Help for non techies re: lost 5,5usa,5*, 4HD Foretecstar Passion HD in France

[Analoguesat]

2E is still on the ground

Launch is expected later summer. (Assuming the Russkies dont drop any more satellites into the wrong orbit in the meantime!)

 

[PaulR]

Who installed the 80cm dish? It should have made some positive difference conpared to a 60cm dish so I suspect that it isn't optimised properly. My first suspicion would be the skew (rotation of the LNB inside its holder) as it's something easy to get wrong if you don't know about it.

 

[John Womble Coates]

I changed it and do deal with satellites in the area so know the skew is right and the angle etc. I have been to look at somebodies today with my equipment and found that moving it to 2d from 2b in this area improves the quality and you can get all channels.

 

[nebeluk]

re the post of womble76. As a non techie could I please ask what it entails " moving it to 2d from 2b" and why that would improve quality? I thought that Freesat had moved from 2d to 1n quite a while ago. Mmm, confused to say the least

 

[Analoguesat]

2D to 2B is not going to do anything - 2D was switched off last year & 2B is currently on her way to 19E!

 

[Lazarus]

An 80cm dish cannot distinguish any azimuth difference (microscopic as it is) between any of the Astra birds at 28.2E. It would be hard pushed even to acknowledge the 0.3 degree difference between Astra and Eurobird at 28.5E.

 

[John Womble Coates]

Hi I have a sat finder that finds individual satellites and i can see the picture or listen to the radio while on the roof and when i put it on to the satellite it shows quality and intensity. I meant it the other way round in the earlier post 2b to 2d. I have read everywhere that 2d is no longer actve but the quality is better on my finder than 2b and i can get all channels with no interference or switching off (5 etc) using sky boxes and freesat. i am fairly new to this and bought good quality gear and have re-aligned 6 dishes so far with no issues or loss of picture. 11700 Azille south of france and within 30km. I am confused to when reading the different blogs and posts.

 

[daro2096]

Here is the footprints for Astra 1N.

http://www.ses.com/4628614/astra-1n

According to this if you are in the north of France you should pick it up with a 50cm dish. Actual results may however differ.

You are out of the footprint. You may need a 1.5m dish and even then it may not work.

 

[John Womble Coates]

Hi Guys

After reading and posting previously i have been hard at work going back to england doing the cai installation course, studying the satellites and upgrading my equipment). Below are the findings after speaking to astra and looking at the footprints.

2F is up there at the moment it has the 5 group, some itv channels, some bbc and 4 london and 4seven. These are all on the UK BEAM there are no channels on the pan-european beam. The list can be found on lyngsat website.

2E after getting confirmation from astra the UK beam power is going to be the same as 2F when all the other channels are transferred from 1N. The launch date is the 19th July and it will take approx 8 weeks to set up so we are looking at end of September beginning October.
What will happen:

1. If you have lost channel 5 now you will lose ALL channels when 2E goes active. Solution upgrade size of dish.

2. If you have a steady channel 5 with no loss you more than likely won't need to do anything

3. If you are competent you can trial dish sizes to get channel5 and 4seven (these are the 2 hardest to get) and when the change over comes you should be ok.

Being on the fringe in the south of france i am trialling different sizes and 88cm seems to be favourite at the moment. I have fitted 80cm and some people have no issues, yet others are losing 5 and 4 seven at night. The few 88cm i have fitted have had no issues as of yet.

When setting up the dish we all talk about lnb skew, elevation and azimouth (compass direction 144 degrees), however there is one more thing which i haven't seen noted yet which is making sure the dish is level. Put a spirit level on the arm to ensure it is level.

This is all of course based on the fact they won't changed the beam power!!!

Hope this helps
John

 

[Captain Jack]

Interesting. Did we come here to the conclusion that 2F Euro beams were, in fact, lit up? Or was that never confirmed?

 

[John Womble Coates]

Interesting. Did we come here to the conclusion that 2F Euro beams were, in fact, lit up? Or was that never confirmed?

They never said anything about the european beams except no english channels will be on it. Sky apparently weren't going on to new uk beams but not sure now as on the lyngsat website some of the channels are the sky channels are on 2f uk beam

 

[timo_w2s]

My guess is the majority of the new 2F and 2E Euro beams will be replacing the old 2A and 2B frequencies (plus some Eutelsat frequencies if SES get their way). The UK spots would then stay in the lower bands below 11.200GHz.

 

[John Womble Coates]

Bit of an update on testing sizes. We have gites so i have an 80cm on those and an 88cm on our house. With the 80cm i can still get channel 5 and the rest without any issues at night, however 4seven still disappears. With the 88cm i can get all channels all day with no problems. Will keep you posted on how other people in the area are getting on. I am just the other side of the black mountains in france

 

[nebeluk]

Bit of an update on testing sizes. We have gites so i have an 80cm on those and an 88cm on our house. With the 80cm i can still get channel 5 and the rest without any issues at night, however 4seven still disappears. With the 88cm i can get all channels all day with no problems. Will keep you posted on how other people in the area are getting on. I am just the other side of the black mountains in france

Hi John, it sounds as though you are in the southwest of France, whereas I am in the southeast, or at least i will be in another week!. Can you tell me what has happened with Freesat up to the present? Still receiving channels, or have they vanished as advised with Astra 2E coming online (or has that still not happened yet?)
Thanks in advance

 

[John Womble Coates]

Hi John, it sounds as though you are in the southwest of France, whereas I am in the southeast, or at least i will be in another week!. Can you tell me what has happened with Freesat up to the present? Still receiving channels, or have they vanished as advised with Astra 2E coming online (or has that still not happened yet?)
Thanks in advance

Hi Nebel

I am in Central south France (inbetween Carcassonne and Narbonne although this is classed as s/e). We are still in a state of emergency at the moment. As it stands 2E is still to go up due to issues at the launch station. A few sites are rumouring 15th September although it's not officially on the astra website yet so i would ignore it for now if you hear it. I can't see it being before xmas to be honest as they have a heavy schedule already. It is a reprieve for now for those needing to upgrade. I have had no issues until last weekend when everybody had a massive drop all of a sudden on the db needed for 2F and all channels where lost on 2F all other channels where fine. I have contacted a somebody who can maybe find out why it is dong this randomly. I will let you know when i know more. I will be upgrading to a 1m dish and will advise if better on the drop outs.

Cheers

 

[Lazarus]

Oh, how I wish you'd not said "2E is still due to go up" >> That turn of phrase brings back memories of why it was delayed in the first place!

 

[nebeluk]

Hi Nebel

I am in Central south France (inbetween Carcassonne and Narbonne although this is classed as s/e). We are still in a state of emergency at the moment. As it stands 2E is still to go up due to issues at the launch station. A few sites are rumouring 15th September although it's not officially on the astra website yet so i would ignore it for now if you hear it. I can't see it being before xmas to be honest as they have a heavy schedule already. It is a reprieve for now for those needing to upgrade. I have had no issues until last weekend when everybody had a massive drop all of a sudden on the db needed for 2F and all channels where lost on 2F all other channels where fine. I have contacted a somebody who can maybe find out why it is dong this randomly. I will let you know when i know more. I will be upgrading to a 1m dish and will advise if better on the drop outs.

Cheers

Thanks John. I have been away for 6 weeks and was wondering what had been happening. It's another one of those wait and see moments:-)

 

[PaulR]

Up in the Vaucluse I can report the following.

My friends the other side of the village lose the C5 channels when it rains. They don't often watch any of the C5 channels so they only tested this the other week at my behest. They haven't reported losing anything in the evenings under normal circumstances but this doesn't mean that they don't. This is using a quattro LNB on an 80cm dish that I installed some years ago.

I use an 85cm dish (TD88) but I run a quad into a multiswitch so I have a compromise with the higher noise floor this setup gives. When it rains hard then I lose all channels. Daytime fine weather I get everything but the 2F channels have no signal latitude to speak of. In the evenings the 5*/5US family and 4Seven disappear whilst C5 and C4HD pixellate very badly.

So it looks as Ill have to go up in size yet again. It's only a matter of months since the TD88 replaced an 80cm Raven-style Gemini dish which had served me well for many years since 2D came along and I had to upgrade from a Region 2 $ly dish. The question is, what should I jump to? I don't think that a 90cm dish will give me enough signal headroom so it looks as though a 1m may be necessary for my purposes. Further south and east of me you can draw your own conclusions but I think that 1.2m may be necessary down in the Var depending on what satup you have.

 

[sonnetpete]

The 1 metre Gibertini XP Premium I use in my multi sat set up (and prior to that on my motor) is a really excellent, well engineered dish. I'd certainly recommend it...

 

[PaulR]

Thanks Pete. I have a 1m in mind that I already have in the UK.