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Orbitron SX-10 Dish
- Thread starter Houston Rockets
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I did Orbitron 10' starting pre-1990 and 8.5' post-1991. Liked their design concept, clean looking. Also very compact in pre-assembled form. Based in Spring Green, Wis. and said to be designed by protege of FLW. Ribs were slid onto tabs on a central assembly plate, perimeter sections were bolted to ends of ribs and spliced to each other, and then the ribs were compressed between 2 center plates to form the structure. Something like 18 bare mesh panels were then placed between each of the ribs and secured with a locking strip. This was when almost all else was the 4-section stuff. Downside was that with enough force panels could be pushed out. Also they had a .3 f/d and rejected TI better.
The mount was equally unique with its "spin" declination setting. "Spinclination". How are there any of these still around?
The mount was equally unique with its "spin" declination setting. "Spinclination". How are there any of these still around?
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Funny, tonight I flipped to an old episode of Strange Evidence and saw an original 10-footer with the bare aluminum ribs (I always thought they looked better- cooler? than when they started painting them black along with all else) in footage from 1994.
Now I'm remembering that I had started making some mods to the polar axis pivot bolts because some were loosening in use. It had like 2 separate bolts top & bottom instead of a single long throughbolt. I think I was getting longer ones and double-nutting them. Did a lot of funky mechanical hacks back then. Also painted the black feed covers silver to reject heat, then later decided against feed covers altogether, just seal coax at the LNB.
Now I'm remembering that I had started making some mods to the polar axis pivot bolts because some were loosening in use. It had like 2 separate bolts top & bottom instead of a single long throughbolt. I think I was getting longer ones and double-nutting them. Did a lot of funky mechanical hacks back then. Also painted the black feed covers silver to reject heat, then later decided against feed covers altogether, just seal coax at the LNB.
Speaking of hacks to them, I took the elevation bolt and cut it off,and put a 18” actuator to control the elevation on weak TP’s on far east or far west satellites able to pull any weak TP using that method.
I guess you didn’t understand what I was saying, I took the picture that was posted a while back and used photoshop to restore it, then printed it out and going to laminate back on the dish.
I think I got it- the dish structure centers on a hub that has a ~4" round pipe stub to insert into the ~4 1/4" round mount opening. The pipe stub on the dish is cut at a specific angle before it's welded to the center hub, thus when inserted into the mount receptacle the dish structure is free to "spin" on the mount, with a continuous up/down wobble. Wherever it's specifically stopped on the "spin" and the 2 set bolts in the mount receptacle tightened, that's the declination setting, and the mount receptacle (when new) had a declination scale with degree markings attached in form of an adhesive strip. The dish hub had a little white line in paint (maybe also an impression mark) to align to indicated latitude spec on the sticker. So the mount sticker would weather away and maybe also the hub marking, and if you need to reset declination what to do? For my part as I recall, I simply did a spin-around on the dish, observing the up & down change, guessed a spot basically in the middle, locked the set bolts and tried the arc. Peaking elevation straight south, I would start moving west. If getting noticably weaker signal, I'd check to see which way elevation would strengthen it, and then I'd know where to go back and adjust on declination. I'd be sure to leave the elevation where I had first set it, go back straight south, adjust the declination (loosen set bolts, slightly "spin" dish) to put the dish either slightly higher or lower according to what the more western arc needed, re-peak elevation (straight south) and then retry the arc.
Another facet of the dish's ability to "spin" on the mount was that it facilitated installation of the panel sections and retaining strips. Those would go in after the dish structure was fully assembled, the hub bolts tightened to rigidize it and the finished structure hoisted up into the mount. Also not having the panels in yet made for easy work to grab it by the ribs and perimeter to land the center stub pipe into the mount. Then just spin and put in panels. Easy 1-man job, and I was a 1-man band.
Another facet of the dish's ability to "spin" on the mount was that it facilitated installation of the panel sections and retaining strips. Those would go in after the dish structure was fully assembled, the hub bolts tightened to rigidize it and the finished structure hoisted up into the mount. Also not having the panels in yet made for easy work to grab it by the ribs and perimeter to land the center stub pipe into the mount. Then just spin and put in panels. Easy 1-man job, and I was a 1-man band.
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