"If set up correctly and maintained, they will perform perfectly well for years on a suitably sized dish such as an 85cm." satelliteman
"Absolutely. Good, inexpensive, utility Motor." Tivù
"A good all round workhorse providing it isn't overloaded - dish wise" Vipersan
So much love for moteck. I take it the set up correctly and maintained is to shift the blame for any perceived failings on the user.
For a mesh 85cm dish it maybe fine. But Moteck rates their motor for upto a 1.2mtr solid dish. That is just over twice the surface area of a 85cm dish, and mesh dishes usually suffer 40% less windloading than solid. I certainly would not trust it to hold a 1.2mtr solid dish in an exposed location, without buckling in strong winds, it is mostly aluminium. Moteck make no claim as to resistance to windloading at all, in Moteck land it is always calm skys and if the mount fails it is your problem. Claiming suitablility for larger dishes to get more sales, than it will reliably hold is immoral. The better made similar Stab motor only claims suitability for upto 95cm dish, and the similar SatControl motor only claims upto 85cm dish.
Mine is in a sheltered location with a 1.1mtr dish (I just measured it 113x102cm so 13kg, could not remeber if I ended up buying the 1mtr or 1.1mtr.). Before I replaced my old echostar receiver/positioner I used a 36v motor mount the Jaeger SMR-99G H-H which is built like a tank in comparison to the moteck but only rated for upto a 1.1mtr dish. Previously to that back in the days of analogue I had a polarmount and actuator, in an exposed location with a 1mtr solid dish that mount got buckled despite being massively more robust and sturdy than a moteck sg2100a.
The beam width to -3dB for a 85cm dish is 2.2degrees, for a 1.2mtr dish it is about 1.6degrees, so you need the motor to be more accurate the larger the dish. The moteck claims a count accuracy of 0.15degrees, but the mount also has play in it which means it does not reliably go to the exact same point in the arc, and only has one hall sensor in it so can lose accurate count over time. Mine is no way accurate to 0.15degrees. It is usually fine on powerful satellites as being slightly off alignment lower signal is not a problem, weaker satellites is another matter. I sometimes have to manually tell it to nudge or move the dish to get in alignment with the satellite position. So yeah it works fine if you do not mine manually aligning the dish when it is suppose to be automatic, or diy modifying the mount to remove any play.
It does not make any reference to needing maintaince and claims to have a quiet motor. But due to the play it needs oiling to stop it from vibrating as the motor strains causing the dish to reverberate making a racket. Thats ok if it is garden mounted like mine, but what about on the side of a house. So yeah it works fine if you do not mine a suposedly maintance free mount that actually requires oiling to prevent a product promoted as having a quiet motor acutually making a racket.
It also depends what satellites you want to track since the design is such that it puts most strain on the motor at extremes of the arc. After about three years of use mine will nolonger move beyond 43-45degrees East, as it automatically cuts off the motor, and no it is not due to hardware or software limits being on or obstruction to the dish. I may take it apart and see if I can fix it, but would not describe that as maintance. The thing should last at least 5years preferably decades. For non diy satellite enthusiasts having a dish motor mount replaced and dish setup again, is going to cost alot more than the <£35 a moteck sg2100a costs.
I picked it up for about £25 incl delivery and it works, so I suppose I should not complaint too much. Since I have a meter and setup the dish myself rather than paying someone to do it, I also only have myself to blame for buying the cheapest motorised mount. I could also have a poor example of the motor since despite the best efforts of quality control, you will always get the occasional lemon getting out the door. One unsatisfied customer usually makes alot more noise than a hundred happy ones, so my opinions my be marred by an atypical experience
I noticed you all seem to use the Triax TD110, how big is it and how heavy is it? It seems to be sold as 1.1mtr but according to the Triax flyer it is 100x105cm. My Televes dish is 102x113cm 13kg while I think the moteck would be better suited to a 80cm mesh dish.