Nice dish Dreamfox, if have time, would you see if you can get any stations from 4.040H on 95 west? There are 2 stations there that I would love to get, WRAZ and WBTW. I can't get them on a 1 meter primestar and wonder how big I would need to go.
Primestar 84E/BSC621-2 LNBF Experiment
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I'd go to Lyngsat and check the coverage map. It will give you a list of the bare minimum size at a maximum signal strength.
I was going to try for Galaxy 3C at 95W, but realized I would not be to likely to have success being towards the edge of coverage. I'd need to have a minimum of a 6' dish, probably an 8 or 10.
Galaxy 16 at 99W was a different story for me. Couple of church channels there that I could pick up with absolutely no problem. The nets are barely there on my 1 meter Winegard and a Panorama 13K LNB so I ordered a BSC421 LNB. I'm crossing my fingers.
I was going to try for Galaxy 3C at 95W, but realized I would not be to likely to have success being towards the edge of coverage. I'd need to have a minimum of a 6' dish, probably an 8 or 10.
Galaxy 16 at 99W was a different story for me. Couple of church channels there that I could pick up with absolutely no problem. The nets are barely there on my 1 meter Winegard and a Panorama 13K LNB so I ordered a BSC421 LNB. I'm crossing my fingers.
I can pull those 5 network stations in on 99 west with the bsc421, although it's not easy. So far those network stations are the only thing that I have been able to receive that I was actually interested in watching on C-band. I would love to have those other 2 on 95 west, but they are weaker than the those on 99, but how much bigger would I have to go to get them, I don't know. I did look at the Lyngsat map, I'm in the 90-115 cm range for C-band but unfortunately it seems like every station is at a different power level so you're still left with some guesswork.
I don't know how realistic those sizes that Lyngsat lists are. I think they would be a best case scenario, where a transponder is running full on, full tilt, full out.
Galaxy 23 at 121W would probably give you a stronger signal than 99, but doesn't have the nets. I've read there are some interesting things at Galaxy 15/133W. But without putting a big (well, big to the wife) dish out front of the house again or putting it on the roof, I don't have line of sight, myself.
I'm with you here. Nets would be a very good thing. But since 8-12' are out of the question (and I know I can get em for free, which makes it more depressing. I'm happily married, I'm told
....) I'll take what I can get on the one meter.
Though, if I could score a 1.2, believe me, I'd consider getting it naked, across broken glass, if that's what it took to get one for nothing. Some women are right: Size is everything
Galaxy 23 at 121W would probably give you a stronger signal than 99, but doesn't have the nets. I've read there are some interesting things at Galaxy 15/133W. But without putting a big (well, big to the wife) dish out front of the house again or putting it on the roof, I don't have line of sight, myself.
I'm with you here. Nets would be a very good thing. But since 8-12' are out of the question (and I know I can get em for free, which makes it more depressing. I'm happily married, I'm told
....) I'll take what I can get on the one meter.Though, if I could score a 1.2, believe me, I'd consider getting it naked, across broken glass, if that's what it took to get one for nothing. Some women are right: Size is everything
no way on a 1.2m dish due to the 7/8 FEC
I have to be balls on the 6 footer to keep it stable and they still pixelate
(also those channels are DT2 so its just RTN and not the actual channel)
Yea, but this 1.2m dish takes you to the next level.
With it, you really deserve your own thread. - :up
This is no longer the 1m or 84e which others have tried.
Several guys around here have their own 1.2's, and they perform.
A 1.2 is in a class by itself.
I'd be interested in hearing what you can get on it.
And even more interesting, where in LA did you run across such a nice commercial dish?
I may have to go a-hunting.
edit: I have seen what looked like a 1m dish on a service station, but 1.2's are rare.
Was lucky
I have a friend who bought a gas station which was a shell station.
Almost all shell stations in LA has this same dish.
The exact size of this dish is 61 in tall and 49 1/2 in wide.
Very strange
Thanks Iceberg. I'm still a newb so I don't know much about forward error correction or SR, but Lyngsat says there are 15 stations sharing 4.040, I guess that should tell me something.
Cracklincrotch when you get the bsc421 if you can't get the nets on 99 right away, keep trying! I recently found out that a metal lampshade that I bought at a thrift store for $2 makes a good conical scalar. As part of an experiment that went bad, I had cut the back end of my bsc421 off, then had to patch it back on. After that, no matter what I tried I could not get the nets on 99 any higher than 63%. I used to get them at 66% which is a perfect picture but at 63% it's un-watchable. I was just about ready to buy a new bsc421, but then I remembered that conical scalar rings have been known to help on a primestar dish. So I cut the top end of the lampshade off with a hacksaw, and that lampshade fits like a glove inside the bsc421. I did not have to glue it or clamp it at all. I did have to cut some off of the front of the bsc421 to improve the signal strength. I was cutting a half inch off at a time, and made the last cut at the 38 line. The last cut made no improvement over the previous cut, so I stopped there. Now the SQ is back up to 66%, and I'm happy with it but I wonder how much better it might have been if hadn't cut the back end off. The lampshade is light too, lighter than regular scalar rings.
Cracklincrotch when you get the bsc421 if you can't get the nets on 99 right away, keep trying! I recently found out that a metal lampshade that I bought at a thrift store for $2 makes a good conical scalar. As part of an experiment that went bad, I had cut the back end of my bsc421 off, then had to patch it back on. After that, no matter what I tried I could not get the nets on 99 any higher than 63%. I used to get them at 66% which is a perfect picture but at 63% it's un-watchable. I was just about ready to buy a new bsc421, but then I remembered that conical scalar rings have been known to help on a primestar dish. So I cut the top end of the lampshade off with a hacksaw, and that lampshade fits like a glove inside the bsc421. I did not have to glue it or clamp it at all. I did have to cut some off of the front of the bsc421 to improve the signal strength. I was cutting a half inch off at a time, and made the last cut at the 38 line. The last cut made no improvement over the previous cut, so I stopped there. Now the SQ is back up to 66%, and I'm happy with it but I wonder how much better it might have been if hadn't cut the back end off. The lampshade is light too, lighter than regular scalar rings.
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Could you give me the measurements for your lamp shade? Depth, and circumference? I have a bunch of aluminum coil stock I'll make one out of. 
I never considered hacking the end off the Panorama. I'm usually pretty nervous about frankensteining anything I'm not sure I understand yet. But, I suppose, with the new LNB coming, I could try it with this and see where I get. Then if I have the same results as you, I'll do it to the new one too.
I started a new thread yesterday asking about scalar ring positioning but haven't had any responses yet. I guess the lines on the side of the LNB are to set the scalar ring at the dish focal depth. My dish has a f/d of .59 so I wondered (and I guess I'll just do it to find out) if it would work any better setting the ring to an imaginary 60 line and see what it does, except that I got my fingers so numb from the cold doing it I'd rather know before freezing my a$$ off again.
I never considered hacking the end off the Panorama. I'm usually pretty nervous about frankensteining anything I'm not sure I understand yet. But, I suppose, with the new LNB coming, I could try it with this and see where I get. Then if I have the same results as you, I'll do it to the new one too.
I started a new thread yesterday asking about scalar ring positioning but haven't had any responses yet. I guess the lines on the side of the LNB are to set the scalar ring at the dish focal depth. My dish has a f/d of .59 so I wondered (and I guess I'll just do it to find out) if it would work any better setting the ring to an imaginary 60 line and see what it does, except that I got my fingers so numb from the cold doing it I'd rather know before freezing my a$$ off again.
Ok I uploaded some more pictures above, hopefully this will help. I included another failed attempt at make-your-own conical scalar. Also I tried adding a ring or 2 to the metal lampshade, those made it worse too. I'm starting to think you need a scalar that is all one molded piece, you can't just tape some pieces together and hope it will work. I was using metal duct tape too, the kind that has something like aluminum foil on the back of it. That didn't help either.
Forward Error Correction
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basically the lower the FEC the more room for error
1/2 is the best.....I've kept stable picture at a 15 quality just fine
3/4 is most common
7/8 you need to have alot of signal quality and it still may not work
example
nets on 99 have 3/4 FEC...I can keep them stable on the Pansat 1500 with a 30 quality with the 6 foot dish...they are around 90 if I peak right
conversely, the Equity mux on G3 (4040) is 7/8 FEC...I need a 75 quality minimum for them to possibly stay stable...any time it dips below 70 I have pixelation and freezing
I was getting 30Q on my VS9000 with an signal to noise ratio of 5.1db a couple of days ago, with no modifications. As soon as I can find my hack saw I'm going to try that out. It's around my shop here, somewhere.
Hack job to shorten up the LNB didn't improve anything. Shaved some more off and that made things worse. Oh well. Guess I'll wait for my BSC to show up now.
I appear to have the same primestar dish that you do Dale, and I've also got a C-band LNB but I have apparently misplaced my scalar ring. I never got C-Band to work on it before anyway, but am intrigued by your approach.
So are you saying that the metal lampshade, did or did not give you enough signal to watch DVB on C-Band?
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So are you saying that the metal lampshade, did or did not give you enough signal to watch DVB on C-Band?
:
I'm saying that the metal lampshade helps somewhat, not a lot. I could get some stations with a stock scalar ring, but I couldn't quite get the networks from the Caribbean Islands, but now I can. Still even with the lampshade the dish has to be dead-on, no room for error. Also note that before I screwed up the back end of my BSC-421, I actually could get the Caribbean stations with the BSC-421, no cuts or modifications and the regular scalar ring. But again the dish had to be dead-on. I really wish I had not cut the back off like that, maybe I could get a few more stations. If you look at the picture you can see how I patched it with the bottom of a pop can. I might have to break down and spend the $30 on a new one, put the lampshade on it and see what happens.
If you could not get C-band with your LNB, you didn't say what brand it is but that can make a big difference. Before I got my BSC-421 I tried an old Chaparral feedhorn with a precision LNB. That thing might have worked OK on a BUD, but on the primestar it was useless. I could barely detect even a strong signal. The BSC-421 blows that thing away, lampshade or no lampshade.
If you could not get C-band with your LNB, you didn't say what brand it is but that can make a big difference. Before I got my BSC-421 I tried an old Chaparral feedhorn with a precision LNB. That thing might have worked OK on a BUD, but on the primestar it was useless. I could barely detect even a strong signal. The BSC-421 blows that thing away, lampshade or no lampshade.
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CORRECTION
STOGIE,
I must set the record straight. The P* dish you gave me was never used, it is sitting in the Mississippi weeds. It is of no value to me because you discarded the P* elliptical feed horn. You obviously did not understand the importance of using this. The bracket you made, and are so proud of, for the dish is at least amateurish.
The only time you come down from your Paraclipse Tower is to belittle others.
You, Anole, Stefan and Iceberg are not the end all to a question and like to bring others down. It seems that if you don’t agree with someone’s work you should just wait and see to what end the work goes, rather then being negative.
I have never seen so many posts by a moderator on any other site and especially posts that favor a particular vendor.
SatelliteGuys.com is not a friendly and fun place to post. Re: Anoles PM to me about Dreamfox.
As far as your Paraclipse is concerned, living in the sticks like you do, permits such a ridiculous antenna to be installed but most people don’t find that a practical solution.
TATA,
SATCOM1
It gives me great pleasure to see that new members are still posting to this thread. Long live good spirit and "TINKERING"
STOGIE,
I must set the record straight. The P* dish you gave me was never used, it is sitting in the Mississippi weeds. It is of no value to me because you discarded the P* elliptical feed horn. You obviously did not understand the importance of using this. The bracket you made, and are so proud of, for the dish is at least amateurish.
The only time you come down from your Paraclipse Tower is to belittle others.
You, Anole, Stefan and Iceberg are not the end all to a question and like to bring others down. It seems that if you don’t agree with someone’s work you should just wait and see to what end the work goes, rather then being negative.
I have never seen so many posts by a moderator on any other site and especially posts that favor a particular vendor.
SatelliteGuys.com is not a friendly and fun place to post. Re: Anoles PM to me about Dreamfox.
As far as your Paraclipse is concerned, living in the sticks like you do, permits such a ridiculous antenna to be installed but most people don’t find that a practical solution.
TATA,
SATCOM1
It gives me great pleasure to see that new members are still posting to this thread. Long live good spirit and "TINKERING"
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You know what Dude? Whatever. I GAVE you that dish, worked on the mount out of the goodness of my heart to MAKE you a motor mount because I thought you were going to use it for KU. I HAVE some feedhorns somewhere around here I believe, my tests have shown for Ku they make little to NO difference. If you didn't WANT it, why waste my time and yours? Why belittle MY effort trying to help YOU? I didn't charge you a plug nickel for it. If you didn't like what I did, fine. I am not, and never will be a professional, nor do I claim to be. I have two dishes set up the same way and they work for what they were designed for. Which is all I require. I might have given that dish to someone that MIGHT have appreciated it more. Now it sits in the weeds somewhere because of YOUR pompous ASS.
That's an ignorant statement.....I am here to make friends and talk satellite as a hobby. What do I possibly have to gain by belittling others? We all have likes and dislikes. I'd rather give a newbie the real scoop that lead him down a false road of hope that a .84m dish could possibly work.
There's a reason why we all use at least a 6 foot dish for C-band. And its not because we want to have such a monstrocity in our yards, either. Its the same reason Dish Network, in Cheyenne, Wyoming uses 10 meter c-band dishes, and why your local Cable company uses 5m dishes. BECAUSE THAT'S WHAT IT TAKES FOR IT TO WORK. Did you ever stop to think that maybe someone has already been down the road you travel, and has already found the idea impractical for any real use? Of did you just assume that you can do something literally THOUSANDS of folks before you couldn't?
I'll follow Anole to the gates of Satellite Hell. He's forgotten more and understands more than I ever have or will. If he said it, it needed to be said.
Neither is a little pissant .85m dish that can receive, on a good day, about 15 percent of the available signals on c-band satellites.
I got the Para because it was AVAILABLE, and I wanted it, not because I NEEDED it. I had a perfectly good 7.5 dish that was doing what I wanted.
Envy is an ugly thing.
Adios, genius.
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huh, interesting. Never knew Stogie had it on a tower. I figured he'd have it on the ground
But we are here to HELP people with their setups. I guess I'd rather tell someone facts versus false hopes. Sure I can get KU On a 18"
Is it reliable? heck no
was it a fun project? sure it was
but I'm not gonna tell someone "use a 18" dish or D500 dish because you can get 4 high powered channels" (until a cloud cover comes across)
so I guess because we aren't sitting here saying "oh wow great job. Nobody had ever done that before"
I guess we're being negativeI'm glad you think of me as a higher power that my word is the "be all end all" of a thread
I'm a member first, staff member second. I only use my "mod status" when I need to remove a post about asking how to steal or move a post to the correct area.
And last I checked I mention all our sponsers. After all they help pay the bills
well since that is between you and him me nor anyone here really cant comment on that.
I love my 6 footer because its get almost EVERYTHING out there. I guess you'd rather play with Primestar dishes getting all giddy when you get ONE channel. While you're doing that, the folks with C-Band (the REAL ones) are getting numerous channels and enjoying what they are seeing. But I guess because you can get maybe 4 or 5 channels, then more power to ya.
addidas
But lets see....hmm you dont think some of us havent tried this before? Lets see, shall we?
4 months beforfe you tried this I did and got it to work. But since I could get more on a 6 footer I scrapped that idea
http://www.satelliteguys.us/1301442-post8.html
and lets see, you're all giddy because you can get a few channels. But when I asked
http://www.satelliteguys.us/1504526-post130.html
all you could respond with is
http://www.satelliteguys.us/1504793-post134.html
so you're doing all this work for ONE channel...I guess if you want HITN so bad yeah this will work. But I guess when I want to see more than just one channel I would try a little harder. Also I love how you think because HITN comes in at X signal, then 5 or 6 other channels will to....sorry...dont work that way
Oh well...keep playing with the Primestar...I'll enjoy my 6 foot C-Band dish with numerous channels on it
I won't try to quote satcom1, such xxxx does not bear repeating. After reading 255 good posts and hitting that one made me look at where the poster was from - It figures. Stogie does not live in the sticks. He lives near the Freeway. Now, the "sticks" is about 25 miles before you get to the "boonies". And 12 miles past the boonies is where I live. If I had a paraclipes I would work on getting it up. I have 7 C-Band dishes to get up on posts and will do by next summer. I have a 1.2 M dish that will be KU band. I have 6 KU band dishes up right now and 5 more to put up. We get winds that are between storm and huricane strength almost every day. Motors and actuators do not last out here. A 4 inch diameter 40 foot tall mast for a wind powered generator requires 5 sets of guy wires. Our closest TV station is over 50 miles away and is a low power repeater of a station 130 miles away, on the other side of the Cascade mountains.
Without the help of those mentioned in you diatribe, we would not have TV worth watching. Many of us here are interested in reliability, not in one shots (except in hunting - One tag, one bullet, one 8 point (western count) buck and that on our own property.)
So if you hate this site so much, how did you reach a count of 363 posts? I hope you were just out of sorts on something else when you made that post -- and not that you are having Family problems!, or really believe what you wrote.
POP (not godfather)
Without the help of those mentioned in you diatribe, we would not have TV worth watching. Many of us here are interested in reliability, not in one shots (except in hunting - One tag, one bullet, one 8 point (western count) buck and that on our own property.)
So if you hate this site so much, how did you reach a count of 363 posts? I hope you were just out of sorts on something else when you made that post -- and not that you are having Family problems!, or really believe what you wrote.
POP (not godfather)
Sometime ago I called a commercial dish manufacturer from this site, (one of the dishes they sell).
DAWNsat - Provider of Satellite and Fiber Optic communication products, satellite receiver, satellite antenna, fiber optic transmitter, fiber optic receiver.
I asked about what size ku dish would be good? The guy told me 6 foot minimum. I guess if you are a cable company you have to have stuff that will work in all weather.
SATCOM1 you need a larger dish or you can wait to see if my efforts in trying to get more Fta will pan out. The switch to The Digital TV Transition: FAQs - Consumer Corner will help my efforts, I hope. Our fight is in Washington not here, I have spoking to other people in the industry and they agree with me on this one.
DAWNsat - Provider of Satellite and Fiber Optic communication products, satellite receiver, satellite antenna, fiber optic transmitter, fiber optic receiver.
I asked about what size ku dish would be good? The guy told me 6 foot minimum. I guess if you are a cable company you have to have stuff that will work in all weather.
SATCOM1 you need a larger dish or you can wait to see if my efforts in trying to get more Fta will pan out. The switch to The Digital TV Transition: FAQs - Consumer Corner will help my efforts, I hope. Our fight is in Washington not here, I have spoking to other people in the industry and they agree with me on this one.
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