aceb
Specialist Contributor
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2007
- Messages
- 1,537
- Reaction score
- 841
- Points
- 113
- My Satellite Setup
-
Prof Tuner 7301 /
1.25m Gibertini + Inverto B.Ultra/C1W, Moteck H180, 68.5E-67W Ku/C-Band /
1.8m Precision PF + ESX241/Inverto Black Pro, 66E-63W Ku/C-band /
2.4m Fortec Star+Titanium C1W/Pride plate, 49E-58W
- My Location
- Sussex
I've finally had time between work, weather and other hobby things to set up this Moteck motor so here's a review on it so far along with some photos and an opinion or two. I bought it from one of the board sponsors RAD for £160 which isn't cheap but probably less than the Gibertini polar mount and the 36" HD actuator that I'd need to get 70E-63W.
You'll see from the photos that the main shaft is basically a length of steel tube with a large cog attached inside the housing that is a driven a by a threaded rod on a motor. Each end of the tube is keyed so the brackets that attach to the dish slide over it and are bolted up. It's all very snug and there's no play even with the bolts out. So this leads me on to the first dissapointment which is obvious from the photo, the top and bottom bracket don't line up! Now the only way this could have happened is due to poor engineering of the main shaft making each end a few degrees out so not the best start out of the box.
The unit comes complete with an adapter plate predrilled for a CM, fortunately this is larger than the mounting section of the 1.25m Gibertini I'm using so I was able to drill the plate accordingly to take the four fixing bolts of the Gibby. As it's quite thick steel I treated myself to some new drill bits to make the job a bit easier so it was immediately obvious that the steel used wasn't the best quality, it had a very coarse feel to it and each of the four holes snatched really badly as the drill went through it.
The adapter comes with a couple of adjustable sliders to offset the plate from the two primary brackets attached to the shaft, I'm not sure how this is meant to go together for the CM but I found it necessary to remove the two primary brackets and swap them top for bottom because only one has an adjustable fixing hole. By putting the two adjustable sliders onto the fixed bracket I was able to square the plate on the motor, had I not had this option there is absolutely no way that the plate would have gone on because the fixing holes were 10mm out on one side and not the same height. This is either very poor engineering or quality control, either way I wasn't impressed! There's a supplied inclination adjuster for use with a PF but as the Gibby still has the bracketery on it for that I removed the dish side bracket completely.
I should take this opportunity to add that RAD were quick to respond to my concerns and stated that I'd be able to replace the faulty part even once I had drilled the plate if I was unable to get it working correctly. Ideally I'd have liked to box it up and sent it back for a new one but as I couldn't be sure the replacement wouldn't be the same I didn't feel there was any point persuing that line. From the emails I had from RAD I got the impression this stuff was coming direct from their supplier because all the advise Ian was sending me was from 'my supplier' but it would have been nice if someone could have opened another box to check another motor.
Two more gripes while I'm at it, the manual which is actually in Russian for the first half but English from the centre makes no mention at all of the CM adapter or offset dishes in general and although one image shows an offset dish all the photos are of it attached to a Jonsa (Fortec Star) with optional adapter. On each side of the dish is a small elevation indicator to set up the main angle so it's not too encouraging to see that there is a 5° difference on each side.
The motor ships with it centrally positioned as far as I could see but with the brackets being over 5° out from each other it's not too easy to tell but assuming it was I attached the re-drilled adapter plate so that it looked square to the motor (having covered up the dodgy brackets with a cloth). In the end I used an inclinometer to set the dish angle and spent an afternoon fine tuning the arc and so far I'm happy that I've got it tracking accurately from 53E-45W (the limits of my arc at patio level).
In operation it takes just over 40 seconds to move from 45E-45W which isn't too bad, it does make a few motor type noises at certain points of the arc on the up drive but coming down each side it's relatively quiet. The motor is spec'd to a 1.8m and 27Kg so I'm rather hoping that a 1.25 17kg dish isn't going to stress it too much. When fine tuning east-west there is one pulse that will take up the slack when the direction is changed so it requires two pulses in the opposite direction to move it one step backwards.
All I need to do now is get it on the main pole, I do like the fact the bracket has a right angled top to it so it will sit on the top of the pole and not slide down when I'm lining it up. I also like the fact I can adjust the dish position and not wait for the card to recover and redisplay the signal strength, plus of course I can now make fine adjustments in CS.
So my thoughts on it so far before I've really used it in anger. It's OK I guess, probably slightly cheaper and much lower profile than a polar mount alternative but the poor construction standard is a real disappointment, time will tell if it's been worth the money. I certainly won't recommend this motor to anyone inexperienced in setting up satellite dishes, it's needed some creativity with a drill, some lateral thinking and probably some luck to get it installed and tracking correctly.
I may as well add a few more photos while I'm in the garden with the camera, I know it's not quite the Pyramids of Giza but there's a spot in the garden where I can get all three dishes in the same shot lol
You'll notice the troublesome tree, well it seems to love Roundup, it's been lapping it up for the last few weeks. 'O'
Finally, my other love in the garden, our best Echium Pininana, all 3.6m of it!
You'll see from the photos that the main shaft is basically a length of steel tube with a large cog attached inside the housing that is a driven a by a threaded rod on a motor. Each end of the tube is keyed so the brackets that attach to the dish slide over it and are bolted up. It's all very snug and there's no play even with the bolts out. So this leads me on to the first dissapointment which is obvious from the photo, the top and bottom bracket don't line up! Now the only way this could have happened is due to poor engineering of the main shaft making each end a few degrees out so not the best start out of the box.
The unit comes complete with an adapter plate predrilled for a CM, fortunately this is larger than the mounting section of the 1.25m Gibertini I'm using so I was able to drill the plate accordingly to take the four fixing bolts of the Gibby. As it's quite thick steel I treated myself to some new drill bits to make the job a bit easier so it was immediately obvious that the steel used wasn't the best quality, it had a very coarse feel to it and each of the four holes snatched really badly as the drill went through it.
The adapter comes with a couple of adjustable sliders to offset the plate from the two primary brackets attached to the shaft, I'm not sure how this is meant to go together for the CM but I found it necessary to remove the two primary brackets and swap them top for bottom because only one has an adjustable fixing hole. By putting the two adjustable sliders onto the fixed bracket I was able to square the plate on the motor, had I not had this option there is absolutely no way that the plate would have gone on because the fixing holes were 10mm out on one side and not the same height. This is either very poor engineering or quality control, either way I wasn't impressed! There's a supplied inclination adjuster for use with a PF but as the Gibby still has the bracketery on it for that I removed the dish side bracket completely.
I should take this opportunity to add that RAD were quick to respond to my concerns and stated that I'd be able to replace the faulty part even once I had drilled the plate if I was unable to get it working correctly. Ideally I'd have liked to box it up and sent it back for a new one but as I couldn't be sure the replacement wouldn't be the same I didn't feel there was any point persuing that line. From the emails I had from RAD I got the impression this stuff was coming direct from their supplier because all the advise Ian was sending me was from 'my supplier' but it would have been nice if someone could have opened another box to check another motor.
Two more gripes while I'm at it, the manual which is actually in Russian for the first half but English from the centre makes no mention at all of the CM adapter or offset dishes in general and although one image shows an offset dish all the photos are of it attached to a Jonsa (Fortec Star) with optional adapter. On each side of the dish is a small elevation indicator to set up the main angle so it's not too encouraging to see that there is a 5° difference on each side.
The motor ships with it centrally positioned as far as I could see but with the brackets being over 5° out from each other it's not too easy to tell but assuming it was I attached the re-drilled adapter plate so that it looked square to the motor (having covered up the dodgy brackets with a cloth). In the end I used an inclinometer to set the dish angle and spent an afternoon fine tuning the arc and so far I'm happy that I've got it tracking accurately from 53E-45W (the limits of my arc at patio level).
In operation it takes just over 40 seconds to move from 45E-45W which isn't too bad, it does make a few motor type noises at certain points of the arc on the up drive but coming down each side it's relatively quiet. The motor is spec'd to a 1.8m and 27Kg so I'm rather hoping that a 1.25 17kg dish isn't going to stress it too much. When fine tuning east-west there is one pulse that will take up the slack when the direction is changed so it requires two pulses in the opposite direction to move it one step backwards.
All I need to do now is get it on the main pole, I do like the fact the bracket has a right angled top to it so it will sit on the top of the pole and not slide down when I'm lining it up. I also like the fact I can adjust the dish position and not wait for the card to recover and redisplay the signal strength, plus of course I can now make fine adjustments in CS.
So my thoughts on it so far before I've really used it in anger. It's OK I guess, probably slightly cheaper and much lower profile than a polar mount alternative but the poor construction standard is a real disappointment, time will tell if it's been worth the money. I certainly won't recommend this motor to anyone inexperienced in setting up satellite dishes, it's needed some creativity with a drill, some lateral thinking and probably some luck to get it installed and tracking correctly.
I may as well add a few more photos while I'm in the garden with the camera, I know it's not quite the Pyramids of Giza but there's a spot in the garden where I can get all three dishes in the same shot lol
You'll notice the troublesome tree, well it seems to love Roundup, it's been lapping it up for the last few weeks. 'O'
Finally, my other love in the garden, our best Echium Pininana, all 3.6m of it!
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