This was really last weekends project but I finished it up this afternoon cleaning up the wires. This is not all FTA related but a lot of it it is, so I thought it would be ok to post it here.
I recently bought a VIP211 and dish 1000 from TheDishStore, great to work with and fast shipping, as I was tired of only having ota locals for a source of HD content. I originally just set the 1000 up and it worked fairly well but I was not super thrilled with the reception on 129. 129 was only getting on average of 75%. I had a Globecast (channelmaster 76cm dish that I wasn't using so I took the single lnb off of the 1000 and mounted it to the Globecast dish and am using it for 129. I used the three lnb holder from the 1000 and had to modify the arm to match the mount tabs, nothing the cordless dremel couldn't take care of. I used the center position for the lnb. Much better reception this way as most all tp's are in the 85 to 95% range. Since I was using the lnb holder for the 1000 I decided to just take it down. I was using a dish 500 for the small bit of fta on 110 and 119, I didn't need this anymore so I mounted the dish pro + twin on it and that took care of the dishnetwork setup. I did try to just use the globecast dish for all three 110,119 and 129 but I was not happy with the results. It was better than the 1000 but I was looking to get the best possible signal from 129.
I replaced my crappy mount (an old direct mount)with a Univmount from sadoun., for my motorized 85 cm fta dish. The mount was taller and helped my LOS issues a great deal. Previously I could only see from 87 to 129 but now I can see from 61.5 to 148
At the same time I replaced the extreme II lnb with an Invacom QPH-031 and a 22khz switch. I am only using a one circular and one linear out. As others have noted this lnb is large and heavy compared to some others but it really wasn't that much heavier than the old globecast lnb I have, nor did it cause any flex or bending of the arm on my Patriot 85 cm dish. ( I have never figured out who manufacted that globecast lnb not much stamped on it. ) I was concernerd that I would lose some quality percentage so I 1st left the switch off and only used the linear side and randomly compared the results to the old Extreme II. Most tp's on most sat where either the same or 1 to 2% better on the quality reading. I hooked up the circular side and the switch and the results are very good. All tp's on all sats are getting equal or better quality % than my prevoius setup.
It all turned out to be very worthwhile. I am getting better reception all around, getting more sats on my fta setup and now am not limited with the circular polarity only being locked on two sats. I have ordered and since received an I adapter to replace the 3 lnb mount that I have on the globecast dish, just because I think it would clean it up and make it look better. Maybe next weekend I will tackle that and see if I can trim some branches off the tree that seems to be blocking my reception past 61.5. Im not sure how far the motor can safely go that direction (MY TS is 97w)or if there is anything worthwhile to scan for in that direction but maybe it will be worthwhile.