Satellite meter in tenerife

[madsater]

Hi everyone, hope i have posted in the right place.

looking for advice on satellite meter´s. living in tenerife, was thinking of buying either the new lacuna mk4 or the satlook micro plus ? can anyone give me some advice on these meters, which ones work best if any at all for astra 2d here in tenerife?

 

[trigger]

I can only comment on the Lacuna but have found it to be a very good simple meter. The astra 2d H low is seperate on the meter so you can align using this no problem.
For basic alignments in the Canaries it is fine for the main sats but not odd ones like Sirius etc. Also Nilesat is a slight problem but you can use the Arabsat setting at 26e to successfully align.

Do NOT put this meter on the roof of your vehicle whilst talking to someone and then drive away. You are unlikely to see it again as I can testify to.

Triggs

 

[madsater]

I can only comment on the Lacuna but have found it to be a very good simple meter. The astra 2d H low is seperate on the meter so you can align using this no problem.
For basic alignments in the Canaries it is fine for the main sats but not odd ones like Sirius etc. Also Nilesat is a slight problem but you can use the Arabsat setting at 26e to successfully align.

Do NOT put this meter on the roof of your vehicle whilst talking to someone and then drive away. You are unlikely to see it again as I can testify to.

Triggs

Thanks for the quick reply, are u using the lacuna 2 or 4? and also I dont understand about the nilesat thing? thought nilesat is on 7w- what has arabsat 26E got to do with that? sorry about me not understanding

 

[trigger]

The frequency that this meter looks at for Nilesat we get no signal here in Lanzarote so even if you are correctly aligned to nilesat the meter will show very little and not show "found Sat". But if you set the meter for Arabsat and point to nilesat it will show "found sat" even though its wrong. As long as you know roughly where you are pointing its not a problem.
Its the MK2 I have used for 3 years but have set up and used the MK4 for a couple of other people and they are very similar.

One more point if you are going to use this for Eurobird Steerable beam (racing UK and Setanta Ireland on a 3M dish) then its very difficult to get a lock (found sat) as the signal is so low here in Lanzarote but I know things can be different in Tenerefe.

I have used this meter commercially for installs on 30W, 7W, 10E, 13E, 16E, 19E, 26E and 28.2E. I only really get the spectrum analyser out for Sirius and 28E Steerable beam. It fits in my small toolbag over my shoulder for climbing ladders etc.

Another thing I screwed up the batteries by using the car charger but as it is only 8 AA rechargables in series I bought some more (15 Euro or so) and soldered them together.

Overall been very happy with it and even though I have a Promax Tv explorer and a Satlook MK4 (old and in very poor shape) they stay at home and the Lacuna is used 99% of the time.

Good luck

Triggs

 

[dxsat]

Lacuna Mk 4 is much better than the MK2. Battery life is rather short, and it has a few software bugs. At our company we have a MK3 as well. Neither will lock on a Mpeg4 stream, meaning you cannot meter any transponder with HD present.
On the plus side, they are smaller and lighter than most other meters, and have an easy- to read display. If the dataset is set to all Astra 2 transponders, it's easy to get a balanced and perfectly tuned installation. Technical support went through a bad patch but is now very good. Datasets can be loaded using software and a USB lead, but it only works on Windows XP. If you have Vista or Mac OS you won't be able to carry out updates.

 

[ICEMAN2000]

I am living in spain and am using the lacuna mk1v. I too am having problems aligning to Nilesat 7.0w. I have taken your advice and used the dataset for Arabsat, which has enabled me to align accordingly, however when I do a search my reciever does not find any of the Fox channels nor MBC.
Can you suggest where I am going wrong?

 

[Huevos]

Can you suggest where I am going wrong?

Hard to say as you haven't told us anything about your system. Also the info on using 26ºE entries to align on 7ºW applies to the Lacuna meter only. Is that the meter you are using? On the Lacuna meter use transponders 26E-H and 26E-V, but not 26-V. Make sure the dish is large enough, 80cm minimum measured horizontally. Satellite is at 44º elevation and 10º to the right of true south (190º azimuth). LNB skew 8º clockwise looking from behind the dish towards the satellite. I'm 200km south of you and I'm getting S67, Q78 (11938V27500) on my Fibo 90cm. Signal is probably lower in your area.

If you are after MBC and Fox, 26ºE is going to be a better bet for you as the signal is stronger. From here its just about possible on a 50cm dish.

 

[iceman]

I am living in spain and am using the lacuna mk1v. I too am having problems aligning to Nilesat 7.0w. I have taken your advice and used the dataset for Arabsat, which has enabled me to align accordingly, however when I do a search my reciever does not find any of the Fox channels nor MBC.
Can you suggest where I am going wrong?

Could it be that the transponder details in your meter identifying Arabsat has changed?
You are replying to a 2 year old thread.;)

 

[Huevos]

Could it be that the transponder details in your meter identifying Arabsat has changed?
You are replying to a 2 year old thread.;)

No, they are good. The Lacuna I checked this with is around a year old and works this way.