Fransat - Help!

[nubee]

Hello, first post.

I was wondering if you could help me. My house has a functional satelite connection attached to a sky minidish which was put in by previous owners.

I checked this was working using a cheap satelite receiver, I also noticed it had a very strong signal for Eutelsat 5°W. Being keen to learn French and only 20 miles away in Dover I bought a Fransat box and a 4 year card - valid and inserted correctly.

The Automatic set-up did not add any Fransat channels despite this strong signal, however I noticed that it was only scanning Eutelsat 5WA and not 5WB, I read that the Fransat platform had recently shifted from A to B and B is not listed.

Can anyone help, I have a strong suspicion that the problem may be the dish set up as it was originally intended for sky. I am very new with all this so am hoping it is something I can rectify in the settings?

Many thanks

 

[Lazarus]

Yes. Your dish will be set for receiving Sky at 28E.


Getting 5W is a false lead - Some of the Transponders have parameters in common with 28E and that is where the signal is from.


If all you want is 5W, then it is a fairly simple matter to realign the dish.

 

[Analoguesat]

^^ Depending where you are - here on my system in the Scottish Borders Eutelsat 5WB is an absolutely terrible signal even on a decent sized dish . Ive given up on 5W. A great pity coz the predecessor 5WA had a huge signal here - easily received on a mini dish .

 

[LeBelge]

Being keen to learn French ...

Are you?
Ce n'est pas la peine.
Mais bon, a free VPN with french IP plus molotov.tv will do it.
Or install a 90 cm dish for 5°W.

 

[nubee]

Thanks for replying guys. I can see mainland France out of the kitchen window on most days, so I think any signal designed for reception in Calais would probably be fine here. I'll point the minidish Westward and see what happens.

I do pay for a French VPN and was using that, but it has stopped working effectively recently especially with TF1. Hopefully I can get it all working because I don't want to waste the money on the satelite kit.

 

[Analoguesat]

Best thing to do is hop on a ferry & pick up a TNTSat sat kit from any Calais hypermarket. Then point a smallish dish at 19E & away you go. It'll last 4 years before you need the card replacing.

 

[nubee]

Yeah I think I've picked the wrong service. Got the 4 year Fransat card and box

 

[Channel Hopper]

If you find Fransat is unavailable on the Sky dish once realigned, swopping out for a zone 2 should fix it.

 

[Lazarus]

^^ Depending where you are - here on my system in the Scottish Borders Eutelsat 5WB is an absolutely terrible signal even on a decent sized dish . Ive given up on 5W. A great pity coz the predecessor 5WA had a huge signal here - easily received on a mini dish .

You do surprise me - massive signal on a rusty old "Sky Analogue" dish in N.Yorks. Can't imagine any issues for @nubee down near Dover.


Edited to add: Just checked the footprint and now I'm less surprised - cuts off sharply right where I am. Not near Dover, though

 

[nubee]

I turned the dish this morning and nothing. I've lost the Astra stuff too. It seems to make a huge difference what settings I use with the dish set up menu in regard to "tone burst" etc. I have absolutely no idea what to set this stuff too, but it seems to make a huge difference to the signal received just messing about with it.

Anyway I'll have to leave it now as the wife is threatening divorce if I don't "put normal telly on"

 

[sonnetpete]

Not sure if this helps but you may want to think of trying to receive French digital terrestrial signals via an aerial The transmitter is located at Boulogne, which is about 50km away from Dover.

 

[nubee]

I did think about terrestrial, I used to live in Thanet and could pick up 1 of the 6 Freeview packages they have without doing anything. So it should be nailed on in Dover. I don't currently have an ariel on the house though.

 

[Channel Hopper]

Not sure if this helps but you may want to think of trying to receive French digital terrestrial signals via an aerial The transmitter is located at Boulogne, which is about 50km away from Dover.

All terrestrial TV in France is MPEG4 meaning older TVs won't receive them.

 

[ozumo]

Get a cheap satellite finder that has an audible tone that varies with signal strength (they had them in Lidl last week and may still be available). Then point the dish due south, set the up/down adjustment so the dish face is slightly leaning back and rotate the LNB so the cables are pointing down. Turn the knob on the sat finder to the lowest level where it is still making a noise and move the dish slowly west, when pointing at a satellite the tone will increase.

There's a good chance the LNB is from a Sky Q installation in which case the LNB will need to be changed for a mk4 Sky quad LNB. Post a photo of the LNB, although if it only has two outputs it is almost certainly a Sky Q LNB.

 

[rodscha]

Well,if you "see" the coast of France,you should ^pick up French tv with a "yagi" aerial & maybe an adaptor,or your TV will just swallow it. There is no more the "pal/secam" problem.
However the DTT system may differ betrween UK & France...enquire locally!
Call people at Darty Calais...theyshould know
try FM radio ,if France Inter:Culture /Musique come in well,TV should work equally.
I used to live near Boulogne,& picked up analogue UK tv ,(&fm radio)no problem.
So how well you pick up French public radio will tell you,as their tranqmitters are on the same poles as the TV ones
Private radios differ.
Point at Boulogne,best choice.

 

[Adam792]

I would definitely think you’d get a usable terrestrial signal from Boulogne (Mont Lambert) there with not too much problem, especially if you can see the coast of France! How well can you hear radio stations like Europe 2 on 91.5FM, France Musique on 89.4 and France Info on 106.5? They’re from the same transmitter site. Any TV that’s less than about 12 years old should be able to decode the French channels even if it doesn’t support Freeview HD (they use the legacy DVB-T format but with the newer MPEG4 video standard in 1080 HD).

Otherwise it will just be a case of moving the minidish round to look at the satellite at 5°W as mentioned. I would have thought the signal will be alright even on a smaller dish that far south and close to France. There’s a sharp cut-off on the beam nowadays but it starts a fair bit further north into England. It’s still very strong where I am in Gloucestershire for example.

 

[nubee]

 

[Channel Hopper]

Yes, a wideband Q LNB, you will get a few channels however if you are lucky, each port is fixed to one polarity only though.

 

[ozumo]

That's a Sky Q LNB and will need to be changed for a Sky mk4 quad LNB, or a universal LNB with a 40mm mk4 minidish LNB holder (the part with the spirit level). The existing LNB holder will work with a universal LNB if it has a 40mm diameter hole.

 

[nubee]

Thanks for this, it is now pointing due south (perhaps 5° west) and I've tilted up as mentioned above.

I will order a https://www.amazon.co.uk/GeoSync-Un...78534714&sprefix=universal+lnb,aps,104&sr=8-6

I'm just curious, from reading about LNBs, they mean you can watch and record in multiple rooms. I only need one room and only have one fransat box, how does this improve chances of reception? Sorry it a newbie question.

Also do I need any particular tools for fitting LNB? Many thanks again