still no go... any reputable installers for fta motorized dishes in mid-Missouri???

[mastermesh]

urgh. Having problems getting everything up and going. Pole is plumb, but I think I'm still too low on roof's slope to overshoot neighbors and the hill behind them. A few more feet up should do it... not really sure if it's the line of site that's a problem or if I'm aiming way off. Hard to find time to get help since the wife's hours are opposite mine for the most part.... she really doesn't like me dancing around on the roof anyways...don't wanna really move the dish up the slope since chimney on the roof might block some signals to far east/west.... + I'm worried about having to patch up all the holes that I've already made - the Soudon Roof Mount uses 6 screws or so to hold itself down to the roof, so that's about 6 drill holes I'd have to patch up before it rains... bad news when it looks like we only have one layer of shingles...

Tried contacting a "pro" installer after someone directed me to a website for one... nearest one was over 100 miles away, but under 150 (some guy named Ed near Joplin)... emailed back and forth with him. He wouldn't do it - too far out. He gave me a local guy's name and number - called him after he didn't call me when he was suppossed to. His name is Bill Branson. Bill said that he doesn't install FTA or motorized. He said that he knows a guy named Randy that has worked with fta. No contact from Randy yet. It was yesterday morning that I called Bill and He said that he'd call Randy. I left a message for Bill last night asking him again if he's contacted Randy. Bill seems reluctant to return calls... urgh. Are there any local fta installers? If so who are they? Seems almost like a business opportunity for someone who's really in to this hobby that know a lot more about getting up and going with this stuff than I do... Sucks having equipment and everything but absolutely no signal...

 

[neil_kc1]

Where are you mastermesh? I am just outside kansas city, not a pro but set my own system so i know it can be done.

 

[neil_kc1]

Another option is to check out Rick's Satellite in Blue Springs Missouri, I bought my system from him and he would have set it up for me if I had needed. He gave great over the phone encouragement and support. you can get to his websight by going to www.gofastmotorsports.com then click through to the sponsors sight.

 

[mastermesh]

wait and see.

Guess for now I'm going to wait and see what happens. Geuss it's prudent to be worried to much yet - but I'm hoping that Bill guy gets Randy calling by mid-next week (figure he might not even mention it to Randy yet since it's a 3 day weekend this weekend) .

I'm located in Boonville.
Setup:
1 of the roof mounts from Soudon (the Universal 1 I think it's called)
Winegard 76 cm
Sg2100 motor
Pansat 3500 SD
Disqec 4 in 1 - 4 ins, 1 out.
invacom lnbf (that one that has both the circular + linear reception)...

Got the pole plumb via level - both n/s and e/w... got the dish aimed pretty much straigh south. Got the elevation set to what's in the book...

hookup is receiver->motor->switch->lnb

I think it's mainly just a matter of finding a bird and tweaking, but my wife won't let me put the tv on the roof (I don't blame her)... but like mentioned, could be line of site problem. Boonville is nothing but old houses and hills for the most part. We are about half way up one of the main hills. The shot to the south seems clear, but the elevation of the dish's mount may be a little low. Just eyeing it, it looks about even with the horizon (horizon being the top of the apartment across the street + top of hill behind it), but going up about 4 or so feet on the slope might get us a little above the horizon. I know that I should be getting something - we had an 18" dtv dish hooked up on the porch, which the dish is on top of now - and it was picking up goltv on 110 degrees west - I know that those are easier to see than the ku birds, but still, if those can be found, it shouldn't be hard to find other stuff, I'm hoping... either way, something's not right with the setup, and I'm willing to actually have someone do this for us, assuming it's not gonna cost an arm and a leg.

The reason I'm willing to pay someone to help out is that I'm known to be one that gets irritated with technology when it doesn't do what it's suppossed to do - and uh, get a little too physically violent... just had to buy a new ps2 controller since the last one has a d-pad that busted due to a being pushed a little too hard one day... at least one computer in the past had to be replaced when I pushed a ram stick in too hard... One of the 18" dishes that I was playing with has a bolt or two that busted off since I tightened them too tight when trying to adjust. I'm afraid if I keep fiddling with this without being patient enough I'm gonna end up doing that to the sg2100 or winegard too, which I really don't want to do...

 

[Mr Tony]

I would remove the switch for the time being. Hook it directly to the "L" of the LNB
make sure the LNB LO frequency is set to 10750

Remember that dishes are offset so where the dish "looks" is actually 22 degrees lower than it really is (due to the bunce off the dish)

 

[mastermesh]

Well, I called Rick's Sattellite - he won't come out this far either...

urgh. Kinda one of those things that remind me that I'm truly in the state of Misery (as oppossed to Missourah as locals call it)....

Guess tomorrow when my wife's at work I'll sneak up on the roof and try to connect the little tv directly to the dish's L... and see what I can come up with.

 

[Mr Tony]

mastermesh

lets see if we can at least get SOMETHING on your setup

Remove motor and switches. Run line from receiver to "L" side of Diseqc. Lets at least get your true south logged in as a fixed dish. Once you do that, the motor will come easier.

Boonville is at 38.9N 92.75W so IA6 is your true south (same as mine. I'm in Minneapolis)

On the dish, put the elevation at 44
azimuth is 182 which is almost straight south
put the LNB stright up and down

Go into the antenna setup and select T6 (thats the old name). Set up the screen in the right EXACTLY as I have in the below picture (the 1st one)

scroll through the transponder list (TP) until you see one of the follwing
11710 V 14310
11865 V 3615

Both of those are strong and should be able to help aim the dish. Now aim the dish straight south. As you move the dish, watch for Quality. You need to move the dish S L O W L Y (1/8" or less at a time) and see if the quality bar moves. Until the quality shows up, you won't get anything.
You may have to adjust the elevation a little bit but you shouldnt have to move more than an inch or so off of the straight south.

Once you get quality, try a smart scan and see what you get.

 

[neil_kc1]

sorry rick's didn't work out. the guys here will be lots of help. I am actually in Odessa, just down the road. so i know it can be done. if i can do it myself so can you. It took me 2 weeks to get my first sat. but once i was on the arc, there was nothing stopping me.

 

[Wildeye]

Yeah, the biggest thing is getting a live strong transponder saved. I did it the hard way kept the motor lucked out with a blind scan and found a test screen with amc9. I took that tp and saved it under the amc9 listing.
--The hard way-----

Point the dish south east, set your elevation to were you think it should. Slowly turn the dish west until you get a signal. Blind scan then check your finding against www.lyngsat.com. If can't get a single set your elevation to lowest working point then. Start the process over again each time slowly moving the elevation higher. --this methods works best if you have a hepler and a 2way radio. --

If you want, I can PM you some of my tp settings.

 

[mastermesh]

we were using cell phones...

not quite as good as a walkie talkie unless you burn a lot of minutes on it.

 

[techpuppy]

Hi Mastermesh,

You're just a few miles from Columbia and the University. There's a great electrical engineering department and someone there could probably give you a local referal. When I was in Columbia I volunteered at KBIA. I also got some technical training there and if you called them they might give you some ideas for local people who could help.

As far as the TV on the roof, consider getting one of the 5" BW cheapies for around $20 to $25. They can run on batteries so you don't have to mess with an extension cord. From my own experience trying to aim a dish without a TV within view is very frustrating. I tried the walkie talkie method and you spend half the time asking the other person if they saw anything. Also, as mentioned in the other posts, simplify. Skip the motor and switches for now.

 

[mastermesh]

Still no signal...We do have an old tv and I put it on the roof for now... Here's some pics showing the situation as it now stands... :


http://www.free.hostultra.com/~articles/art/dish/viewer.html

 

[mastermesh]

swapped out the invacom with a plain ol universal lnbf (a part I ordered via ebay before ordering the invacom) - still no go... I was thinking maybe the other lnbf might have been the problem?

this is quite frustrating and annoying! ...

The reciever is set up like your image Iceburg, with the sig button in the installation setup pushed... annoying having to go down to receiver to hit remote sig button and then up the ladder, etc. but the real annoyance is having been out on the roof all this time (about 3-4 hours so far) slowly moving dish left and right (moving the motor's U bracket)... and then nudge up elevation a degree or two and do it all over and over and over and over... with none of it bringing any success... urgh!

I haven't taken the motor off of the pole yet because, in part, I'm afraid if I do that and do find the signal for t6, it'll all be lost again when I go to re-mount the motor.

I'm sweatting like crazy - the sun is starting to get a lot hotter up on the roof, and I think if I stay up there too much longer I'm either going to fall off due to sweat in my eyes or get a really bad sunburn in a few hours... almost getting to the point I want to just call it quits, but then I'm out all the money I've spent on this stuff - urgh. I'm going to sit in the AC inside for a while.

I think I changed some light bulbs the other day - I'm gonna go and see if I can't find some of the old ones and shatter them somewhere. That sound always has a little bit of Carthesisthetic effect on me when I get this frustrated with something - the sound of something breaking in to a million bits is really somewhat soothing when you are highly irritated and just want to break something.

 

[mastermesh]

I'm gonna try contacting some locals...

Pulled out the phone book - called Gary's Sattelite, (573) 819-8459
just called Gary's Sattelite in Columbia - Gary's specific words when I mentioned FTA and an SG2100 were, "I'm familiar with those and to be honest with you I don't want to mess with it at all. I just don't want to mess with it at all"

On to the next number...

http://booneelectric.coop/bess/index.htm ,
http://www.midamericawireless.com/ ,
http://www.kempersatellite.com/
http://www.zigdish.com/about.html doesn't have any email addresses or anything - so I left a message on their voice mail...

same with Dyna Electric 573-815-0459...
just mentions Direct tv and or Dish... so guess they are out...

 

[Mr Tony]

mastermesh
If you switched the LNB to the Universal, then the LNB LO has to be changed to Universal from Standard.

Honestly I would remove the motor temporarily and get youe true south locked in using a fixed dish. Then you can mark it on the mast because your true south is in the same spot whether on fixed dish or motorized (just the elevation is different)

hang in there

 

[mastermesh]

gonna go get an early lunch and start at it all again...

 

[PSB]

Good idea (Removing the motor and the early lunch)

 

[voomvoom]

mastermesh, it might help us to help you if you could get some screenshots on the tv screen of some of the set-up pages in the menu, to see if we can spot something you may be overlooking.

Al

 

[mastermesh]

got the motor down... now it's nothing but Soudon roof mount + Winegard w/ the Universal LNB, universal LNB plugged straight in to a RG6 going in to receiver... receiver's out to tv is going to a 50 ft. coax that leads to a small tv on the roof.
got the dish's elevation now at 45 degrees...
I've been moving dish east and west a long while and am getting nothing. I am also starting to get overheated

tip: don't wear shorts on the roof, especially when the highs are in the 90s!

I'm doing laundry as I'm doing all of this - just put on some pants. Think I'll have to wait til Monday to try again. It's too blasted hot on the roof to stay out there - been out there on and off since 6:30 or so this morning with only one small half hour snack/late breakfast/early lunch break... now it's 10:53, I'm sweating bullets, my legs feel blistered in at least one spot behind my calf, and I'm getting no signals - just more frustration in the summer sun. I'll get back at this later... Thanks for the tips. Hopefully I'll come at this fresh in Monday and pull a signal right in. When I was fiddlin with the old dtv dish trying to get 110 it took a while... probably same thing's going on now with all of this. If/when I do get a signal I'll go get a permanant marker and/or china marker to mark location... and will probably sit on the first bird I find for about a week or two before I try the motor again.

 

[mikekohl]

The pictures that you posted several entries back show a dish that
appears to be physically pitched back 35 to 40 degrees from vertical.
You just stated that you are now at 45 degrees. Did you raise it higher in the sky from previous setting, and how did you measure 45 degrees?

If there is a gauge on the side of the antenna and the mast is vertical,
is can probably be trusted to compensate for the typical 22-25 degree offset found on these antennas. If you use an angle finder across the dish, and
it measures 45 degrees...and physically looks halfway between vertical and horizontal...you are probably at least 20 degrees too high in the sky.
A true 45 degree angle from the satellite would result in the dish being
physically between 20 and 23 degrees back from vertical (using 25 degree
or 22 degree offset for this type of antenna, respectively). Measured across the front of the antenna, 23 degrees back would read as 90 minus 23, or about
67 degrees, on a typical inclinometer.

Get the local oscillator settings under control first---matching the LO frequency
with that of your LNBF, first. Then pay attention to the angles given above.

Good luck!

Mike