Suggested solution to dish 40m-50m meters away

[BBunter]

Hi all - first post.

Due to new houses and very large trees the only place I can even see the horizon is about 40m from my house where two of the buildings and trees part enough to let me see though (see pic)

Anyway. To see if it was even possible to get a signal I purchase a zone 2 dish with a quad LNB and ran some cheap coax that I had in the garage to the dish mounted on a pole.

I used a sat meter to locate and fine tune and to my amazement I actually got a picture.

However while the quality was 90% the signal strength was between 0% and 20% depending on channel.

Nothing I did would improve this.

Having done some reading on the forum I am hoping this is due a combination of the cheap cable and the length of the run.

Below is what I was thinking of doing and I thought I would run it past you guys who have some real world experience with this first.

To combat the line length I was going to run 2 lines of WF125
There is already a waterproof junction box where the cables meet the house (house it run in WF100)
With the WF125 would it be worth installing an LNB amplifier at the junction box (is this the correct place to install?)

Any comments greatly appreciated.

Regards

Mike

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[Lazarus]

Quality is the important parameter.

If it's a Sky Box you are using, then I suspect (as is often the case) that the "metering" is up to cock anyway.

All that matters is that you have lock plus a decent rain margin.

Don't rely on "metering" on crude receivers!

Amplifiers compensate for excessive losses, but they also amplify - and add - noise: Ergo, no benefit if you already have lock. 40m of cable isn't unduly long especially with a decent size dish on a strong Satellite.

 

[Analoguesat]

Ive got 4 runs of 30m of coax on a 60 cm circular (ex analogue!) dish with an octo lnb here and dont have any problems at all. (Like you I have problems with trees and the dish is halfway down the garden to see around them)

One of the feeds (to the dreambox) is at least 50m as it runs 10m the wrong way down the garden to the disecq switch then back up! Its absolutely fine.

You might think about a size bigger dish if you are concerned with the losses.

 

[BBunter]

Thanks for the prompt reply....I have bags of quality on the channels with signal but ....I guess as much as anything I was hoping for confirmation that the WF125 will go some way to improving the signal strength....I don't think as it is it will survive much in the way of rain.

Mike

 

[Analoguesat]

Theres an easy way to check rain fade - put a wet tea towel over the lnb - it will simulate a heavy shower!

If you get loss of signal se eif you can tweak up the reception. If its a lost cause then think about a bigger dish & repeat the test.

 

[BBunter]

I will give the tea towel a go tomorrow and let you know the results...

I get the impression that the cable is not going to do much and if the rain test fails a bigger dish rather than better cable is the answer?

 

[Analoguesat]

A bigger dish will give you more signal into the lnb in the first place. You can always try better cable of course - just cut an appropriate length off a reel and string it along the garden temporarily (warning the missus not to fall over it first!)

 

[Lazarus]

Sorry, but unless you are actually having problems with lock, then I still think the only (and totally ignorable) issue here is the cr*p metering on your box.

You may be trying to fix a non-existent problem.

eg My neighbour has a Sky Box which records a consistent signal strength of precisely zero yet he has never had a problem with loss of lock, pixellation etc.

I strongly suspect that there is bags of signal strength, regardless of what your Box is leading you to believe.

 

[BBunter]

Point taken....I guess the tea towel fade test will confirm this tomorrow

Mike

 

[BBunter]

I went to do a tea towel test this morning and the realised I didnt know if I should be testing over the dish or LNB.

I did several tests on what is an overcast day in Devon.

Test 1 - wet tea towel over the LNB - no loss of picture
Test 2 - wet tea towel over right 1/3 of the dish - no loss of picture
Test 3 - wet tea towel over left 1/3 of the dish - no loss of picture
Test 4 - wet tea towel over centre 1/3 of dish - total loss of picture.

I also noticed that even with no tea towel on the dish some of the channels with a good picture show no signal or quality :|

Should I be getting a picture with the tea towel over the centre of the dish?

Mike

 

[Lazarus]

All those results demonstrate is that you have no problem whatsoever.

The visible Channels do not have no Strength or Quality, rather the "metering" I keep banging on about is just misleading.

Think what you're trying to achieve: Stable lock with rain margin.

You've got that.

What else is there?

 

[Analoguesat]

As Tivu says I think your set up is ok. Meters on receivers are indicative only - swap two identical receivers over onto the same dish / cabling and I guarantee the results will be slightly different.

Change manufacturers or even the same maker but a different model and the results will probably be vastly different.

 

[Lazarus]

And Sky Boxes in particular have appalling metering - It's ok as a crude relative indication IF it's working properly, but no Installer (Pro or Hobbyist) should rely upon it.

 

[Captain Jack]

I agree with the others. I don't think you have any problems - a wet tea towel over the LNB is a good test and since you are not losing picture, there's nothing to worry about. I've also had a 40m cable run from the back on my garden, around the house, through the garage and into the house without issues. I think there was a *slight* degradation of signal compared to a 5m run but on strong satellites, this isn't an issue.

 

[norm360]

Judging by your location you could install a dish on your property to pickup 30w (you would need to source a subscription/card share, but there's a lot of channels with original english audio).

Those trees are pretty dominating though. I trust a neighbour let you put the dish on their property? Did you rig them up a signal as well?

 

[norm360]

PS. Looking at your location on dishpointer. If you mounted a dish on a 2m pole at the highest point of your house, you should be able to get a signal.

Assuming the tree line is 12M, your roof is 6M + 2m (pole) should clear the obstruction (just). As the 5.2m height obstruction is the limit (measured from the base of the dish).

12m - 8m = 4m

IMG removed, added attachment [Admin]

 

[satelliteman]

As suggested, 40m of good quality cable shouldn't be a problem.

 

[BBunter]

Finished installing wf125 cable from the dish to the house and I now have 60% signal strength and 90% quality.
I take on board the comments about how bad the built in sky box metering is, especially as some of the channels had no signal or strength but had a picture. That said this cable has made a big difference - much more than I expected.
I did say to my neighbour if it worked I would hook him up with a feed- job for the weekend.

Thanks to all for comments and suggestions.