Watching FTA but with a few problems

[linuxman]

Well we got the 10' BUD mounted on the building, and I have been able to identify and watch the following satellites with some of the stronger TP's.

Galaxy 15 - had 4 or 5 jewelry/Christian TP's that I could pull in. The picutre was not quite perfect, but very watchable.
Galaxy 14 - was able to lock on to several VCII TP's but had no authorization.
Echostar 9/Intelsat Americas 13 Jewelry Channel
Galaxy 4R - couple of Christian channels and identiefied a feed.
Intelsat Americas 6 - locked onto 3 different Xtsy VCII channels but could not view because of no authorization.
Was able to lock onto an ABC Channel East of IA6, but could not identify the Satellite.

I could tell there were more signals, but never got a picture moving East from IA6.
It just seemed like I was a little out of phase.

Maybe I don't have the Polar mount turned to true North which is keeping me from all the other Sats and signals. Just don't know what might be the cause.

I am hoping some of you might be able to give me some direction.

This is the equipment:
10' Winegard alum. mesh BUD.
Chaparell CoRotor II Plus with a Cal-Amp 25K C-Band Lnb, and an Aspen Eagle .6 KU LNB. I did pick up a couple of KU TP's in the above Sats with Von Weise 24" actuator and Drake ESR-1524 receiver.

I did have a question about the actuator too. It will almost lay down on the horizon when pointing West, but only come down about 1/3 of the way from center when pointing East, and won't go any further. The receiver tells me that it has reached the limit.

I walked through the setup part and moved the dish as far as possible both to the West and East, but I think it came up agains hardware limits in the motor.

Is that about all I can expect to the east out of this actuator?

Any pointers or help you guys can give me, I will be grateful. I would have never gotten this far without reading this site from one end to the other.

Thanks in advance,

Linuxman

 

[Mr Tony]

are you looking for analog only?

East of IA6 is Doc Scott on AMC3 (87W) TP20 but that's about it for analog

 

[linuxman]

Thanks Iceberg.

Let me see if I can pull that in.

The problem I am running into is that this old receiver has a few Sats programmed in, and they are called F4, G1,F3,T7,G9, and G5.

I hae identified T7 as Galaxy 4R and G5 as IA6 which is at 93W.

I will set TP20 and nudge it East and see if I can Get Doc Scott.

Back in a few.

Thanks!

 

[linuxman]

Okay,

I got Dr. Gene Scott to come in. The picture is pretty snowy, but I can see it.

I do have a problem though, because it is coming in on TP21 and not 20 so what do you think may be causing that kind of anomaly?

But it does indicate that I am tracking the belt so far.

 

[Mr Tony]

maybe the polarity is backwards. I think DOc Scott is on a V transponder

 

[linuxman]

Hey anything is possible.

Is that something I can change by switching the wires on the back of the receiver?

 

[linuxman]

On second thought,

I checked most of the other TP's that I can view, and they all seem to be on the right TP and polarity.

Hmmmmm!

 

[drhydro]

I dont have a 1524, but if it is anything like my 1724 you can set the beginning polarity for each sat in the sat setup screen.

For Doc Scott I would go to tp 20 and then swap the polarity. In my 1724 you press menu on the remote, then press skew, format. After that you will have a screen where you can select polarity and adjust skew.

 

[voomvoom]

The problem I am running into is that this old receiver has a few Sats programmed in, and they are called F4, G1,F3,T7,G9, and G5!

Here you go:
W9 = AMC9 @ 83.0w , ku = K9 , at one time this was at 85.0w
W2 = AMC2 @ 85.0w , ku = K2 , at one time this was at 105.0w
W3 = AMC3 @ 87.0w , ku = K3
T4 = IA8 @ 89.0w , ku = L4
G11 @ 91.0w , also known as GB and G7 , ku = X7(X11)
T6 = IA6 @ 93.0w , ku = L6
G3 @ 95.0w , ku = X3
T5 = IA5 @ 97.0w , ku = L5
G4 @ 99.0w , ku = X4
W4 = AMC4 @ 101.0w , ku = K4
W1 = AMC1 @ 103.0w , ku = K1
Anik F1 @ 107.0w
Anik E2 @ 111.0w
Solidaridad F2 @ 113.0w
Satmex5 @ 116.8w
Intelsat13 = IA13 @ 121.0w
G10 @ 123.0w , also known as GO
G5 @ 125.0w , now known as G14
G9 @ 127.0w , ku = X9 , now known as G13 and Horizons1
T7 @ 129.0w , ku = L7
F3 = AMC11 @ 131.0w , also known as C3
G1 @ 133.0w , now known as G15
F4 = AMC10 @ 135.0w , also known as C4
F1 = AMC7 @ 137.0w , also known as W7 and I think it was once C5
Hope this will help you some

Al

 

[linuxman]

Thanks Doc and VoomVoom.

I'll give it a shot on the swapping polarity.

VoomVoom you are a life saver. It would take a week for me to figure all that out.

Be back in a few with report on the swapping polarity part.

 

[voomvoom]

Okay,

I got Dr. Gene Scott to come in. The picture is pretty snowy, but I can see it.

I do have a problem though, because it is coming in on TP21 and not 20 so what do you think may be causing that kind of anomaly?

But it does indicate that I am tracking the belt so far.

It's got everything to do with polarity. And these old boxes were set up with the polarity pre-set in the box for each satellite. When using a servo motor, the sats are all side by side reversed polarity. Every 2 degrees the polarity swaps, enabling the ability for 4 degree spacing to work for 2 degrees. Doing what the Doc says, should work.

Al

 

[linuxman]

Holy S**t!

You guys are the greatest!

The polarity swap worked fine, and the skew helped me clear up the picture a little.

So if I manually adjust the skew on any TP that isn't coming in clear, I can probably have it clear up some?

Thanks again Iceberg, Doc, and VoomVoom!!!

 

[Mr Tony]

Holy S**t!

I say that alot here too

The polarity swap worked fine, and the skew helped me clear up the picture a little.

So if I manually adjust the skew on any TP that isn't coming in clear, I can probably have it clear up some?

correct. Skew fine tunes the picture and gets rid of sparklies and snow

 

[voomvoom]

Some other old birds, that may or may not be in your receiver are:
Westar 4 , known as W4
Westar 5 , known as W5
Comstar 4 , known as D4
Spacenet , I think there were 2 maybe 3 , they were S and number
Anik F2 , known as AD2 , which was where Anik E2 is at
Don't remember where the other's were located, But I think one of the Westars was around 99.0w

Al

 

[linuxman]

I don't know how to thank you for your help.

I woke up at 2:00 this morning thinking about the guys coming at 6:00 to help me put this thing up on the 22' pole mounted to my building and never went back to sleep. I am worse than a kid with a new toy.

Tomorrow, I will go through each channel listed by VoomVoom and see what else I can squeeze out. I want to get this thing lined out, and make sure it sees C and KU okay, then I will order my the DVB box and set that up for some more fun.

I haven't finally decided which receiver to buy yet, and have read everything you guys have written as far a pros and cons on each one. Just don't know yet.

But for now I am going to bed.

Talk to you tomorrow.

 

[drhydro]

In setting up each satellite you should be able to set initial skew. You might have to delete and re add satellites in able to get the skew correct on each one. You will need the password for your Drake 1524 to get in the satellite setup menus, I believe the password is 1524.

Good Luck

 

[linuxman]

Thanks Doc,

I had a few errands to do this morning, not the least of which was to buy a 10' ground rod and hammer it into the ground with 6 guage bare wire and clamps before the storms this afternoon. Didn't want to see all this work go up in smoke.

I asked as part of my original question last night how to get more arc out of my 24" actuator. I see that you have a similar setup and can view from 137 to 58 degrees. I think I have figured out how you did that.

If I am correct, I need to find my furthest most West Sat, probably AMC 7 at 137 degrees. Move the dish to that position, measure how much more of the arm is available when all the way to the limit West. Then loosen the clamp on the arm and extend it by that much which will allow for a farther swing to the East.

Please correct me if I am incorrect.

Thanks for the password to setup the satellites.

 

[PSB]

Make sure to Bond that ground rod to your main service grounding point also, its a MUST if you want it done right to NEC code

 

[drhydro]

If I am correct, I need to find my furthest most West Sat, probably AMC 7 at 137 degrees. Move the dish to that position, measure how much more of the arm is available when all the way to the limit West. Then loosen the clamp on the arm and extend it by that much which will allow for a farther swing to the East.

That sounds like what i did

 

[linuxman]

Cool!

Then that is next on the agenda.