Newbie Here Some advice please for a new member.

airbourne

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Hi all. A couple of years ago we sold our house in Spain and for the ten years we had it, I used a few different dishes and played about with the different satellite directions in our quest to get the UK channels and to see a bit of sport.
We have the Sky basic package here in the UK (Kent) and I'm thinking I may buy a larger (motorised) dish setup to have a go at viewing some of the foreign sport channels as we don't have the expensive Sky-sports stuff. I'll probably have a look at what's on Ebay in the second-hand market as the last banking crisis wasn't very kind to us!

The thing is, I don't know what size dish to use, plus all the other gear that's come on the market in the last few years, not to mention some new satellites that are flying about that were not there when we were in Spain. I'm hoping that some of you could point me in the correct direction so I can start having some more fun!
Thanks. Steve
 

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Hi airbourne, welcome to the forum.

In most cases you are allowed up to a 1 metre dish, without the need to apply for planning permission, unless in a listed building, or restricted region.
The first thing, I would advise, is to discover where you are going to site the dish.
If you are fortunate you might have an open, South facing, garden, so you could use a ground mount, making it easier to install, and maintain.

You can gain access to a large number of satellites, in the UK, with a smallish dish, both East, and West, but might want a larger dish for feed hunting, or difficult to receive satellites.

Personally I have a channel Master 1.2M, ground mounted on a 1224 motor, but tend to stick to 19.2E, for sports, with visits to 4.9E, 0.8W and 23.5E, for live sports.

As things have changed I tend to use Kodi, on my VU+ Duo2 satellite receiver, to view television series, and old films, as you can then view them when you want, and they tend to be on sooner than on the Discovery channel, or other channels, but you do require a reasonable broadband speed, so this option was unavailable, to me, until we finally got fibre broadband, in our area, a few years ago.

Check dishpointer.com, to see where you can site your dish. Type in your postcode, select a suitable satellite, like Thor 0.8W, and zoom in on the map, moving the icon to where you live. You can use the obstacle checker option to see if you can get away with a ground mounted dish, or how high you need to site the dish, to get all the available satellites.
 

airbourne

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Hi Mickha. Many thanks for the valuable info on this subject.
I do indeed have a south facing garden of about a third of an acre, plus I have a large flat roof extension with a brick chimney coming through it.
I am looking at a second hand 1.2 channel master with a motor at the moment and I now know it would be one to use. In Spain we all had 1.8 Andrews dishe which are channel master dishes I think with quad LNBs on a large slab of concrete! They were quite expensive. The satellite we were on isn't in operation now so I don't know what they are using now. I didn't have a motor on it so it was a pain if I wanted to get onto a different satellite. In a way I'm glad to be back in the UK but getting TV here is a lot more expensive.
We used to get quite a bit of tennis over there so I'm hoping for bit of that if I have a motor and some directions on where everything is in the way of satellites.

I'm think I'm going to have to do a bit of learning about all the jargon that goes on on here as I don't know what a Kodi is plus all the other abbreviated stuff that goes on. A glossary would be useful!
I'll return when I have the dish located for some other questions on receiving equipment etc. Thanks. Steve
 
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Mickha

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KODI is simply a way of viewing television series, old, and new, and films, using streaming.
Using it I've viewed very early series of Doctor Who, mainly starring Tom Baker, Unhappily Ever After, an old comedy starring Nicki Cox, as well as new series like Gold Rush, Altered Carbon, and early English films, like the Confessions series, which are no longer shown on television.

If you do an internet search for KODI addons, or what is KODI, you'll soon pick up the jargon.
 

airbourne

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Well I think the 1.2 channel master dish may not be on as its a long long way from where I am and I don't see me driving 300 miles to collect it!
I've been looking at the other dishes on sale at 1 to 1.2m. Most of them are made of steel. Some have motors and LNBs but I really don't know if any of them are worth buying. I have good fabrication experience so I could modify whatever needs beefing up to support the LNB.
Perhaps someone could advise me what to look for. Tecnomate and Gibertini plus all the ones that the seller doesn't know what it is.

I was thinking that with my lack of knowledge in mind it may be a good idea to buy say a steel 1 or 1.2 mtr dish with a motor on it and put my money into a decent receiver. I could then just wait for a channel master to come available a bit closer to home.
Just as a matter of a mention, I was in conversation the other day with a guy who sells sky packages and he recons that "they" whoever they are, will prevent us from getting onto the satellites across Europe. As far as I recall, "they" have been trying to do that in Spain for as long as I can remember but they haven't got there yet! Steve
 

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...I was thinking that with my lack of knowledge in mind it may be a good idea to buy say a steel 1 or 1.2 mtr dish with a motor on it


In my personal opinion if you go for a 1.2m motorised dish you need a 36 volt motor to move it. You could probably get away with using a DiSEqC motor on a 1.2m dish but there would be a risk of wind load on the dish damaging the motor, particularly in exposed locations. If you decide to go for a 36 volt motor you could use either a linear actuator or an H-H motor.

If you are looking on eBay for a motorised dish, the chances are that if it is 1.2m or larger the motor will be 36 volts.
 

airbourne

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I've just found and bought a 1.2 Channel Master dish with "inverto black ultra LNB" that the seller has said is quire a good LNB so as soon as I find a motor and get it bolted to the house I'll return for some advise on what receiver to connect it to.
Thanks. Steve
 

statalite

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Channel Master 1.0m (to be setup)
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Was this bought on eBay as I'm also looking for a 1.2m.
 

airbourne

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Yes, it was. As far as I am aware, this was the only CM on Ebay but they are available new. I did see one dish that did look like a CM but only had a picture from the front and very little info on exactly what it was. I did message the seller asking for some more info and pics but nothing so far.
It may be that the seller has no idea of what dish he has and just wants it off his wall.
Steve
 

statalite

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Zone 1 @ 28.2°E
Zone 2 @ 19.2°E with 28.2°E and 13.0°E
Channel Master 1.0m (to be setup)
Channel Master 1.2m (to be setup)
SMR 1224
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Yes, it was. As far as I am aware, this was the only CM on Ebay but they are available new. I did see one dish that did look like a CM but only had a picture from the front and very little info on exactly what it was. I did message the seller asking for some more info and pics but nothing so far.
It may be that the seller has no idea of what dish he has and just wants it off his wall.
Steve
To clarify the seller you bought from has multiple new ones in stock?
 

airbourne

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Hi. No, this was a private sale buy it now. It went through a couple of times. The first was a guy who came to collect it in a very small car and had to leave it. Then the seller reduced the price twice so I couldn't resist it.
To purchase a new one you would have to go to one of the suppliers. The other dish I saw, the seller has revised with some more information and pictures. It isn't a CM but is 1.2 and has a very sturdy looking lnb arm. Worth a look I think. I'll put a link on later. Steve

Here's the link Satellite dish | eBay
It finishes today at 19.52 but if it doesen't sell it will probably be re-listed.
 
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Channel Hopper

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That is definitely not a Channel Master. I would hazard a guess it is no more than a 1m either.
 

aceb

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Hi Steve, I wonder how low your horizon is to the east, depending where you are in Kent (anything east of Tunbridge Wells) you may be one of the lucky few who will get 76.5E. Not that there's anything particularly exciting about it but it's a bit of a holy grail for a few of us in the SE :)

If you don't have one good spot where you can reach both ends of the arc I'd say look to position the dish so it has a lower easterly horizon because there's very little out to the west unless you put up something much larger and can get at the feeds on 55W C band.

FWIW I installed a 1.2CM on a CM polar mount on a flat roof not far from here and with a bit of brute force to the dish rim can cover 76E-63W on a 24" actuator.

I've bought quite a bit of stuff from hm-sat-shop.de/en Unless you want to spend serious money on an actuator their range is OK although they could do with extra magnets placed on the wheel to improve positioning resolution. Both my 36 and 12 are still working fine after four years and little if any maintenance. Don't even consider putting a 1.2CM on a diseqc motor, especially if you are thinking about putting on a flat roof.
 

airbourne

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Hi Channel Hopper. The seller mailed me back. He says he doesn't know much about sat dishes but had contacted the guy that fitted it and he said it was a 1.2. Its pretty obviously not a CM as the pics will show.

Hi aceb. My location is in the area of Bluebell Hill, (on it). I've put my post code into the dish pointer site but I notice that the work just done cutting down a fairly large conifer has not got onto that site yet. I also notice that if the pointer is moved very slightly the "d" measurement alters quite a lot so I'm wondering just how good the information there is.
This is a very recent "toe in the water" for me as I've only previously had any dish at all when we had our house in Spain that we sold about three years ago so I'm not up to speed on what equipment to purchase. I remember that one of the most useful boxes we tried was a Zapbox Twin so with that in mind you can see how far I got with the subject! I truly have a lot to learn on this and I'm going to need all the guidance I can get. I do of course have a sky dish on the roof and I'm quite fed up with paying them for the service.
The guy I've bought the dish from says he has had six dishes up and running at the same time so I'm hoping to ask him a few questions on the subject of equipment. I'll probably need to visit some installations and ask all the question you can't ask on here! Thanks for all the answers so far......Steve
 

RimaNTSS

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Hi Steve! Thanks for starting this thread! Channel Master, IMHO, is one of the top brands of the dishes you can get on the market. When you have possibility, please show some pictures of your equipment and installations. I am curious who is the seller you have bought dish from, and he has lots of dishes installed?! Ask him to come to the forum, if he/she is not here already.
 

airbourne

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Hi RimaNTSS. I'm going to meet him next week so I'll put all those questions to him and see what his reactions are. After all, if he would prefer not to be recognised it wouldn't be fair to "blow the gaff" on him.

The next stage is to look for a suitable motor that will stand a 1.2 dish in an elevated position without falling to bits. Having looked at some motors and mountings I'm thinking that most of them lack the support you would think they would have when working under the conditions of a UK winter. In Spain the wind is also a problem. Even in the height of summer a late afternoon wind is common (every day) If the motor was supported at both ends of the mounting shaft the internals would probably last a lot longer. This would need the use of two motors of course and a bit of engineering thought!
You may have guessed that I have more of an engineering background than any skills in satellite TV tech!

I'm thinking of painting the dish in a colour that will suit its surroundings to reduce the eye view a bit. If I do this, will it compromise its performance?
Also, can someone give me some motor makes and model numbers please as I'm looking at them with glazed eyes! Steve
 

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What do you mean by "two motors" ? To change azimuth and elevation? Then you will need also motor #3 to change the skew of the LNB or whole dish.
Painting of the surface of the dish will change performance, but this change will be minimal, so you will not notice it at all, moreover you will not be able to measure this difference :D
 

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...Also, can someone give me some motor makes and model numbers please as I'm looking at them with glazed eyes! Steve


For an H-H motor look out for a second hand Jaeger 1224, they are very good and often come with a fitting plate that is made to accept a 1.2m Channel Master dish. If you use a polar mount you will need a linear actuator. A genuine SuperJack actuator if you can find one is probably your best option but there are a lot of cheap clones about with names like Super Power Jack.

There are other makes of linear actuator but the respected makes such as Venture and Von Weiss are expensive and not easy to locate in Europe.
 

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moonbase

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...I'm thinking of painting the dish in a colour that will suit its surroundings to reduce the eye view a bit. If I do this, will it compromise its performance?...

As long as you do not use paint with a metallic content you should be OK. Car paint is a type that has been used by some members. Personally, I would use either a matt finish or a satin finish. For a 1.2m channel master dish a few spray cans should be enough to do the job.

Going back to your motor question that I part answered above in post 18. For now I would setup the dish for simple East/West rotation on Ku band with your Inverto black ultra LNB. The East/West rotation can be achieved with either an H-H motor or a linear actuator in conjunction with a polar mount.

After you have got comfortable with a motorised Ku band system you could consider adding "multi band" capability using something like a "Trust LNB Changer" which replaces your existing LNB setup with a rotational LNB setup at the dish focal point. With a multi LNB rotational setup you can use additional LNB's that cover C band and Ka band. For C band there is not a great deal available to a 1.2m dish, however, there are some satellites where you will get signals.
 
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