Primestar 1.2 Dish On C-Band Mount

[GreatFTA]

Primestar, I am looking at the picture you uploaded. Right now my Primestar 84e is mounted on a SG2100 motor drive and have a C-Band LNB. I can only get 99w and Satmex 6 satellites. Can't get other satellites at all. If I flip my dish upside down and redo the LNB for proper skew I will have better chance?
Iceberg is saying that the dish is only getting the strong TPs. If that is the case I may be passing wind. Right?

 

[primestar31]

Primestar, I am looking at the picture you uploaded. Right now my Primestar 84e is mounted on a SG2100 motor drive and have a C-Band LNB. I can only get 99w and Satmex 6 satellites. Can't get other satellites at all. If I flip my dish upside down and redo the LNB for proper skew I will have better chance?
Iceberg is saying that the dish is only getting the strong TPs. If that is the case I may be passing wind. Right?

An 84e elliptical dish isn't large enough to get most c-band transponders. C-band transponders just put out a lot weaker signal, and need a larger dish to gather enough signal to be usable. The thread is talking about a 1.2 meter dish, which has quite a lot larger reflecting surface than the smaller 84e.

For C-band, really, a 6 foot dish is the absolute smallest I would bother with. With a HOT lnb, you can get nearly anything that's up there, albeit, some analog signals might be a bit sparkly. The other problem with a smaller dish, besides not gathering enough signal, is that they "see" too much "sky", and don't have a tight enough beam. So, if aimed at a satellite, they will also pick up signals from sats on either side, if they are too close together.

Smaller dishes are fun to fool around with, but if you are serious on ever really watching much tv with a good picture, you want a bigger dish!

 

[GreatFTA]

Ok Primestar. I will go back go the larger dish. Thanks everybody!

 

[Anole]

Weren't we talking 1.2meter? That's 4 feet across...

Here is part of a PM I just sent a buddy who was thinking about an elliptical dish:

I don't particularly encourage mini-BUDs below 4' diameter. However ...
Iceberg had some success on an old elliptical Primestar 84e (about 40 inches wide).
Linuxman did have good results on a 1 meter round dish (about 40 inches).
Here is Linuxman's list of birds. (additional birds after some tweaking)

The conical scalar would help some, but it matches better a round dish.
So, the jury is out on how well it'd work.
Don't expect anything special on Ku, though.

If you'd find one of those big DirecTV dishes I keep going on about, that would probably be a better choice.
A 4' dish would be better yet.
Next would be a 4' or 6' prime focus dish.

Or, what about a real BUD?
Probably pick up a 7 or 8' mesh up in California, just for the taking.

I think the links above might give some encouragement to your plans.

 

[GreatFTA]

Thank you, Anole! I am going to keep trying! From timt to time I will post on how I am doing...