Newbie Setting Up In Holland - Help Please!!

S

steve and d

Member
My Satellite Setup
Pace DV
Apple Mac
My Location
UK
Hi,

Hi and greetings from a Brit newbie beging this kind forum for help!

I am visiting daughter in law at present trying to set up Pace DV3 digibox and standard Sky minidish (from UK) to get Sky from Astra 2d. Have compass, signal meter, have dish elevation set to around 30 degrees (we are near Eindhoven) pointing toward South in first instance then gradually moving SE, getting high pitch on signal meter, finding Astra *D satellite (hopefully) but nil, nada , NOWT shows on the signal strength or quality meter in the Sky menu.

The connections are as they were in UK, so dont think its that.

We are picking up several strong sat signals moving slowly across the arc, but the digibox refuses to show anything on strength!

I know they are there. Leaving Sat. Any help gratefullyt appreciated!!!
Kind regards,
Stev eand D!!!
 
Welcome to the forum steve and d

The footprint is very tight for 2D as it is a spot beam see here I am no expert on sky inside UK let alone outside but a standard zone 2 dish I would have thought a tad small but I may be wrong having a look at astra2d web site a poster from holland says OK on 60 cm but neglects to say exactly where. I think your problem mat be elevation, and too much of it, your dish should not be too far off nearly vertical
 
Eindhoven is still well inside the 2D "spill-over" zone, so it should be no problem at all picking up 2D over there.
are you pointing enough eastwards, funny as it may sound, it is located at 28°E so well away from the UK which is located in the west of your location. Your dish should point to a location 'above' germany.
otherwise, try to get into contact with some local sat folks, you may need to borrow a 'normal' sat receiver to align your dish first.
 
Thank you for your kind replies!

I put all advice into operation, but to no avail. Lowered the elevation, tried to move everything very very slowly, and at one point, just past East, the strength box flickered up to half and got an OK!! However, that lasted about two seconds!! (proving the spot beam theory, but thankfully, proving I'm not going mad!)

I know this is the kind of stoopid "b...in obvious"" thing noobies say, but something just occurred to me. I am in Vught, south Holland, and although there are no trees directly in front of me, I am in a huuuuge forest!!! Could it just be as simple as that?

Kind regards,
Steve and D
 
You say your dish is a sky one therefore it is offset and the signals arrive like this picture.

edit mmmm Half my post disappeared there, wierd
 
steve and d said:
...Lowered the elevation, tried to move everything very very slowly, and at one point, just past East, the strength box flickered up to half and got an OK!! However, that lasted about two seconds!!...
Click to expand...

Is that on a satellite meter or using the digibox's one?

If it is using the digibox it takes a couple seconds to update, so if you are doing a smooth slow pan and get a signal reading you will be past where the signal is by the time it shows up (and it will then disappear quickly as you have moved the dish).

If you are using the digibox as a meter move the dish in very small steps around where you think the signal should be, with pauses of several seconds.
 
Eindhoven is positioned at Latitude 51.43 Longitude East 5.5. Astra 2D is at 25.80 degrees east (West 334.2 degrees), satelite elevation is 27.454 degrees.

See:
http://www.satellite-calculations.com/Satellite/lookangles.htm

Armed with the info from this site you should be able to point the dish in roughly the right direction. If you point the dish in the direction of the sun at about 12.37 tomorrow morning then it should be pointing to Astra 2D. The dish will be ' looking' more or less straight forward and not tilted backwards very much.


Sat Jun 10 2006 12:36:37 GMT+0200 Sun 31.81° above satellite

 Sun Jun 11 2006 12:36:55 GMT+0200 Sun 31.89° above satellite

 Mon Jun 12 2006 12:37:14 GMT+0200 Sun 31.96° above satellite

Tue Jun 13 2006 12:37:31 GMT+0200 Sun 32.02° above satellite

 Wed Jun 14 2006 12:37:48 GMT+0200 Sun 32.08° above satellite

 Thu Jun 15 2006 12:38:05 GMT+0200 Sun 32.12° above satellite

 Fri Jun 16 2006 12:38:21 GMT+0200 Sun 32.16° above satellite
The 2d signal deteriates the more you travel east of the UK faster than it does as you travel south of hte uk. Although the minidish should be ok in the Eindhoven area but if you are finding that the dish is too small (i.e. bockiness and/or frequent loss of signal during rain) then I suggest you buy a 64cm dish.
 
Have a good look at this link, its jam pack full of good info for you
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:

http://www.satelliteforcaravans.co.uk/

Cheers

Nick
 
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