Channel Master/Laminas 1.8m project

John said:
Feel for you CJ, we have had coming up to 20 years of loosing really very close surrounding beautiful farm land and countryside taken up with building thrown up housing estates with very dubious occupants - it's very demoralising and is not good for peoples mental health.
On top of that, we got the 5G towers crap.
I'd love to give a full blown opinion on how to rectify the problems but i'd only get arrested
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No no. We operate a free speech policy here.
 
John said:
Feel for you CJ, we have had coming up to 20 years of loosing really very close surrounding beautiful farm land and countryside taken up with building thrown up housing estates with very dubious occupants - it's very demoralising and is not good for peoples mental health.
On top of that, we got the 5G towers crap.
I'd love to give a full blown opinion on how to rectify the problems but i'd only get arrested
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Test Boom GIF
 
I lost access to most of my west coverage, when tall buildings on the main street started to grow. Very sad.
 
Captain Jack said:
The final nail is being driven into the coffin for my Channel Master dish. The lovely field behind us is being turned into yet another soulless housing estate. While it doesn't really do much to the dish, the wife is insisting we plant some evergreens/trees at the end of our garden so we don't see the monstrosity that is the new estate - especially the building works that will follow over the next 5(!) years. The trees mean that they will all block the dish...

That, as well as the bloody neighbour's tree which is blocking much of the eastern arc, means that there's little point in keeping the dish - at least where it is.

I will likely be putting up my Fibo 90 on the side of the house, which has a good view of the eastern arc to about 30W and eventually retiring the Channel Master. Sad days ahead.
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Replace a tile for one of those rubber grommet things and stick it above the roofline.
 
With the SMO36 motor rebuild well underway, I'll be trying the Laminas 1800 dish on it. Reasons being, it's much lighter and easier to handle and I seem to remember getting marginally better performance from it than from the Channel Master.

And it's something while it's warm!
 
Spent the day yesterday dismantling the CM1.8 dish and installing the Laminas onto the SMO36 motor. I really forgot how freaking heaving the CM dish is and the Precision polar mount. Definitely not a 1-man job and took half a day....

20250825_123227.webp

This was then followed by a jet wash of both dishes and a string test of the Laminas. There is a gap but it's less than 1mm, which I think is acceptable?

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This was followed by a relatively painless install of the motor and the dish itself. It's not aligned on the arc at all but is pointing at 1W (for my badminton world champs this week). The signal is very comparable to CM - maybe even slightly better.

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The declination jack seems to be half dead. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Definitely not seized - possibly a loose connection.

I am not overly happy with the look of the dish bracket - it's too wide and I'll probably chop it in half.

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The dish otherwise is relatively stable. I don't think it's as stable as the CM on its mount but that depends where on the arc the dish is parked. With the jack fully extended, it's wobbled around like a flag...

Next steps are to align the thing and mount a C band LNB on it. I have @Trust's excellent LNB "skewer" and a skew mod board from @dreambox1959 for the JPC posi to control it with.
 
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Captain Jack said:
Spent the day yesterday dismantling the CM1.8 dish and installing the Laminas onto the SMO36 motor. I really forgot how freaking heaving the CM dish is and the Precision polar mount. Definitely not a 1-man job and took half a day....

View attachment 164578

This was then followed by a jet wash of both dishes and a string test of the Laminas. There is a gap but it's less than 1mm, which I think is acceptable?

View attachment 164581 View attachment 164582

This was followed by a relatively painless install of the motor and the dish itself. It's not aligned on the arc at all but is pointing at 1W (for my badminton world champs this week). The signal is very comparable to CM - maybe even slightly better.

View attachment 164583 View attachment 164585 View attachment 164586 View attachment 164587

The declination jack seems to be half dead. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Definitely not seized - possibly a loose connection.

I am not overly happy with the look immediate dish bracket - it's too wide and I'll probably chop it in half.

View attachment 164588

The dish otherwise is relatively stable. I don't think it's as stable as the CM on its mount but that depends where on the arc the dish is parked. With the jack fully extended, it's wobbled around like a flag...

Next steps are to align the thing and mount a C band LNB on it. I have @Trust's excellent LNB "skewer" and a skew mod board from @dreambox1959 for the JPC posi to control it with.
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Good job CJ
Now u gotta flog the CM and mount ?
 
Welp, I know why the declination jack isn't moving. The motor is knackered. I opened it up and the windings are all good and there's continuity through each one of them. However, the magnet has separated from the casing and was rattling around.

With a bit of cleaning of the rust and debris out and gluing the magnet back where it's supposed to be should get the motor going.

20250826_172414.webp
 
Captain Jack said:
Welp, I know why the declination jack isn't moving. The motor is knackered. I opened it up and the windings are all good and there's continuity through each one of them. However, the magnet has separated from the casing and was rattling around.

With a bit of cleaning of the rust and debris out and gluing the magnet back where it's supposed to be should get the motor going.

View attachment 164596
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If that is one of mine, you get a lifetime warranty (installed correctly of course)
 
Channel Hopper said:
If that is one of mine, you get a lifetime warranty (installed correctly of course)
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Appreciated but I've no idea where the thing came from. Found it buried inside a storage chest. It was probably dropped one day and the magnet came away
 
The glued up magnet worked! Used some metal epoxy for glue. Cleaned up the brush things, put it all back together and it worked. Quiet too. So now I also have up/down movement on the dish.
 
So today has been a "wibble wobble" test for the Laminas and the SMO36. It's been windy all night and the dish and motor remained in place with no alignment lost.

However, the dish does wobble a fair being and during gusts of winds to the point where fringe signals start pixelating. This did not happen with the Channel Master and the polar mount (at least when the jack arm was not fully extended).

I know I could somehow lock it in place during the storms but I am lazy and don't to accidentally move with the dish while it's locked. I was thinking of somehow stabilising the dish while keeping it motorised - perhaps using some struts/hydraulic arms?

Any other ideas?
 
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