Simple rotor mount mod to ease alignment

[Vorg]

With the rotor down for checkup, I decided to take some pictures of my mod.

To rotate the rotor on the poll you need to loosen the brackets. But when you do this, you have two problems. The rotor and dish leans forward changing the alignment and everything wants to slide down the pole making it a handfull.

Take a small chunk of angle aluminum (or steel), drill 2 holes and cut a notch that reaches to or past the holes. Bend the corners of the notch down creating 2 wedges. Feed a couple of J-bolts through both main U-bolts and bolt to the aluminum.

The J-bolts now support everything when the brackets are loose keeping it from sliding down the pole.

Also, as the wedges are pulled down into the top of the pole by the weight, the tops of the J-bolts are pulled against the pole. This in turn pulls the top of the motor to the pole. The bottom of the motor will want to pivot towards the pole, so now it is kept tight and alighted. As you can see from the pictures, the upper bracket is very loose, but the motor is still clamped to the pole. The lower bracket can not be too loose as the lower end of the J-bolts will tend to pull away from the pole and if they get too far out, will not be able to hold the top tight.

A touch of grease on the rim of the pole would also help smooth rotating assembly.

 

[brentb636]

Not a bad idea at all. I've been there !

 

[1ADAM12]

SG2100 Bracket Mod

I like everything you stated but in addition it prevents the corrogated bracket from deformation by the flat mounting bolts. Thanks, I saved the pictures.

 

[sleeper]

Cool idea, good thinking!

 

[Anole]

I like it

Great idea. Best I'd seen before, was Tron's gate latch trick.

Now, wouldn't it be nice if one of the motor dealers decided to include either of these ideas?

 

[Mikey11]

good idea....

i normally put a hose clamp around the post to prevent the motor from sliding down....

 

[B.J.]

My solution to the above mentioned problem below:
Worked really well, however I know that most people wouldn't have that massive bracket laying in their junk pile like I did. I have NO idea of where I picked that up.

 

[Mikey11]

My solution to the above mentioned problem below:
Worked really well, however I know that most people wouldn't have that massive bracket laying in their junk pile like I did. I have NO idea of where I picked that up.

nice!

i suppose a standard U-clamp could be used also....

 

[beavs2112]

nice job vorg. your invention is an azimuth fine adjust so to speak. but don't forget about elevation. it also sucks if your dish is heavy and wants to move down when you loosen your elevation bolts during alignment. i would also recommend something to ease elevation fine adjustment alignment as well. AcWx had a good solution in his sticky thread on motorized ku setups.

http://www.satelliteguys.us/fta-mpeg2-faqs/190527-how-set-up-motorized-ku-band.html

some dishes include this elevation fine adjust feature (geosats ??) now so...

 

[Anole]

credit where credit is due:

The J-bolts now support everything when the brackets are loose keeping it from sliding down the pole.

Also, as the wedges are pulled down into the top of the pole by the weight, the tops of the J-bolts are pulled against the pole.
This in turn pulls the top of the motor to the pole.

... As you can see from the pictures, the upper bracket is very loose, but the motor is still clamped to the pole. ...

A touch of grease on the rim of the pole would also help smooth rotating assembly.

I like everything you stated but in addition it prevents the corrogated bracket from deformation by the flat mounting bolts.

I didn't mean to minimize Vorg's clever and patentable idea!
It has several features the simple bracket-below-the-motor doesn't have! -
Initial dish tune-up would go so much faster if they all had this part -

... i would also recommend something to ease elevation fine adjustment alignment as well. ...

some dishes include this elevation fine adjust feature (geosats ??) now ...

Yes, the 1.2 meter GeoSatPro dishes have a threaded adjuster rod for vertical fine tune.
Something the Fortec and most other brands don't have.
You'll also find it on some Primestar, DirecWay, Bob Jones University (search for Phlatwound pix).
Likewise, members have come up with a number of ideas, some using turnbuckles, or one-time add-on devices.

But in all my years of reading the forum and studying ideas and pictures, I've never seen anything that matches Vorg's clever bracket trick! -
One hell of an innovation. :up

 

[Vorg]

When I put up the wineguard I replaced the lower bolt that held the lnb rod on with a little longer one, not much. Then put a kind of spacer nut on it which is just a nut that is about an 1" long. Then put another bolt in that. When you run that second bolt out, it hit against the motor shaft lifting the dish. But for some reason it didn't work well as an adjuster. I ended up lifting the dish, turning the bolt a turn or two and letting the dish rest back down on the bolt until the right point was found. then tighten down the pivot bolts.

 

[Skjellyfetti]

I used a Hose clamp, put the thread area of the clamp toward true south, and the motor bracket would rest on the clamp. I loosened the nuts just enough to allow some rotational movement of the whole assembly and the hose clamp kept the motor from sliding down the pole.

 

[Vorg]

This WS9036 I just got has a tab on the dish side of the bracket. It is already bent down a little and if bent in a bit more should hold the dish to the pole while the clamp is loose. But it does have a few flaws.

The tab is welded to the inside of the jaws so that it keeps the pole from fully setting in. Would be better if it was attached to the top or back.

It's not very long, so it holds the upper clamp very close to the end of the pipe which makes it more likely to crush. The pole the provide is fairly heavy metal, so might not be a problem. They also provided a nice cap for the top of the pole which, though plastic with fins might provide a bit of extra support. Not much from the look of it, but you never can tell by looking at plastic. Problem with the cap is, it would keep the tab from reaching down in the top of the pipe. It also creates a bit of a dome.

It gets in the way when mounting on a rotor because the end of the pipe is at the bottom on a 2100, not the top. Would be helpfull if the tab was something that bolted on. You could mount the bracket upsidown which would again put the clamp right at the edge of the pipe. You also would loose the alignment lines. But of those don't allow for the fact that the tab holds the dish out, they are off anyway and they have no numbers. They are just lines. Maybe something to tell how much you moved it form a ref point.

 

[Wescopc]

I remove that tab from a WS9036 (grinder or file) before installation - very bad design!
Bob

 

[Vorg]

I added a threaded adjuster to the bracket of my new dish.

 

[Anole]

elevation micro-adjust

Pretty good first effort.
Here are some of my favorites...

- DirecWay - Anole

- invention by - Walrus1957

- Bob Jones University - by Lak7

- Bob Jones University, note easy adjust knob - Phlatwound

- SatelliteAV prototype - Brian