Ok guys so I'm sure it's been discussed many times but I'm curious with our first big snow storm coming to my area since I have had dish. How do you guys get the snow off of your dish without using a ladder? My dish is on the roof on the front of my house about one story up on the roof of my front porch.
Pending snowstorm first one since I've had dish
- Thread starter Joe891
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All you need is something long to tap it so the snow falls off. It may not even get any snow on it to worry about. It's generally not a big issue.
A broom has worked for me back when my dish was on the roof of my 1-story home.
Wet snows definitely are more problematic for signal loss.
Actually, I think it is more about the density of the material absorbing the signal. Light snows can accumulate too, I remember just losing my signal and looked at the dish and snow went from the dish all the way to the LNB! However, it is the amount of water that the signal must get through. A wetter snow has more water in it.
Wet snows definitely are more problematic for signal loss.
I use a 12 ft fiberglass adjustable paint roller extension with a 12" car wash brush screwed onto it.
I kinda wonder if the melting snow bends the satellite signal sorta like a prism bends light waves. We need a scientist here to confirm my theory. 
Sometimes you just can’t keep up. In November 2014 when we had our ‘Snovember’ you just couldn’t keep up with snow that falls at rates of 4 or 5” per hour. Woke up on Day 1 of the storm with 30”. Cleaned out the driveway on Day 2, only to get 30 more inches on Day 3. 70 inches of snow in four days for me, other areas got hit harder. It made for a pretty dangerous few days in my corner of the world. Not too far from me some poor guy died when he got trapped in is his car because he chose to pull over and was either asphyxiated to death or froze to death and no one even knew for a few days because his car was completely buried. Total of 8 or 9 people lost their lives because of the storm.
Last year on this site, when I brought it up I was called lazy for not clearing off my dishes. When I had other things to worry about, like cleaning out my driveway and not having a heart attack from overexertion. People generally have no clue how dangerous these situations can be. These high amounts of snow are no joke. Being inconvenienced by loss of a TV signal or power shouldn’t even matter. If I’m lazy for not setting my alarm to go off every few hours in the middle of the night and not trudging through snow that came up to my neck just to clear off a satellite dish, then so be it.
Point is, if the snow is heavy enough and falls at a rapid rate, there’s not much you can do. Mine are mounted on the back of my single story house. Where I have the X is where my old Dish Network dishes were located. They were completely mangled and hanging off the roof. You can see my two DirecTV dishes peeking out from the snow at the end of the house. Although you can't really tell, they essentially collapsed. The arms and LNBs were just about flush with the slope of the roof and the masts were bent. If I remember right, the dishes got snowed in the Wednesday of the storm, and a DirecTV tech wasn’t able to get out here until the following Saturday. To even suggest it was possible to clean them off with a broom or water gun is laughable.
Stay safe, it's only TV.
Last year on this site, when I brought it up I was called lazy for not clearing off my dishes. When I had other things to worry about, like cleaning out my driveway and not having a heart attack from overexertion. People generally have no clue how dangerous these situations can be. These high amounts of snow are no joke. Being inconvenienced by loss of a TV signal or power shouldn’t even matter. If I’m lazy for not setting my alarm to go off every few hours in the middle of the night and not trudging through snow that came up to my neck just to clear off a satellite dish, then so be it.
Point is, if the snow is heavy enough and falls at a rapid rate, there’s not much you can do. Mine are mounted on the back of my single story house. Where I have the X is where my old Dish Network dishes were located. They were completely mangled and hanging off the roof. You can see my two DirecTV dishes peeking out from the snow at the end of the house. Although you can't really tell, they essentially collapsed. The arms and LNBs were just about flush with the slope of the roof and the masts were bent. If I remember right, the dishes got snowed in the Wednesday of the storm, and a DirecTV tech wasn’t able to get out here until the following Saturday. To even suggest it was possible to clean them off with a broom or water gun is laughable.
Stay safe, it's only TV.
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The higher the moisture content in snow, the higher the attenuation. Satellite signals are slightly attenuated as they pass through fluffy snow and reflect off the reflector, but as the moisture content increases, this layer increases the attenuation and signal may be lost. BTW... KA frequencies will be lost before KU.
If the snow cover becomes slush, water sheets on the snow surface or the snow freezes and creates a sheet of ice, this becomes the reflector surface. The uneven surface accuracy may disperse the reflected signals or moves the reflective surface closer to the feedhorn instead of focusing the signals into the LNBF feedhorn.
The highest signal loss will occur when snow builds up directly in front of the LNBF or sheets on the face of the LNBF cover.
If the snow cover becomes slush, water sheets on the snow surface or the snow freezes and creates a sheet of ice, this becomes the reflector surface. The uneven surface accuracy may disperse the reflected signals or moves the reflective surface closer to the feedhorn instead of focusing the signals into the LNBF feedhorn.
The highest signal loss will occur when snow builds up directly in front of the LNBF or sheets on the face of the LNBF cover.
So the bottom line here is the melting snow creates a double whammy. Both attenuation and a reflected signal.
I decided to buy a Dish Heater Should have it next week.
Then we'll see how well this thing works.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk
Then we'll see how well this thing works.
Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G900A using Tapatalk
