Help with C band satellite dish install (Any help would be appreciated)

[MN_Vikings]

Ever since I was a little kid I always wanted a big satellite dish. Now I have two in my backyard and I’m ready to admit defeat and ask for help after to many hours too count. I signed up at satellite guys 5 years ago but now I’m stuck with the wiring part and any help would be appreciated. As far as experience I have set up and aimed both Direct TV and Dish Network satellite dishes but C/Ku band is a lot more complicated. I have been reading the forums at Satelliteguys and have done my homework but coming up short. I live in Bloomington Minnesota zip code 55420 and been unable to wire or aim 2 C-band satellite dishes in my backyard. Six years ago I purchased a 180m (6ft) dish from Ssadoun and just took it out of the box and put together about two months ago. I purchase 2 ten foot Schedule 40 pipes (2 inches and 3 inches) concreted them in the ground and installed the Saoudoun dish on the 2 inch pipe. I purchased a Dreambox 800 clone and wanted view both C-band and Ku band feeds. After dozens of hours I’ve been unable to aim this dish or even get a signal. The second dish is the Black 7 ft mesh dish in the photo from a guy that lives 2 miles from me. I installed this dish on the 3 inch Schedule 40 pipes I concreted in my back yard. This is the dish I want to set up first. The guy I bought it from is unhelpful and I’m stuck on the wiring part and wondering If anyone can help me. For $200.00 I got a 7ft mesh dish with a feedhorn that includes both a C band and Ku band LNB’s. Also included is a actuator and an old analog Toshiba Trx-2220 Satellite Receiver. For some reason I'm unable to upload photos...

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here are my BUD's...

 

[Anole]

We have dozens of active (talkative) members who have gotten similar systems running.
Guess you are next!
.
Pictures really would help. Just the system you are concentrating on.
And maybe some discussion of your wiring , and aiming attempts.
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?edit: geo orbit is a giant site, and this may not be the best page to start, but the site has EVERYthing you are likely to want to know about BUDs:
http://www.geo-orbit.org/sizepgs/tuningp2.html
.

 

[sergei]

Have you also invested in any test equipment? Any thought on what programming or satellite your looking at getting.

 

[turbosat]

Have you got the cabling for the dish(es)? If you have the ribbon cable from the former owner, wiring it to the dish and actuator isn't that hard to do. That Toshiba is a good analog IRD, there may be a manual available for download, that would likely contain all the wiring information you need. How far are the dishes from your receiver?
Basically it is going to need a run of RG6 cable (quad-shield unnecessary) , plus the wiring for the actuator, which is dc and usually 2 bigger wires& 2-3 smaller guage wires.
And 3 conductor wire for the polarity motor on the feedhorn, which is 5 volt supplied by the Toshiba. Unless you upgrade the lnbs to LNBFS, you'll need to switch polarity with the Toshiba while using your fta receiver, and scan twice on each satellite-once for vertical and again for horizontal channels.

 

[mmewrench]

If you have never been able to get a signal on this dish, Your best bet would be to just move a tv and receiver out to the dish, since you need to aim it anyway. In order to use the feedhorn you have, you need to slave off of your analog receiver. This requires two high frequency splitters (one for C band and one for Ku) that have one side power passing, and the other side DC blocking,and a DiSEqC switch. For simplicity you need enough ribbon cable to reach the analog receiver (when set up near the dish). You can probably get that from the guy who sold you the dish. If that is not available to you, Many people use sprinkler cable for the motor wiring. At any rate you need 18 guage wire to power the actuator (2 leads M1 and M2 on the receiver). you also need two leads from the reed sensor in the actuator to the receiver (pulse and ground), and two leads from the servo motor (that blue or black thing on the feedhorn) one lead for pulse and one for ground. Heavy speaker wire works for actuator power and 4 lead telephone wire will work for the rest in a pinch. Also you will need rg6 coaxial cable from the lnbs to the splitters and from the splitters to both receivers.

Here is a wiring diagram for the splitters, I think you can still get them from sadoun or maybe satellite AV: http://www.satelliteguys.us/album.php?albumid=88

I would start out with Galaxy 25, which is your true south satellite. Since the dish was working two miles away you don't have to mess with elevation yet. Just be sure your dish is at the highest point of the arc (center the polar mount).

 

[KE4EST]

Post lots of pictures, of everything.

 

[Babadem]

Here are my BUD's...

Where are they?

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here are Photos of my Buds

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here is the LNB's in the Feed horn



There is both a C and Ku Lnb and three small wires. The last photo is of the end of the C-band ribbon cable that I will be connecting to the Toshiba receiver.

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here is the dish actuator




Inside the actuator wire box there are two thick power wires (Red and Black) and two small wires (Blue and Brown).

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here is the Reciever front and back and the manual wiring diagram

 

[MN_Vikings]

Here is my confusion on where the wires plug into back of the receiver



Where do I plug in the 3 wires (Red, Black, and White) from the LNB's on the back of the receiver?





Where do I plug the blue and brown wires from the actuator on the back of the receiver?






Here is the C-band ribbon cable that connects the wires from the actuator and LNB's to the receiver.





Here is the wiring diagram from the manual. It shows where the wires go but is not specific to which color goes where.





Here is the back of the Receiver.


OK, I understand where to plug in the RG6 wires from the C and KU LNB's to the receiver. The rest of the wires I'm unsure of and did try but kept getting a message on the TV that the actuator had an error. I should have wrote the error down but the acutator would not move and I was unable to aim the dish or get any channels by manually moving the dish. Once I have the wires correctly installed in the correct place I can start the process of aiming it.

 

[Anole]

A little off-topic

Your questions are easy to answer, but I have one for you.
Does the 6' Fortec have a motor?
.
Here's why I ask:
It has a simple LNBF which would work with your other receiver.
Maybe you could aim that dish to 99 west C band , and get some strong network feeds.
I'm thinking you could get some experience and quick success.
.
Alternately, that dish might provide many foreign channels from 97west, on Ku band.
Looks like it has a dual band LNBF.
.
Aiming a fixed dish and getting a signal is a lot eeasier than jumping into the deep end on a motorized system with A polarotor and no preparation.
?.

 

[MN_Vikings]

Wiring and aiming the dish

For the aiming part I have an analog satellite meter that should help me out. I also have a small TV I can bring out to hook up the receiver to the Dish (actuator and LNB's). Hopefully I have not hooked up the wires wrong and blown up the actuator or LNB's. The guy I bought the 7 ft black mesh dish lives a few miles from me and on the paperwork he wrote down the angle of the dish which is set at 45 degrees so I think I have this set up correctly. My understanding is now I only should have to turn the dish on the post and aim it to my direct south satellite which is 93.1W GALAXY 25 according to dishpointer.com My zip code is 55420. My plan is once I get the 7 ft black mesh dish set up then I can work on the 180cm (6ft) white dish from sadoun with the dreambox clone receiver.

 

[MN_Vikings]

Yes, the 6ft fortec dish from Sadoun has a h-h-180 motor which is not made anymore and may be obsolete but since I have it I plan to give it a try. My package that I bought from Saudoun 5 years ago included the Dish, hh-180 motor. a C\Ku LNB and a dish mover box. I did not purchase a receiver until last month and got a Dreambox 800se clone. Yes foretec dish as one of those cheap combo C\Ku LNB that I could move to the 7 ft black mesh dish. In fact I even purchased a second cheap combo C\Ku LNB that I could install onto the 7 ft black mesh dish as a last resort. You are very correct that Aiming a fixed dish and getting a signal is a lot eeasier than jumping into the deep end on a motorized system with A polarotor and no preparation. The 7 ft black mesh dish with the Toshiba receive was just an impulse buy at $200.00.

 

[MN_Vikings]

Turbosat,

Thanks for the reply. Are you saying if I upgrade my LNB's to LNBFS I can eliminate the 3 small wires from the LNB?



Woud you have any idea where I could source replacement LNBFS for my setup?

 

[Lone Gunman]

Turbosat,

Thanks for the reply. Are you saying if I upgrade my LNB's to LNBFS I can eliminate the 3 small wires from the LNB?

View attachment 90244View attachment 90245

Woud you have any idea where I could source replacement LNBFS for my setup?

Yes, those wires are for the servo motor to change polarity. LNBFs change polarity via a voltage change (13v/18v) sent by the receiver through the coax. If it is a C and Ku LNBF then it switches from C to Ku via a 22Hz signal that is also sent through the coax.

Several vendors on fleabay sell the C/Ku LNBFs. I've used a couple of different types and they all work about the same. My next one though will be a BSC621 as I've never used one of those yet and I want to give them a try since the DMX741s that I have now are no longer in production.

Motor wires are red and black and connect to the M1 and M2 terminals on your receiver. If it's running in the wrong direction when you start moving it, then you'll have to reverse those two wires to make it run in the correct direction, ie, make sure the dish moves East when you tell it to run East at the receiver!!


Main thing to keep in mind here is that you DO NOT want to put motor voltage through that reed switch as it will burn it up.

 

[FaT Air]

Actuator.. 2 heavy wires to the Motor +&-, Reverse if direction of buttons is reversed.
Two small sensor wires of actuator. one goes to GND, the other to pulse. Usually doesn't matter which way.
The above are the connections of the actuator to the Toshiba.
I'd use the LNBF, as it will directly work with the FTA receiver. (No screwing around with trying to use the Toshiba for polarity/skew/ and powering the LNB's. Too much extra hardware required, and use isn't at all 'handy')
Then set the angles on the dish to that shown in the picture attached with the dish moved to the highest point with the actuator.
BTW: what's your longitude? Latitude? They are a 'need to know' quantity.

 

[MN_Vikings]

Thanks for the help everyone. I think I have the wiring figured out and hopefully I did not blow anything up when I hooked up the wires wrong. I also just found a C-band dish receiver wiring instructions that confirmes how I plan to wire up the reciever. I will post my results after I get a chance to wire it all up....