Sun Fade Time

[AcWxRadar]

I may have seen a few issues yesterday as I was watching 97W & 99W cband. I'm guessing it was maybe a half hour or so several channels were way down, even lost a few....minutes later they were back. If it wasn't solar it was something in the air lol...Blind

BlindOwl,

If you run the calculator for one of those sats and it matches the time, then it is the solar outage!

Those of us with Ku-band offset dishes won't notice it as much, but I have witnessed it before. I actually lost one satellite's signal for a brief moment each day at the same time for about three or four days. I dialed up the calculator and ran the numbers and sure enough, it fell right in! What I perceived as the "prime" time for signal loss according to the calculator was only off by a few minutes from the total loss of the signal. I didn't think it would affect Ku band on an offset dish this much, but it can if it is just right.

RADAR

 

[woodheat/nooil]

I will try to plant a dish on, SES WORLD SKIES - Center of Box Data
It will be close because of a hill and trees, I only get it on my C-band dish.

 

[billyboy_1]

On the prime focus dishes the shadow of the feed will be directly in the center of the dish during the outage time.

 

[Bob2011]

Bump !

This week most of us should start to see sun fade again. Use the calculator on the first page to map out when the sun will be in your favorite satellite's position. Enter a large dish size to find the peak outage date/time. This will help positioning a prime focus dish or find out which trees limbs are blocking out the view of the satellite.

 

[toucan-man]

Hah, I calculated this morning, found a spot to see 30W. But thanks for the bump!

 

[phlatwound]

Another bump.

Sun Outage Calculator

What a great resource. I now know exactly which trees have to disappear to get 30W LOS for my 1.8 Prod.

 

[toucan-man]

Another bump.Sun Outage CalculatorWhat a great resource. I now know exactly which trees have to disappear to get 30W LOS for my 1.8 Prod.

30W is what the Sun Outage Calculator was made for.

I had to flip the dish over though to get it.

 

[phlatwound]

30W is what the Sun Outage Calculator was made for.

I had to flip the dish over though to get it.

Yeh, 30W is at 12.2 degrees elevation here, and I have lots of trees towards the east end of the arc.

93W @ about 47 degrees elevation is my due south, I was surprised how high in the sky it actually is .

 

[toucan-man]

Yeh, 30W is at 12.2 degrees elevation here, and I have lots of trees towards the east end of the arc.93W @ about 47 degrees elevation is my due south, I was surprised how high in the sky it actually is .

At my other house, the sun lights up the top of a utility pole for 30W. Wonder if I could rent space at the top of the pole to attach a dish?

 

[stanleyjohn]

Bullseye!! yesterday on AMC3! Next few days just need to follow the sun to see if any satellites have a line of site problem.From what i saw yesterday~no line of site problems from 30w to 135.

 

[guacharaca]

I was kind of skeptical that a sun spot would affect an offset dish. But sure enough, just at the calculated time, i just now saw my signal drop from 89 to 67 on my one meter dish pointed at 72W. It then came back near the end of the time period.

 

[Mr Tony]

Yes it will affect any dish...and like Murphy's Law it happens just as I want to watch something worth while

Friday there was a cool documentary I wanted to see....started at 4. 10 minutes in I get "no signal" and I thought the wind blew the 6' dish out of alignment (my dish is ghetto moved by hand). Went out to aim the dish and nothing. Came in and sure enough......outage from 4:08 to 4:19 or something...dang it
Today I wanted to watch something at 2. sure enough at 1:58 the outage begins

 

[dfergie]

I had Hotpass black out for about 20 minutes about an hour ago...

 

[brex2001]

Was over at new member ivanyakinoff's place today when AnikF3 went to "No Signal" for about 20 min. He is located 3.5 mi. SW of me.

Walked out back to look through the back of his 10 ft Orbitron & sure enough the sun was in the arc.

Trying to get him to post about the Orbitron with some pics soon.

 

[Inno]

I used it to find Hispasat 30°W. I recommend the use of some sort of lens to view the sun through, more than just sunglasses. I used my welding mask.

 

[brex2001]

I had removed the buttonhook then converted the dish to quad leg support & so was able to sight through the buttonhook tube to check solar alignment with the LNBF.

And yes I was wearing eye protection.

 

[Bob2011]

I cursed the fog every morning this weekend as it blocked my view of 15w and then for a magical moment this morning the sun appeared.

Check out these neat fog filtered pics of 15w and 30w.

 

[Inno]

Here's 30°W thru my welding mask on Saturday morning. Didn't focus all that well because I had the flash off and it was thinking it was too dark for the pic so the exposure was too long.......well that's my story.