Comments from a newbie to FTA

[Keith Brannen]

Have used a variety of types, from straight pieces of aluminum I had, curved pieces, and round pieces. The last two came with LNB holders, the most important aspect, some that I modified to fit on other pieces.
Also used aluminum spacers to adjust height on flat pieces.

97, 103, & 110 (c).

99 & 105.

 

[k4otl]

Update! There's a house literally 1/2 mile from me that I'd walk past when I'd take walks after work, and noticed a large C band dish tucked around the corner. Walked up to the owner yesterday and he readily said I could have it haha, even mentioned there's another like it at his parents a few miles away. Got it back in one piece to my house today, it's a 10 footer, the "eye" of the actuator arm broke off but hey, it's free. He even still had the old Drake analog receiver and gave it to me, it turns on, that's all I've messed with thus far. Dish isn't dead nuts true but a string test shows it's <1/2" out, there's some minor spots in the mesh (a holly tree was slowly growing through it and next to it) but it's pretty decent actually. Cut the pole down right above the concrete too. The homeowner had it since it was new, and I don't think has touched it in 20+ years.

 

[k4otl]

General question (it's hard to find info on some of these topics):
- Has anyone tried putting a sidecar Ku lnb on a mesh C band dish, if so, how well does it work? (Anyone tried putting aluminum foil on the mesh to help out Ku reception?) I haven't begun to prep putting up the 10' dish but I'm just pondering things right now
- Does anyone have any experience in receiving the High SR DVB-S2 feeds on C band with a sidecar C band LNB? Like getting the 101(or 99) mux as a sidecar from a dish fixed on 105 for example? I'm shooting for 105 first when I do get the dish up, and just looking for other's experiences. My dish will be fixed at the beginning, baby steps (I'm also cheap).
- Does anyone ever stop fiddling with their SAT system? I mean seriously, will I end up with 40 dishes at the end of this? Is there an Antennas Anonymous?

 

[comfortably_numb]

- Does anyone ever stop fiddling with their SAT system? I mean seriously, will I end up with 40 dishes at the end of this? Is there an Antennas Anonymous?

"My name's David and I'm a satellite TV addict."

 

[cyberham]

...- Does anyone ever stop fiddling with their SAT system?...

No. Why would you? If all you want to do is watch TV, then get cable. Glad you're having a thrill exploring.

 

[k4otl]

No. Why would you? If all you want to do is watch TV, then get cable. Glad you're having a thrill exploring.

Sometimes kinda lol. Of course "getting cable" is actually harder to do these days, "they" want everything to go streaming. I've got 3 TV antennas on top of the house, it's more fun getting more OTA (and FTA) channels than watching sometimes (although I watch alot of TV it feels like sometimes). Also I'm cheap so there you go. Honestly with my current setup, I probably use FTA more for the radio feeds than TV. Ku FTA is no replacement for OTA, but a good supplement IMO. For radio it's fantastic. That's how I started, I told myself all I wanted was the 101W radio services, and it's grown from there.

 

[comfortably_numb]

I told myself all I wanted was the 101W radio services

That's how my KU project started for me also. Of course those radio feeds were on 103 then, but they were my main goal. Then I got hooked on the wild feeds.

 

[k4otl]

"My name's David and I'm a satellite TV addict."

Me: "Hello my name is Nick and I'm addicted to antennas"

Others: "How many do you have?"

Me: "Not enough"

Others: [Sees how many] "Oh my..."

 

[one_db_compression]

General question (it's hard to find info on some of these topics):
- Has anyone tried putting a sidecar Ku lnb on a mesh C band dish, if so, how well does it work? (Anyone tried putting aluminum foil on the mesh to help out Ku reception?) I haven't begun to prep putting up the 10' dish but I'm just pondering things right now
- Does anyone have any experience in receiving the High SR DVB-S2 feeds on C band with a sidecar C band LNB? Like getting the 101(or 99) mux as a sidecar from a dish fixed on 105 for example? I'm shooting for 105 first when I do get the dish up, and just looking for other's experiences. My dish will be fixed at the beginning, baby steps (I'm also cheap).

Optimally on paper, gain at Ku frequencies is about 8 to 9 dB higher versus C frequencies on that 10-footer. This is 48 to 49 versus 39 to 40 dB "ish". The -3 dB beamwidth at Ku is probably about 0.5 degrees. As a result when you're off-axis, your signal strength is trivially going to collapse by 6 to 8 dB, turning that 10-footer into effectively a 4-to-6-footer. If you want to lock on signals that need a heavy C/N ratio, you need to be peaked as much as possible on the main lobe. This is independent of the band. Higher-order modulation schemes require more signal energy, period. Being off-axis on a reflector geometry that was not designed to accommodate that type of configuration will incur fast signal roll-off. When you compare radiation envelope patterns for TX-rated parabolic antennae for the equivalent bands for terrestrial microwave, it becomes pretty obvious pretty quickly.

https://www.andrew.com/globalassets/digizuite/47018-7435-7-17-19-pdf.pdf for a HX10-11W (10' reflector for 11 GHz use)

https://www.andrew.com/globalassets/digizuite/47003-7420-7-17-19-pdf.pdf for HX10-4 (10' reflector for 4.5 GHz use)

Armed with a receiver that provides C/N in dB, a DVB-S/S2 bitrate calculator, and the technical parameters for your reflector, you can determine in a few seconds how many dB of signal you are above or below a locking threshold for any satellite signal in any location in a footprint.

Everyone else's mileage may vary.

 

[k4otl]

So when I got the 10' dish, the owner had me take his Dishnet dish (19"x25" approx) and I had the idea that since 101W is so strong on the Hughes dish, why not try it? It took me like 30 mins, I mounted the dish to the j pole that came with it, to a block of wood, lined it up using my other dishes as a guide, guessed the elevation, slapped an LNB on it with no skew and BAM! got the Muzak mux! Didn't adjust anything! Talk about luck. Pretty good signal level too, I tweaked the skew and brought up the quality somewhat. And I've got pictures this time! I included pics of the 10 footer too.