I have a couple of brand new 10-foot Sami Mesh dishes for a new radio station and am having much difficulty in aiming these puppies at Galaxy 17 and AMC 3 to pick up our programming. We pointed to the correct elevation and degrees, yet got no signal at all, even when we made adjustments. Any suggestions?
Sami 10-foot aiming troubles
- Thread starter Dennis Macha
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More info please. As much as you can provide.
Receiver
Firmware
LNB
TPs
Is it FTA? If so give positions, TP, and SR and I am sure many will scan and verify signal for you.
Receiver
Firmware
LNB
TPs
Is it FTA? If so give positions, TP, and SR and I am sure many will scan and verify signal for you.
A few more details
Chaparral Superfeed II, Sing.P
NORSAT PLL 3220 lnb, +/- 10 KHz
I am trying to pick up WEWN broadcast from EWTN and Relevant Radio signals for our upcoming Catholic Radio Station.
How difficult is this to do for a newbie? We had a digital level and a fairly good compass, but the battery-powered signal detector (that we programmed with these stations' information) would not pick up any good signal. We do not have them connected to the receivers yet, as there is no electricity at our site, due to easement procedures. I am not sure if this is a job for a professional only. If it is, does anyone know who works c-band in the Bryan/College Station, TX area?
Chaparral Superfeed II, Sing.P
NORSAT PLL 3220 lnb, +/- 10 KHz
I am trying to pick up WEWN broadcast from EWTN and Relevant Radio signals for our upcoming Catholic Radio Station.
How difficult is this to do for a newbie? We had a digital level and a fairly good compass, but the battery-powered signal detector (that we programmed with these stations' information) would not pick up any good signal. We do not have them connected to the receivers yet, as there is no electricity at our site, due to easement procedures. I am not sure if this is a job for a professional only. If it is, does anyone know who works c-band in the Bryan/College Station, TX area?
Do you know if you had your LNB/feed oriented properly (horizontal or vertical polarity) for the transponder you were attempting to receive?
I have never used any kind of a signal meter/Birdog type sat-finder (just a DVB receiver and a small tv) but you should be able to aim those dishes yourselves, with some study and effort.
It's not like you are trying to get them to track the arc, just need to set the azimuth, elevation and skew properly to do what you need to do.
I have never used any kind of a signal meter/Birdog type sat-finder (just a DVB receiver and a small tv) but you should be able to aim those dishes yourselves, with some study and effort.
It's not like you are trying to get them to track the arc, just need to set the azimuth, elevation and skew properly to do what you need to do.
Several years ago
Several years ago a friend gave me a 12 foot Paraeclipse Mesh dish. Everything as far as the skew was basically set up. All I had to do was move the from one location to another. I had a hand held meter, a TV and a receiver and at that time many analog channels was being transmitted. I also have the advantage of having another 10' foot Sami right beside of the location for the Para. Let me tell you I worked for days trying to hit one Satellite and all I had to do was basically adjust the elevation. I think I readjusted that dish a 1000 times and could never get a signal. I had to call the guy who installed my dish and although he had been out of the business for several years he came by and helped me. Took him about 5 minutes to stick the dish on the arc. I think everything I did was wrong and he had to undo everything and start all over. I know a lot more about installing a dish now and have a lot more experience and I was lucky enough to have him teach me some tricks. That said I would still rather have someone help with the install of a Large dish..LOL what a pain that was...
Several years ago a friend gave me a 12 foot Paraeclipse Mesh dish. Everything as far as the skew was basically set up. All I had to do was move the from one location to another. I had a hand held meter, a TV and a receiver and at that time many analog channels was being transmitted. I also have the advantage of having another 10' foot Sami right beside of the location for the Para. Let me tell you I worked for days trying to hit one Satellite and all I had to do was basically adjust the elevation. I think I readjusted that dish a 1000 times and could never get a signal. I had to call the guy who installed my dish and although he had been out of the business for several years he came by and helped me. Took him about 5 minutes to stick the dish on the arc. I think everything I did was wrong and he had to undo everything and start all over. I know a lot more about installing a dish now and have a lot more experience and I was lucky enough to have him teach me some tricks. That said I would still rather have someone help with the install of a Large dish..LOL what a pain that was...
laundry list:
You can do a string test with string stretched across the dish vertically and horizontally, to see if it's built right.
The feedhorn needs to be located accurately, so measure from the left edge of it to the left edge of the dish...
...repeat right, up, down, and make sure all numbers are equal.
The feed needs to be aimed at the center of the dish.
Sometimes we use a laser pointer instead of the feed, to make sure it's aimed well.
If the dish is on just a fixed mount, then the elevation you set is the elevation you get.
No need to worry about declination, nor any arc tracking.
However, the azimuth you need to aim is affected by the local magnetic variation.
So, any proper sat finder program will give you the azimuth for your location to your chosen bird.
That's another source of error for the unwarry.
And the last thing I can think of is already mentioned twice above: skew.
You have to rotate the feed or the probe ... or accommodate it however necessary.
The Geo-Orbit web site is good for reading about the basics, if you would like to do some research.
However, that said, we won't abandon you to your own devices.
Now that I think of it, proper in/out adjustment of the feedhorn in the scalar to set the F/D is also ... useful.
Probably won't kill you, but having everything set correctly is what you want, so I bring it up.
Think that covers the basics.
No reason you can't learn and do by your self.
Who assembled the dishes or installed them?
You can do a string test with string stretched across the dish vertically and horizontally, to see if it's built right.
The feedhorn needs to be located accurately, so measure from the left edge of it to the left edge of the dish...
...repeat right, up, down, and make sure all numbers are equal.
The feed needs to be aimed at the center of the dish.
Sometimes we use a laser pointer instead of the feed, to make sure it's aimed well.
If the dish is on just a fixed mount, then the elevation you set is the elevation you get.
No need to worry about declination, nor any arc tracking.
However, the azimuth you need to aim is affected by the local magnetic variation.
So, any proper sat finder program will give you the azimuth for your location to your chosen bird.
That's another source of error for the unwarry.
And the last thing I can think of is already mentioned twice above: skew.
You have to rotate the feed or the probe ... or accommodate it however necessary.
The Geo-Orbit web site is good for reading about the basics, if you would like to do some research.
However, that said, we won't abandon you to your own devices.
Now that I think of it, proper in/out adjustment of the feedhorn in the scalar to set the F/D is also ... useful.
Probably won't kill you, but having everything set correctly is what you want, so I bring it up.
Think that covers the basics.
No reason you can't learn and do by your self.
aiming:
Code:
[FONT=Fixedsys]
College Station, Brazos, Texas 77840
Latitude 30° 36.879'N Longitude 96° 19.585'W
Sat Name, Sat Lng, Az(t), [COLOR=Red]Az(m)[/COLOR], El, Skew
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
[/FONT][FONT=Fixedsys]
[/FONT][U][URL="http://www.satstar.net/beam.html?bid=2493601"][FONT=Fixedsys]AMC-3[/FONT][/URL][/U][FONT=Fixedsys], 87.0W, 162.1, [COLOR=Red]158.2[/COLOR], 52.9, -15.3
[/FONT][U][URL="http://www.satstar.net/beam.html?bid=3130701"][FONT=Fixedsys]Galaxy 17[/FONT][/URL][/U][FONT=Fixedsys], 91.0W, 169.6, [COLOR=Red]165.7[/COLOR], 53.9, -8.9 [/FONT]
Hopefully, Dennis got his problem resolved. The larger the dish, the longer it takes to find the bird. Having the correct tools is a must. A magnetic elevation level and a spectrum analyzer with a fast responding spectral graph works wonders. The difference is two days of frustration now becomes one hour of fun. 
A 10' dish is much more precise in aiming. I have a Sami 10' and it's quite touchy on ku with the half degree beamwidth @ ku frequencies. It's quite an impressive ku big dish with a corotor II feedhorn and norsat lnbs.
Being sure your feed is perfectly center is extremely important.
Being sure your f/d is set (how far the feedhorn is pushed into the scalar ring)if I remember right your f/d for a sami 10' should be .38
your feedhorn should be marked on the outside and that .38 line goes at the edge of the scalar ring.
Being sure your feed is perfectly center is extremely important.
Being sure your f/d is set (how far the feedhorn is pushed into the scalar ring)if I remember right your f/d for a sami 10' should be .38
your feedhorn should be marked on the outside and that .38 line goes at the edge of the scalar ring.
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