Newbies new installation up but need help positioning motorized dish please

jackhulk · 20-11-2007

Hello

I have just completed my installation of 110cm motorized dish but I'm a little confused as to the correct angles I should set the motor/dish to.

Info.
My Latitude is 51.45
Set motor to elevation angle of 39 (as instructed by motor manual based on my lat)
Declination Angle 7.4 - Not sure what this relates to?
Dish Bracket Angle - Set to 27.6 (as instructed by motor manual based on my lat)

From the guides I’ve read and advice I’ve received the dish should be vertical but as you can see from the picture below, using the above angels leaves the dish slightly tilted backwards. Does this look correct?

http://img406.imageshack.us/img406/7773/dsc01344na8.jpg

I believe my closest sat to be Thor 1W but do I move the whole motor around on the pole or do I use the motor manual controls to just move the dish?

Thanks.

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

Hi,

Your motor setting is correct.

Yes, the dish should be roughly vertical, yours is roughly vertical.

The elevation of 1W in the Sky from London is approx 31 degrees.

How you dish looks depends on its offset angle.

For example if it was say 25 degrees, the the dish face would be titlted up by 6 degrees.

On that premise I would say that your dish could be about right, without knowing the offset angle I can't say exactly.

But what you have is a reasonable starting point, you can adjust it to the correct position by tuning for max signal.

To adjust the dish:

Set USALs on the receiver, and enter your long and lat.

Motorise the dish to 1W

Set the transponder in motorised setup in the receiver to 11325H

Adjust the azimuth of the dish by swivelling the whole lot round the pole. Adjust the elevation with the swivel bracket on the back of the dish. Do not adjust the motor setting at this stage.

Keep adjusting until find the MAXIMUM signal and quality on 11325H.

It all then should work with USALs.

You can go and use Diseqc1.2 on its own later if you want to,

Robbo

BTW it looks like your azimuth is about right also, judging by the sky dishes in the background

***Yorks*** · 20-11-2007

Hi jackhulk,

If your dish is pointing at 1w then the elevation looks about right. It should be slightly tilted back.
If you have the motor elevation set to your manual's instructions and your dish bracket set your manual's instructions - that's all you need. The declination angle is just another way of setting the motor angle - and you can ignore this. (Usually the motor has two scales - one either side, to set which ever).

If you are in London then you are as near as dammit to Zero Longitude as you can get. Set your motor manually to 1w and then move the whole assembly (dish and motor) from your due south position around the pole until you get your strongest signal for 1w, then tighten the motor onto the pole. Then slacken your dish bracket and peak the signal further if possible by moving dish in vertical plane. Tighten up. Your Lnb should be vertical (no scew) when setting up to this satellite from your location. That should be it!

Hope this helps you.

Yorks

Edit: Haha Robbo71 - beat me to it!

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

Excellent place to put a dish also. Nice and easy to get at!

I hope that pole is 100% vertical.

And as Yorks says, depending your exact location in London, your longitude is pretty close to 0 degrees, so when you send the dish to 1W, the scale on the motor should read about 1W also.

jackhulk · 20-11-2007

Thanks for the fast reply guys!

I've just come down from the roof (before viewing your posts) where I moved the whole lot around the pole (from my starting south position) and adjusted to find max strength on the sat finder. However, I did not manually move the motor to 1w so I am now facing 1w but the motor is still set to 0 - is this correct or should I re-set everything and start again?

Also I've yet to use my receiver (just been using my sat finder) so not used USALs yet. BTW - what is this and what's the difference between this and diseqc 1.2 please?

Originally Posted by Robbo71

I hope that pole is 100% vertical.

I'm starting to think it's ever so slightly off. I think I need to move the T bracket to the left a bit, however the left bolt is as far right as possible, doh! New holes needed then.

I know now (as it stands if it is off) this will cause probs trying to follow the arc but I'm pretty chuffed with my install so far. Completed by me, myself and I, which included attaching the dish, motor etc as a whole unit to the pole!

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

Originally Posted by jackhulk

Thanks for the fast reply guys!

I've just come down from the roof (before viewing your posts) where I moved the whole lot around the pole (from my starting south position) and adjusted to find max strength on the sat finder. However, I did not manually move the motor to 1w so I am now facing 1w but the motor is still set to 0 - is this correct or should I re-set everything and start again?

Also I've yet to use my receiver (just been using my sat finder) so not used USALs yet. BTW - what is this and what's the difference between this and diseqc 1.2 please?

I'm starting to think it's ever so slightly off. I think I need to move the T bracket to the left a bit, however the left bolt is as far right as possible, doh! New holes needed then.

I know now (as it stands if it is off) this will cause probs trying to follow the arc but I'm pretty chuffed with my install so far. Completed by me, myself and I, which included attaching the dish, motor etc as a whole unit to the pole!

By not motorising the motor to 1W before you started means that your arc will off to one side by about 1 degree.

You haven't got to start again though, just motorise to 1W, then go and and tweak the azimuth again, it won't be far off at all.

Yes, get that pole vertical, most important!!
You may be able to slip a shim between the U-bolt and the pole, to save re-drilling.

USALS is a software addition to Diseqc1.2 to make life easier for us to find the satellites.

Problem with astra signal

Have a search round the forum, and have a look on the 'STAB' website, they invented it. There is also Diseqc1.3, which is supposed to do the same as USALS, but this is not officially recognised by Eutelsat ( the inventors of Diseqc).

Yes, well done, I think it's going to be a nice install.

Robbo

jackhulk · 20-11-2007

Ok I'll go and make the adjustments now. Just fired up my receive and USALS is asking for my latitude.

Multi map states my longitude is 0:12:01W (-0.20037), however USALS doesn't allow me to enter the a minus number? What should I do?

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

Originally Posted by jackhulk

Ok I'll go and make the adjustments now. Just fired up my receive and USALS is asking for my latitude.

Multi map states my longitude is 0:12:01W (-0.20037), however USALS doesn't allow me to enter the a minus number? What should I do?

Can't remember the button presses off the top o'me head, but make a 'W' appear instead of an 'E'.

i.e 0.2 W.

Oh you are so close to 1W, the dish will hardly move.

Also using just the sat finder meter, you won't be able to confirm that you have actually found 1W. You need the receiver for this. If you do a TP scan of 11325H you should get BBC world.

jackhulk · 20-11-2007

Ok entered my lon and lat and my 9100 has found 1.0W Thor 2 and presented the following info....

SNR = 62%
AGC (what is this?) = 78%

I think I read somewhere that I need to aim for 85% signal. What should I adjust now please?

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

OK, so:-
you have motorised to 1W?

selected 11325H?

and got those readings?

Not sure what AGC is my rec doesn't have that.

It is probably the SNR ( signal to noise ratio) that you want to maximize.

Are you getting BBC1 world?

If so, using your sat finder, go outside, flex the dish up and down and left and right and see if you can get a better signal on the meter. Adjust dish to get max signal.

The readings between boxes can be different, just aim for the maximum.

***Yorks*** · 20-11-2007

Originally Posted by jackhulk

Ok entered my lon and lat and my 9100 has found 1.0W Thor 2 and presented the following info....

SNR = 62%
AGC (what is this?) = 78%

I think I read somewhere that I need to aim for 85% signal. What should I adjust now please?

Well done jackhulk,

With Robbo's coaching, you are very nearly there. A bit more tweaking should do it. But as Robbo says - if your pole is not vertical then you need to sort it, and then all the other satellites will fall into place.

Yorks

**Robbo** · 20-11-2007

Just looking at the picture again.

Once you get it working, don't forget to set your motor limits.

Not sure what length T&Ks you've used there, but if you go too far west, your dish is going to clonk the wall, and probably 'bend' something if limits not set.

jackhulk · 23-11-2007

Hello guys.

After much tweaking I've now got a 84% signal!

I then scanned for all FTA channels. Looking at the below results, would my results suggest I am following the arc correctly?

http://img91.imageshack.us/img91/376...resultsvg9.jpg

One thing I don't understand is why I'm able to get a signal from 58.0W PAS 9 (& other PAS sat's) but no signal from other sat's around that area? Was really quite keen on getting 55.5 W Intelsat 805.

**HB13DISH** · 23-11-2007

Hi jackhulk,

Great setup indeed. Congratulations.

I am not sure if you got only the FTA channels since there should be on Astra 19.2E 283 FTA Digital channels (according to Lyngsat) and your table shows 413 so it could be a mixture of FTA and some Encrypted.
Why didn't you scan for all channels? After all you should aim to open all the interesting channels which are usually encrypted.

**michael01707** · 23-11-2007

55.5w is C band which you won't be able to get. You can only receive Ku band. You need to check footprints as well to give you a rough idea what you will be able to pick up. Lyngsat and Lyngsat Maps are what I find to be the best.

jackhulk · 23-11-2007

Thanks HB13dish! I am quite chuffed considering this was my first attempt at setting up a motorized system but couldn't of done it without all the help received from guys at this and other forums (this is starting to sound like an award acceptance speech!) lol.

I'm sure I only selected to scan for FTA channels on 19.2E (will have a check). I will be doing a full scan just as soon as I've updated my 9100 etc but just wanted to check signal strength for the channels I could get and to make sure my dish was tracking the arc correctly.

Michael01707 - Thank you, I forget to check the band! doh! I'll certainly remember this in future.

**michael01707** · 23-11-2007

I know how you feel, setting up your own motorised system is something to be chuffed about, especially considering how much some so called professionals will charge to do it.

**Robbo** · 23-11-2007

Originally Posted by jackhulk

Thanks HB13dish! I am quite chuffed considering this was my first attempt at setting up a motorized system but couldn't of done it without all the help received from guys at this and other forums (this is starting to sound like an award acceptance speech!) lol.

I'm sure I only selected to scan for FTA channels on 19.2E (will have a check). I will be doing a full scan just as soon as I've updated my 9100 etc but just wanted to check signal strength for the channels I could get and to make sure my dish was tracking the arc correctly.

Michael01707 - Thank you, I forget to check the band! doh! I'll certainly remember this in future.

Without going through the list in fine detail, I would say it looks fine.
So Well done also.

You have stuff from 42E and the the western side.

So excellent job.

When you go to some of the weaker sats at the extremes of the arc, you would be able to tell properly then.

Robbo

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