I wonder if Lyngsat's calcuation for satellite drift shows the sat has stopped when in fact it's just slowed its rate of drift as it approaches its new orbital slot. I'll have to download the latest batch of TLE's and see whatsup.According to Lyngsat SES 3 has arrived @ 99W...what is up with that?
I dont think they would be testing that quick or loading it up yet. Normally they wait a few days after a bird arrives so it can settle. Then they do all the testing of the satellite to make sure everything is working correctly. The loading of channels comes after that is all done.
Sneerboy, if you are scanning 99W instead of 103 W you are more than likely picking up Galaxy 19 Ku. I get that many channels on the Ku side.
I would doubt that they will leave the skew as is. The biggest client will be NBC and they control all their downlinks remotely. I worked for an NBC for over and yr and they have total control of all dishes including the movement of the KU dishes & the skew of them. The unit we had at the station was a Patriot 12 ft. It was really amusing to stand outside and watch NBC move the dish E & W then up and down each month to make sure everything was w/in parameters. They would do this in the afternoon during the long breaks between the program feed of the shows. When we installed the new digital sat receivers I had to set all the parameters in them as they didn't have remote access to them at least when I was there. FedEx will have to readj their skew as I installed their 2 way dish and it was hand skewed for max strength. I can't say about Microspace or the pentagon channel though.If this is a typical change out, both satellites will be co-located and operational for a month or so as they transition the services over. Rarely is one satellite "shut off" before a replacement is already on line and transmitting the muxes on the same frequencies.
The change over is usually timed in the late might with minimal impact on viewers and so seamlessly that a viewer may only observe a minute of ramping down a signal and coming right back up.
This one may be different as SES may chose to keep the offset skew to minimize the impact on downlink facilities or provide multiple identical programming sources mirrored on both satellites to allow downlinks time to correct the skew setting for transfer of service to the new bird with standardized skew settings.
It will be an interesting change out for sure!
I would guess it awaiting approval for the last move into position. I would think they will keep AMC 1 there as a backup for KU and the C band will stay as is.Anybody know why SES 3 is still stationary at 98° West? When will SES 3 replace AMC 1?