Motorized setup - with multi LNB bracket - possible ?

[satphreak]

I currently have a motorized Triax 110 TDA which works very well. However - I tend mostly to use only one satellite position - as it takes time to turn the motor to another satellite.

I was therefore thinking - why not get a multi-LNB bracket for my Triax - so I will have 4 positions available - and just use the motor when I need other positions not available in the fixed position

Is something like this possible ? I guess it would be if I play with the LNB settings in the receiver - but obviously I want it to be as easy as possible.

Another consideration is to get a second dish - a Toroidal T90 as it can hold up to 16 positions. One of the only reasons that I want to stick to my current dish is that it allows me to watch Astra 2D here from Stockholm, Sweden - and a T90 wouldn't (and not any other multi-LNB setup - without a motor)

 

[Robbo]

Hi, Yes it should be possible. It is something I was considering. I have used a 4-way Diseqc 1.0 switch in conjunction with a motor, with 3 dishes in total.

The motor has to come first, then connect to the switch, then to the LNB.

Receiver wise you are going to have to play with the satellite positions a little, so that when you are using one of the offset LNBs it goes to the position that puts the focal LNB at the its correct position.

Eg if you had 28E, 19E,13E with 19E at the focus, you would need to change the positions of 13E and 28E within the receiver to 19E. In USALS this would just be a case of editing the satellite position, in Diseqc1.2 you would have to re-store all the positions again.

Actually I have two LNBs on my motorised dish at the moment, perhaps I'll try it later and wire up the 2nd LNB.(Dish was originally fixed for 19E and 13E, with 19E at focus)

Robbo:-hny

 

[satphreak]

Cool, so it is possible . It's not exactly straight forward - but I guess it's worth the hassle as you get the best of both worlds. Thanks.

Hi, Yes it should be possible. It is something I was considering. I have used a 4-way Diseqc 1.0 switch in conjunction with a motor, with 3 dishes in total.

The motor has to come first, then connect to the switch, then to the LNB.

Receiver wise you are going to have to play with the satellite positions a little, so that when you are using one of the offset LNBs it goes to the position that puts the focal LNB at the its correct position.

Eg if you had 28E, 19E,13E with 19E at the focus, you would need to change the positions of 13E and 28E within the receiver to 19E. In USALS this would just be a case of editing the satellite position, in Diseqc1.2 you would have to re-store all the positions again.

Actually I have two LNBs on my motorised dish at the moment, perhaps I'll try it later and wire up the 2nd LNB.(Dish was originally fixed for 19E and 13E, with 19E at focus)

Robbo:-hny

 

[Robbo]

I'm going to wire up my other LNB later on tonight, so I'll have two, one for 19E and the other for 13E. ( I might have a look see if I can any other 6 degree pairs as wel). I 'll post back to say how I got on.

Robbo

 

[Robbo]

Right, I can confirm that it works fine.

I have two LNBs on the motorised dish.

One at the focus

another about 6 degrees to the right ( looking at dish face)

On the receiver, when I select 19.2E (Astra1) the dish moves there.

If I select Hotbird (13E/now19E), the dish doesn't move, but the DiSEqC switch switches instead.

I'm using USALS.

I have edited the position of Hotbird to 19.2E (was 13E) on the receiver.

All satellites use DiSEqC 1.0 position 1, apart from Hotbird which uses position 2.

Oh, I also have another dish on 12.5W fixed, connected to position 2.

Here is the wiring diagram:-
(it is for two separate dishes, but the principle is the same)

http://www.satellites.co.uk/satelli...rised-fixed-dish-one-receiver.html#post613907

It was very easy and to do on my TM1000, so Have a go.

Robbo:-hny

 

[dxhound2003]

Satphreak

How long does it take for your motor to go to another satellite. I have the same dish as you and a TM 2200+ motor and it only take a very short time (maximum 30 seconds) to go to any satellite from 42 E to 30 W.

It seems like a lot of trouble to go to to get multiple LNB's so maybe a new motor would be a better solution.

 

[Robbo]

It's never going to be as quick as instantaneous though, is it?

and not half as much fun as a multi-LNB bracket and a motor

I think the TM2200+ motor is an upgraded version. My STAB takes about 16 seconds to go about 20 degrees, which is quite a bit slower than yours.

The bracket plus a couple of extra LNBs and a switch would cost less than a new motor too.

and having just tried it, it really isn't any hassle to get working. In fact a faster motor and a multibracket would be the best solution.

 

[satphreak]

Robbo71: thanks a lot for your replies - and your real world tests I'll see if I can get around to trying that out soon too. Unfortunately we've had a lot of snow today - so there's no way I can do it today...

As for the TM2200+ compared to my TM2100 - they should be the same speed:
1,8°/s(18V);1,2°/s(13V)

So - I often go from 1W to 28.2E - and that would take around 16-24 seconds - depending on whether it is a V or H channel. Fair enough - but as Robbo71 said: instantaneous beats that quite easily ;-)

 

[vma]

Hi,

I have operated a system like that for a long time (se pictures here: http://www.geocities.com/dazed1970/crazy/dazed1970.htm - it's the big dish with 3 LNB's).

The only thing you should be aware of, is the wiring and operation:

Receiver -> DiSEqC-Switch -> 1 = LNB, 2= LNB, 3 = LNB, 4 = -> Rotor -> LNB (of course you can put the Rotor on any one of the 4 positions)

To use this, you can switch channels on LNB's 1, 2, 3 and 4 as usual.
To rotate the dish, you will have to first zap to a channel on LNB4 and then to a channel on a different satellite, which requires rotation.

Some receivers allow complex LNB configurations to send the DiSEqC-commands in cascade, i.e. first DiSEqC-1.0 and then DiSEqC-1.2, when required.

Humax IRCI-5400 with ToH will do it, as well as the Dreambox range of receivers.

It will work on ANY receiver, but you would need to create a dummy channel, just to commute do LNB4, whenever you want to rotate the dish.

I hope you could understand what I mean - not easy to explain.

Cheers,
vma

 

[Robbo]

@vma,

Sounds far too complicated, and I did not find it necessary. Connecting the motor first, and then the switch, the motor always turns if it needs to, and any switch output can be used for any LNB.

Would be interesting to see if this works on another setup also. I have a STAB H-H 90 motor and a Eurostar 4x1 DiSEqC.

Robbo:-hny

 

[satphreak]

vma - that sounds like some pretty high tech stuff - and I'm not QUITE following you on this one ;-) But to know that you can actually get stuff like this working gives me hope. I'll keep you updated of any progress - and Robbo71 - please let us know if you get any further with your setup

 

[Robbo]

vma - that sounds like some pretty high tech stuff - and I'm not QUITE following you on this one ;-) But to know that you can actually get stuff like this working gives me hope. I'll keep you updated of any progress - and Robbo71 - please let us know if you get any further with your setup

Will do. I'm, going to have to make up a bracket first (just got an old SKY LNB taped on right now) as I can't find one for my dish, but in principle up to 3 additional LNBs will work on my current setup, since one extra one does.

 

[vma]

It is not a difficult installation at all: I had the Switch between the receiver and the rotor.

To rotate the dish, I just had to make sure, that i.e. DiSEqC position 4 is turned on. For that, I just needed to zap to a channel configured to a satellite on DiSEqC position 4. Then I could start to zap to channels which involved rotation of the dish.

Only later on a new function was included in the ToH-firmware to automatically send the DiSEqC-1.0 command prior to the DiSE1C-1.2 command. This way, I could zap directly without using a dummy channel to set the switch correctly.

Of course you will need manually to rotate the dish back to the standard position to use the other multifeed LNB's. That is not automatic.

Let's try an example:

LNB A = Astra
LNB B = Hotbird -> Rotor connected to this output of the switch
LNB C = Sirius

Case 1: Dish is pointing to Hotbird and one wants to use Astra, Hotbird and Sirius
Channels can be zapped on Astra, Hotbird and Sirius. No problem and no rotation.

Case 2: Dish is pointing to Hotbird and one wants to use Nilesat
Zap to a channel on Hotbird first. DiSEqC position B is selected.
Zap to a channel on Nilesat. Dish will rotate from Hotbird to Nilesat.

Case 3: Dish is pointing to Nilesat and one wants to use Astra
Zap to a channel on Hotbird first. Dish will rotate from Nilesat to Hotbird.
Zap to a channel on Astra.

Very easy!

Why I did not connect the switch AFTER the rotor?

Because:
- I had a very long LNB cable, which had some problems with DiSEqC-commands: the did not arrive clearly to the switch/rotor - sometimes I had to issue the command several times. My setup worked better.
- I had only one cable from the roof to the apartment, but this cable was connected in series to several receivers in different rooms. I did not want all DiSEqC-communication to go through the rotor.
- I was not sure if the rotor would let the DiSEqC-1.0 commands pass.

The point is: it DOES work and I did use such a configuration for a 2-3 years without any problem.

Cheers,
vma

 

[Robbo]

Why I did not connect the switch AFTER the rotor?

Because:
- I had a very long LNB cable, which had some problems with DiSEqC-commands: the did not arrive clearly to the switch/rotor - sometimes I had to issue the command several times. My setup worked better.
- I had only one cable from the roof to the apartment, but this cable was connected in series to several receivers in different rooms. I did not want all DiSEqC-communication to go through the rotor.
- I was not sure if the rotor would let the DiSEqC-1.0 commands pass.

The point is: it DOES work and I did use such a configuration for a 2-3 years without any problem.

Cheers,
vma

Ahh, that it explains it. I originally had my switch first and nothing worked, but all OK with motor first. At least I know what I could have done for a more complex system like yours.

Robbo

 

[satphreak]

Cool - thanks for taking the time to give us such a good explanation. I'll certainly look into getting something similar set up.

It would take some time to get it working properly - but I'm sure it would be worth it.

 

[wod]

if you want to speed up the time it take to move to satellites then go with a 36volt motor instead ?

 

[satphreak]

Sure - it still wouldn't beat instantaneous though

Actually - I'm pretty happy with my setup - but I'm one of those people that always just wants a little bit more, better etc

if you want to speed up the time it take to move to satellites then go with a 36volt motor instead ?

 

[Topper]

but I'm one of those people that always just wants a little bit more, better etc

Isn't that the definition of greed :-sugar:-sugar

 

[RedDevil_UK]

im afraid im with dxhound2003 above...

i can swing from 42e to 30w in seconds...

it just so happens that the sats i use most, 13e 19e are close together so its hardly noticable when changing channel

sounds like a lot of hassle for 1 second?

 

[vma]

I LOVE to zap a LOT, specially between 19.2E and 13.0E. Having to wait an EXTRA 1-2 seconds for the dish to position itself (plus 1-2 seconds for the receiver to show the image) is not even remotly as nice as switching with DiSEqC! Why not put a second LNB, so that you have both Astra and Hotbird, when the dish is pointing to Hotbird? There is no hassle at all, as it works smoothly. Also, you get a switch and an LNB for less than 20 Euro, which will certainly extend the lifetime of the rotor, if you stop zapping back and forth all the time.

Cheers,
vma