Help Required Poor reception on one frequency

[BarryC]

Have you tried attenuating the signals by adding a 10/20m run of cable, just in case there is too much coming in at that frequency ?
It might be the case if you have a Zone 2 dish or larger (you didn't take any pictures and your profile doesn't help).

I have a Zone 2 Sky dish with Sky Hybrid LNB. I haven't added any additional cable. With the current setup I have 3 cables connected - 2 shotgun and one single. 1 shotgun is 20m, the other 10m and the single is 10m. The reception issue is present on all the cables.

Do you have a meter in the coax? Once knew someone missing one channel. I suggested he remove the meter and Voila!

No meter on the coax

One other thing..Is the coax going down to the receiver properly grounded???

It could be a bad "F" connector at some point, a bad ground block or a crusty connection from the ground block to the ground point it's self, so another question is how old is the coax going out to the dish?

My installation would be a typical Sky installation and all the equipment is designed for use on UK power supplies which has a ground (earth) wire as standard. Would this be considered sufficiently grounded? I'm not sure if there are differences between the UK and US satellite setup?

Have you, in case of a drifted LOF, tried frequency 11303?
And frequency 11309?

There were no channels available on 11303 however they did tune fine on 11309 for both V & H. The signal strength and quality was pretty much the same as the 11306 readings.

 

[ozumo]

You could try unplugging everything electrical in the house apart from the satellite receiver while making a recording of the the 11306 transponders, if they record ok then you know it's something in the house causing interference and should then be a process of elimination to find the culprit. If no joy then if you are friendly with your neighbours you could ask them to switch off the power for a few minutes to see if there's any improvement.

Are there any traffic/speed monitors on the roads near you?

 

[Fisty McB]

One other thing..Is the coax going down to the receiver properly grounded??? I have seen direct outside RF leakage getting into the coax, this was caused by a poor ground, the shield on the coax does several things, one is to provide a return path for the DC voltage out to the LNB, a shield to prevent outside interference from getting into the signals coming down from the LNB and a shield to stop signals from affecting outside equipment from the signals coming down from the LNB.<snip>

I must say that in many years checking or helping install both satellite & terrestrial antenna setups here in Ireland, both north/south or NI/Republic, I have never once come across an instillation for a single household or similar building where the coax from the antenna or the LNB is grounded prior to entering the building, and this have never appeared to be a problem either. It is of course a different kettle of fish where the antenna is serving multiple residences e.g. Flats/apartments, where different earth/ground potentials or mains phases demands that proper attention to electrical safety (though sometimes this is bodged by some that think they can get away with it), but for an ordinary domestic install I've never seen it happen. Might be down to the general Irish climate being quite humid most of the time as well as a low general level of lightning discharge compared to many other parts of the planet, but I gather that a similar attitude to not grounding coax cable in such single domestic installs happens in Britain as well, which depending on where you are can be notably less humid much of the time.

 

[Terryl]

Proper grounding of the coax before entry to the dwelling is a NEC requirement here state side, most of the time it's a single ground block and a connection to an earth ground, this could be the main AC meter cabinet, a cold water pipe or a earth rod.

In some areas a gas discharge lightning arrester is used, this device does both, it grounds the coax shield and protects the inner conductor from a lightning hit.

Grounding the coax shield helps with rejecting unwanted outside interference.

In large urban areas we also have to sometimes put the coax inside metal conduit.

 

[Terryl]

Hey Berry, are there any "Meter reader free" AC service meters in your area, (remote reading type) some of these new type of electrical service meters use an RF signal to report the usage back to the electrical company, I had noise problems on 6 meters with the one at my location, they came back out and traded it out with one that had better shielding.

They are also doing this to water meters, they just drive by and get a reading, saves time as the person doesn't have to get out of the truck.

 

[Channel Hopper]

I have a Zone 2 Sky dish with Sky Hybrid LNB. I haven't added any additional cable. With the current setup I have 3 cables connected - 2 shotgun and one single. 1 shotgun is 20m, the other 10m and the single is 10m. The reception issue is present on all the cables.

No help, apart from it may be over signal.

Do you have some spare cable and a barrel connector nearby ?

 

[BarryC]

You could try unplugging everything electrical in the house apart from the satellite receiver

Are there any traffic/speed monitors on the roads near you?

I did try that with the microwave and WiFi router and it didn't make any difference. When it is convenient I might try knocking off everything at the trip switch, just leaving the power for the Freesat box and TV.

Hey Berry, are there any "Meter reader free" AC service meters in your area, (remote reading type) some of these new type of electrical service meters use an RF signal to report the usage back to the electrical company, I had noise problems on 6 meters with the one at my location, they came back out and traded it out with one that had better shielding.

They are also doing this to water meters, they just drive by and get a reading, saves time as the person doesn't have to get out of the truck.

There has been a massive push to get smart meters installed over here. I don't have one but I could check with my neighbours to see if they have one installed.

No help, apart from it may be over signal.

Do you have some spare cable and a barrel connector nearby ?

No spare cable. What would be the limit? My main box is connected to a 20m run of WF100 cable.

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I notice this group of channels are on the lowest frequency on Astra 2F. If the dish was fractionally misaligned what direction would it most likely need to be nudged? I think the inverse weather effects would indicate interference over misalignment but I'm willing to consider all possibilities.

 

[Channel Hopper]

I did try that with the microwave and WiFi router and it didn't make any difference. When it is convenient I might try knocking off everything at the trip switch, just leaving the power for the Freesat box and TV.


There has been a massive push to get smart meters installed over here. I don't have one but I could check with my neighbours to see if they have one installed.


No spare cable. What would be the limit? My main box is connected to a 20m run of WF100 cable.

---

I notice this group of channels are on the lowest frequency on Astra 2F. If the dish was fractionally misaligned what direction would it most likely need to be nudged? I think the inverse weather effects would indicate interference over misalignment but I'm willing to consider all possibilities.

You mentioned earlier the dish has been peaked, more than once by 'professionals', so no.

Why not take a picture of the dish and post here, saving everybody some time.

 

[a33]

I'm wondering if the problem is at 11306, or at the intermediate frequency of 1556.

Is your reception of 12148H and 12168V normal, or also less?


Did you try to cover the LNB (but not the feedhorn!) with aluminium foil, if that gives improvement??


Greetz,
A33

 

[BarryC]

Is your reception of 12148H and 12168V normal, or also less?


Did you try to cover the LNB (but not the feedhorn!) with aluminium foil, if that gives improvement??

Both frequencies are good - 90% strength, 100% quality.

I'll give the foil a try once the stormy weather settles down and see what happens.

 

[deeptho]

Perhaps one more thing to check: could it be interference from the TV or monitor on
which you are viewing the receiver? A explained in another thread in the forum,
I had a similar problem but on a much lower frequency and that turned out to be the
hdmi cable. The only problem with that explanation is that the interference was
at much lower frequency, but it was extremely strong, despite decent coax, and
affected reception in another room of the house.

The tests to rule it out are simple: Some ways to check
-move the receiver to another place (e.g., outside or well away from its current location;
if you can reroute the cable, or perhaps some other cable)
-and/or connect another tv/monitor
-and/or change the screen resolution of the receiver
-if the receiver allows it: watch the channel using streaming on a pc (and fully disconnect the TV)

Another not too expensive diagnostic tool could be one of those cheap Chinese portable battery
powered dvbs-S2 meters. Connect them outside after disconnecting all other cables from the lnb.
In that way you isolate the test setup completely from the house.

If you have picture then you know the problem must be inside the house. If you then connect connect the other cables and the picture disappears then you will know the interference travels through the cables from inside
(but the opposite is not true).

Another test would be to connect this meter to the cable end point in the house.

These meters also have a spectrum analyser screen, but the picture is tiny. However, if there is
interference on that meter (i.e., it has picture problems on 11307), a simple test is to cover the
cover the lnb with something blocking reception (alu-foil?). If the spectrum still shows a peak, then the interference must be at 1.547 Mhz approximately, otherwise at 11307MHz (unlikely).

A pc tuner card, e.g., tbs5927 is a more expensive solution, but it would allow inspecting spectra
and has many other uses.

Or you could find out if there are some amateur radio operators near by (they may have equipment
for testing).

About LNBs: many LNBs have a metal casing inside the plastic, so covering the side with aluminium
foil will not do anything. Covering the front with a wet cloth or some foil is a good way to simulate
reduced/absent signal strength, but I think it will simultaneously reduce interference, should that be
picked up by the lnb (which I doubt).

 

[BarryC]

Perhaps one more thing to check...

Interesting - that has given me a few more things to test out. Thank you.