This dish farm was dismantled in 2003. I still use some of the Ku dishes at my new location, but the 9' DHS spun aluminum was destroyed in transport. The large 12.5' square all steel and aluminum spherical I built in 1983. It rests on its back waiting to be returned to service, someplace someday. It was an experiment at the time, I wanted to go all metal, instead of redwood or cedar. I wasn't sure if I could get the smooth surface using my design, but it proved to be a success. I could park my pickup in front of it and still watch sparkle free pictures on Galaxy-5, using a 125 degree LNA. Even in winter, when the snow would sometimes accumulate over 3 feet from sliding off the surface, no maintenance was necessary. I had three tripod feeds and could have had many more at 2 degrees spacing. The metal mesh is 1/8 inch mesh heavy gauge galvanized, attached with 800 self-tapping screws to a horizontal aluminum lattice, welded to vertical aluminum channel that is attached by adjustable jackscrews to an angle iron frame bolted to a massive angle iron base platform. Only the angle iron has shown some surface rust over its 25 year existence. The mesh is fine, and it's proven to be impervious to hail. Sometimes birds in flight would whack into it, and once I saw a house fly with its head stuck tight in a square of the mesh, wings buzzing. Looking like a stationary model in a wind tunnel.
That was the first satellite dish I owned, at a time when it was necessary to construct your own LNA, waveguide, feedhorn, and receiver. Back when premiums like HBO were in the clear; the analogue era. Somewhere I have photos that detail my spherical dish, that when found I will share. My present dish farm has seven dishes, but is a bit smaller in size, as I rent in the city. I'll post some of those pictures later. My spherical needs to find a good home. It's been lying on its back focusing a starfield of galactic signals to multiple focal points; imagine an RF cloud layer hovering 18 feet above the dish at every possible focal point of the V/H radius. Oh well, at least the birds can walk on it now.