Declared "dish dimensions " v "effective dish size"!

[jeallen01]

As I mentioned elsewhere, I'm starting this thread to try to gather together the opinions on the above!

My contribution is my Triax 110" is, at best, a dish which is 100cm top to bottom - I am sure others can do "better"!

 

[Lazarus]

The TD110 is 102cm high.

But surely the meaningful dimension is the width?

 

[jeallen01]

The TD110 is 102cm high.

But surely the meaningful dimension is the width?

Possibly so, but the width is not the "headline figure" in most cases - and so please include that in replies.

 

[Lazarus]

But the headline figure is where the confusion arises ..... I seem to recall our friends in Spain (@Huevos et al) get rather exercised about this. Rightly so.

 

[4wd]

Some get it right, my CM 180 is 180 w x 200 h (afaicr), so 180 is the correct (and effective) size.
And no surprise for my Prime F 90, was bought as 90 cm, and is really 90 :O)

My Famaval(s) "advertised as 140" got approx 122-123 cm 'reception width' (after strengthening 'rim' substracted), am calling them 125 with a little goodwill.

About Gibertini, correct that their 150 is really 150 ?

That triax TD110, that's a 100 cm, no?, official dimensions 100 w x 105 h > Triax - TD110 std RAL 7035,emballage individuel

 

[hvdh]

Some confusion with TD110 versions, I just measured a reflective area of 100 width x 110 height.
I am sure the packing was labeled TD110, about 10 years ago.
There is also a "TD115" advertised with dimensions 114 x 103, I assume that is including the non-reflecting rim.

 

[archive10]

Some get it right, my CM 180 is 180 w x 200 h (afaicr), so 180 is the correct (and effective) size.
And no surprise for my Prime F 90, was bought as 90 cm, and is really 90 :O)

My Famaval(s) "advertised as 140" got approx 122-123 cm 'reception width' (after strengthening 'rim' substracted), am calling them 125 with a little goodwill.

About Gibertini, correct that their 150 is really 150 ?

That triax TD110, that's a 100 cm, no?, official dimensions 100 w x 105 h > Triax - TD110 std RAL 7035,emballage individuel

See Advice Needed - missing frequencies 30W for comment on TD110, which is indeed grossly mislabelled.
But I guess everyone does it for with dishes - I recently obtained a Telesystem 80 cm dish, which has a reflective area of about 75 cm (80cm dish would be 13% bigger).

In contrast, the CM180 is about 183cm wide, and has a reflecting area of roughly 180cm.
Similarly, the CM120 is 123 cm wide.
But even better, the Prodelin 1241 has a effective reflecting area width of 96 inches, which is 243.8 cm (!)

 

[pontiend]

As near as dammit.
My ally Orbital Dish measures.
106 x 97 cm.
My TD88 measures.
95 x 86 cm

 

[william-1]

Raven 80cm mesh
79.5cm Wide
89.5cm High

Gibertini 100cm solid
94.5cm Wide
102 cm High

 

[RimaNTSS]

@jeallen01 thanks for starting this discussion.
Effective area (working area) of the dish is one of the main parameters of it. And, of course, in offset antenna case, only horizontal dimension really matters and it describes in the best way surface of the aperture. The bigger horizontal size better reception. Some (I call them unhonest) sellers (even companies) trying to better sell their products announce bigger sizes for their antennas. Will not mention the names of manufactures but there a lots of them. Almost for sure, if you see an add on the second hand market that 1.4m antenna for sale, it is almost certain that antenna is not bigger than 1.2m.
As a good example, it is already mentioned before, I would repeat Channel Master. If they say 1.8m antenna it is really 1.8m horizontally. If they say 1.2m antenna, be sure it has working area 1200x1300mm. Nothing more nothing less.

 

[RimaNTSS]

I have personally measured (as best as I could) WODs of more than 20 types of the dishes. There is screenshot of spreadsheet.

 

[archive10]

...Almost for sure, if you see an add on the second hand market that 1.4m antenna for sale, it is almost certain that antenna is not bigger than 1.2m.

I went to pick up a 1.5m Prodelin dish some years ago.
Of course, it turned out to be a 1.2m Echostar/Prodelin.

...then the very old "well my husband says this is 10 inches" joke sprung to mind!
But I resisted, the poor man had no sense of measure

 

[RimaNTSS]

Once I went ~150km to pick up 2m aluminum PFA. When I brought it home I realized it is 1.8m and not aluminum . Now I have this dish aerographed hanged on the seeling in the garage.

 

[jeallen01]

My contribution is my Triax 110" is, at best, a dish which is 100cm top to bottom - I am sure others can do "better"!

Maybe I should not have started this thread! Having learnt a few "telling lessons" from the other posts above, I have now re-measured that dish and, being realistic, it looks it's not a TD110 but a TD88 (88w x 95h) (I picked it up from a local "recycling yard" for a tenner including the 36V Superjack motor, so was never really certain what it was!).

OTOH, from what I got when I last scanned some of the weaker sats, I think it still does pretty well for that size - but maybe I should now think about getting something that is "really" a bit bigger (although I am rather limited in that respect because of the trees and the greenhouse which are very close to it).