Hi Guys, Many thanks for the help and advice.
My 3.1M prime aluminium dish is now fitted on my little roof. A welded mast was bolted to my roof then a foot of cement poured over it and cased in with wood while it set. The mast is not a snug fit to the dish cowling (mast 90mil dish cowling 100mil) so they pack it out with steel. Seems a bit heath robinson to me!
The technician came out during the evening to align the dish (as evening gives the weakest signal) and could not get anything more than my old 90cm dish got (south beam and a bit of Eurobird). After 3 hours of head scratching and dish bending they decided the petals had not been screwed on right. It was now after 10:30pm!
Next day at 5pm they returned and undid all the petals then reseated them correctly. By 6pm they had a signal for C4 and BBC etc. They then set about running my cables which took another hour before connecting the dish to my plus box.
However on turning the TV on, the signal was no longer present. This prompted more technicians to arrive and stroke their beards, sit on the dish to make it work but to no avail. All they got on their digital signal meter screen was 2 red bars (on and off) and nearly 80 DB's (or whatever there called) on their signal strength meter screen. After repeatedly saying "I cant understand it, 80DB is more than enough, why is the digital signal not present?" for an hour they announced that the dish needed to be elevated up its mast 3 inches and that would pull the signal in. It was now nearly 11PM
So tonight they are coming back and welding more mast on to the existing mast thus raising the dish 3 inches. However I don't have high hopes :-(
During the day the BBC etc work, but by 6pm I get no digital signal. Raising the dish will be yet another night of a gaggle of men plus welding gear on my roof.
To say this has traumatised me is an understatement. Mrs Makum on the other hand is on the brink of a nervous breakdown!
I'm not happy at all, I sincerely believe this has been a mistake and wish I'd never started :-(