said "131W" or "Satcom C3" (which is long since gone, I think it's AMC 11 at that slot now) naming the bird at the slot or just the orbital position.
 
Southern Californians do that, we in the north call them the same way most everyone else does. For instance, I live off 101 not the 101... :)

Thanks for the clarification :) Sounds much like North and South Alabama. I have heard it said that Alabama and Mississippi were split the wrong way when Mississippi attained Statehood in 1817. Should have been split across rather than down the middle. The northern portions of both States are much more alike than the southern half of their own State.
 
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We in PA would say "Route 101"

We wouldn't say My Dish is pointed at 61.5.
Sounds like an incomplete sentence.

We would say ,My dish is pointed at the 61.5 orbital location.



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That's very odd. Why not use that and put a little older satellite with not a much capability as a in orbit spare


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I wondered the same thing, why spend hundreds of millions on an in orbit spare?
 
Satellites have a life span. It makes sense to have newer ones be the backup while the old ones continue to do the job.
 
Satellites have a life span. It makes sense to have newer ones be the backup while the old ones continue to do the job.

I realize that, just usually, they will use the older ones that are closer to end of life for in orbit spares and use the newer birds. They're still expending fuel, just not at the rate of an active bird.
 
IMHO, I think Dish has a plan--as jSheridan said--for this sat to be used as a primary, but I don't think Charlie is ready to pop the plan just yet. Considering how AWFUL the HD PQ is on the WA and the plenty of space to, at the very least, really make the HD look stellar PQ, I have to think that Dish is holding onto that bandwidth for something pretty big. Dish as #3, now #4, has always been secretive in its plans. Scott may know, but I'm sure he is not a tellin'. The crappy HD PQ on the WA with bandwidth gains makes NO SENSE--unless something else is needed for that bandwidth. We may find out at CES in January 2017, if Dish is ready by then. All IMHO, of course. Just trying to make sense of the most capable bird in the wings and the never ending crappy HD PQ ever since the full 8PSK implementation on the WA.
 
Echostar 15 is CONUS only it will stay at 61.5 (it was previously located at 45w for an ill fated Brazilian DBS venture). Echostar 16 has CONUS and spotbeams. I assume they will locate it at 110W where E18 was first planned to be. At this point, it will provide probably nothing more than redundancy at the 110 orbital slot, where currently there is E11 a CONUS bird and E10 a spotbeam bird. With that at 61.5W they will have E12/R1 for redundancy and E16 at 110W for redundancy.
So, if you are saying that all will be left at 61.5 is E18 then sounds like you are the one that needs to do the research.
I see that you joined here in 2015, the main reason for my post was to highlight the fact that you made it sound (perhaps you didn't mean it that way) that Nelson61 did not have a very good idea of what he was talking about regarding his speculations, when the contrary is true. He has been a a member here since I believe, the beginning, and has made vast contributions to this site with spotbeam maps, etc... For "The List" and from the best I can tell reading his posts, is extremely knowledgeable about satellites in general.


I hope that you are right...and that ECHOSTAR 16 is moved to orbital position 110w ... I am in Costa Rica, Central America... and I can not get ECHOSTAR 16 at orbital position 61.5w... I believe that Spanish AMAZONAS 3 and AMAZONAS 4 @ 61W are generating interference to DN satellites...

Before, we were able to get 119w and 110w but now there are super weak...they do not even show up with a 3 meter offset satellite dish ...
I was looking at satbeams and ECHOSTAR 16's conus beam requires a 1.8 meter dish .. or 6 feet for signal reception or.. maybe less ...
Right now, we only have 77w ( 70 cm dish) and 72.7w ( 2.4m dish) ...

Regards,
Alberto
 
Southern Californians do that, we in the north call them the same way most everyone else does. For instance, I live off 101 not the 101... :)
Right, but are you old enough to remember when we NEVER referred to HWY numbers: it was "Hollywood Freeway," "San Bernardino Fwy, "Pomona Fwy" "Harbor Fwy"? I hadn't encounterd HWY numbers for locals referring to expressways until Chicago in the 1970's. Then by about the 1990's Hwy # seemed to catch on here as suburbs and exburbs boomed.

FWIW, "LA" was orgianlly used by locals ONLY in certain instances of reference, but then "LA" caught on so profoundly OUTSIDE of "LA" that most here still say "Los Angeles" in most circumstances, far more than outsiders who seem to only say "LA". It is one of my ways of easily finding out who is a visitor: way too much "LA" in their speak, except for our ding-dong Mayor who NEVER says "Los Angeles" but ONLY "LA, LA; LA; LA" it sounds so foreign, the way a visitor from outside would speak. It was an outsider (the brillian Peter Hemmings) who instituded the offical name of "LA Opera" rather than "Los Angeles in the name. The far older Los Angeles Philharmonic never considered "LA", but we do say "LA Phil" in infomal instances as we do LAPD, LADWP, LAFD; LADOT, for quick ease, but NEVER in formal instances nor used by politicians (except the ding-dong Mayor) in public discussion of issues. Meanwhile in the instance of the Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportaion Authority (LACMTA) we just say "MTA" or even the stupid offical MTA forced upon us moniker or "Metro" never even using "LA" nor "Los Angeles," but many of us still stick with "MTA." Yet, wouldn't "LAMTA" (omitting the "C" for County) roll off the tounge? Funny :).
 
What I don't get is the WA HD signal break-up at the slightest lousy weather...a light rain and it's practically unwatchable. Wasn't like this 6 months ago...
In my case, I have no problems with signal in the WA in most weather, only if a cloud is really dark, but certainly not the slightest of weather. However, I have too observed that it is does lose signal in LESS weahter than it used to over the last 15 years, and even family in the house has made that observation, so I agree that we do lose signal in WA in weather conditions that a few years ago was no problem.

I do beleive that when running 8PSK modulation scheme and MPEG4 and with greater compression which requires more FEC (and at re-using transponders out of phase, which decreases power even more as opposed to running just the 16 xpndrs), I believe it increases chances of losing packets and is less robust in poor weather, so power has to be increased to compensate, but that is a delicate balance: running sufficient power not to greatly reduce the life of the sat, but still powerful enough to get through bad weather. In other words, with modulation scheme and compression to provide more channels in good PQ with more FEC, there is a cost to how robust it is getting those packets through weather and still have a relatively long life to the satellite. Under such conditions, these birds will probably last 10+ years, not the full 15 years as advertised because that life is based upon less demanding configurations, and Dish has its sats in demanding configurations (using more power than ideal), but luck and good engineering could have these birds lasting close to 15 years, if demands are decreased near the end of life.
 

Any DIRT team members online now?

Dish/Spectrum Sports Suite?

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