Finally!

[dougruss]

 

[hwm]

"BTW, the info I found online for MeTV was out of date, it said the channel is horizontal but the coolsat found it on blindscan on vertical."

This could mean your LNB is installed 90 degrees off. I had the same issue when first setting up my C-band dish.

 

[Phottoman]

"BTW, the info I found online for MeTV was out of date, it said the channel is horizontal but the coolsat found it on blindscan on vertical."

This could mean your LNB is installed 90 degrees off. I had the same issue when first setting up my C-band dish.

Actually, I think if you turn your LNBF 90 degrees, you'd be right back where you started from. Did you read the explanation I gave about turning her LNBF 45 degrees?

Photto

 

[Dee_Ann]

Well..........

Today, it's not working...

It was working great last night and this morning when I went to sleep, when I woke up a little while ago, the picture is all herky-jerky freezy and everyone sounds like Cher being auto-tuned. Robotic sounding..

Something is really messed up..

The weird thing is, the signal and quality meter on the app shows a strong signal, just as strong a signal now as it was when it was working fine this morning..


Now a few messages back one of y'all said I have to reverse the polarity. How do I do that?

Thanks guys...


edit: oh wait, I see y'all posted new info while I was composing this one. Let me read this over and think what I need to do next.

 

[Dee_Ann]

I found a photograph I took of the lnb back when I got it new last year.
I put it in the paint app and blacked out everything but the lnb and then rotated it to various ways it could potentially be set to.




Now imagine you were behind the dish, looking through the hole in the center of the dish towards the lnb out front. This is what you would see..
The second image is how it is currently set. You guys say it is set wrong because MeTV shows up as a vertical channel instead of a horizontal channel. Y'all say I need to rotate the lnb.

In your opinion, which would be the right way to rotate it?

I think I will put some marks on the lnb and ring before I change it from what I have now so that if all else fails I can get back to where it is now which is kinda working..

Thanks guys!

 

[PopcornNMore]

Well..........

Today, it's not working...

It was working great last night and this morning when I went to sleep, when I woke up a little while ago, the picture is all herky-jerky freezy and everyone sounds like Cher being auto-tuned. Robotic sounding..

Something is really messed up..

The weird thing is, the signal and quality meter on the app shows a strong signal, just as strong a signal now as it was when it was working fine this morning..


Now a few messages back one of y'all said I have to reverse the polarity. How do I do that?

Thanks guys...


edit: oh wait, I see y'all posted new info while I was composing this one. Let me read this over and think what I need to do next.

Actually today MeTV has a signal strength of only 35-40% here in PA on my 8' WSI International dish. The signal strength is usually above 70%. Also, EVERY RTV channel is completely gone. Funny thing is that the NASA channels, WPIX and others have a steady signal strength above 75%.

 

[Anole]

the devils in the details

Rotate to either picture 1 or 3, your choice. Results are the same either way.

Looking at some of your earlier pictures (good that you put the big mark on the LNBF! ) it appears to not agree with item #3 below.
But, it's a simple change, and you'll probably fine tune it for rotation and for focus (in/out) while you are at it, so it's not a problem!

- 2. - move the dish to the top of the arc. As you sweep the dish (motor) from east to west, in the middle the dish will be pointed higher in the sky, than at either end. Set it there, lock it down, and leave it for this exercise!

- 3. - skew the LNBF to zero. Find out what LNBF you have, and how to twist it in its mount, to set it to zero at the top of the arc (also known as TS [true south]).
As a rule of thumb on the C & Ku LNBFs, you set their mark or their zero to "up" or 12 o'clock position.
The C-band LNBFs like the GeoSatPro C2 or WSI/Galaxy 242, their zero mark goes at 9 o'clock.
(double check, as this is from memory)
Set it, lock it, and forget it.

 

[upnatm]

I agree, the skew you want would be either example 1 or example 3, either will change your "V" to "H".

Don't forget to redo the STB settings accordingly.

In your pics Dee-Ann, it looks to me like the small probe is off-angle a wee bit, compared to the
opposing bar it's pointing to. Maybe it's just the camera or flash angle?

Would anyone recommend trying to straighten it out if it is actually out of alignment?
I guess maybe; "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" might apply?

By the way Dee-Ann, you've made great progress in only a few short weeks, WAY TO GO!

Here's to "rocket surgery" --Cheers!

 

[Dee_Ann]

Hi,

Thanks guys for the advice. I'll go try moving the lnb in a short bit.
You've probably saved me many hours of frustration and hair pulling.

I dug up some pictures of the lnb box when I bought it and some pictures of the markings on the back of it.

Aw heck, something came up, will have to continue this later.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Ok..

So I went out and messed with the dish some more. I found more loose bolts on it which would explain why it lost MeTV while I slept. I had aimed it when it was dark and the wind was nil then when the sun came up the wind started blowing pretty hard and those loose bolts let it move a good bit. Fixed....


Then I spent a few hours messing with the lnb and rescanning over and over. So I got it where now the channels show up in the horizontal on a blind scan and no longer on the vertical. The picture is strong and stable and very clear. It looks GOOD....

The NASA channels come in really good too. Sometimes I like to watch it when I'm bored. They have some pretty space pictures, planets, stuff like that and I was pleased to see that there are a lot of women working at NASA. I find that to be inspirational.. And very cool...

I've watched a few shuttle launches and it's really cool when they put cameras all over the thing and play it back as all the parts separate and splash down. And I love stuff about Mars. Mars is a very cool planet. I would go if I was offered a ride. Even if it was one way. One of these days there will be pioneers there homesteading like they did in the old west. Sadly though, not in my day.. Even if it does happen, I'll be way too old by then...


I could not find ThisTV no matter what I tried and I tried everything.

So, MeTV is coming in really strong and clear and I'm very happy about that.

RTV better get on the stick. I've reached the point where I've seen all the Adam-12 and Dragnet episodes, several times over. That said, I am breaking out of my 4pm routine and switching over to Hawaii 5.0 at 4pm on MeTV instead.

I used to watch Daytime a lot but since Dave left and that new guy replaced him, meh........ So, I Love Lucy is stepping into that time frame for me.

That pretty much eliminates everything I watched on RTV.
I still check Tuff TV at midnight because sometimes they play a really good BAD movie. Old B movies are sometimes cool.. They don't always have something but I always at least check. Here lately they have broken out of their re-run loop and have been showing "new" material. Thank you...

There's soooooo much good stuff on MeTV !!

And now that History is history, it helps fill that gap too especially in the evenings and weekends.

Well, I know there is other stuff on that satellite but for now I'm leaving that dish alone, not touching it because it's getting me a LOT of good stuff that tickles me pink! Besides, I am now working on the BIG ten foot dish and I'll have that one up and working in a few weeks and I WILL fully utilize the motor on it. With that dish I can get the other stuff this one can't get plus so much more...

This has been one very rough, hard learning experience and it came so flippin close to pushing me over the edge, several times. You don't know how close I came to pushing that bleepin thing off the pole, jumping up and down on it to crush it into a ball and roll it to the curb! Oh so close!

I'm glad I didn't though because this is sooooo awesome!

Thank you guys for your help and inspiration and nudging me along when I was ready to give up...

You guys are awesome!

 

[PopcornNMore]

Out of all the channels on AMC3 "THIS" comes in the weakest for some reason and is usually not watchable on my 8' dish even when all other channels have a signal strength over 70%. Others on this forum had said that "THIS" comes in the strongest. I can't wait until the weather gets warmer, so I can adjust my dish as well.

Congratulations Dee on your success.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Hmmmmm.

I was watching I Love Lucy and at 8:55am the signal dropped out and is now gone. NASA is still coming in very clear and strong so I know the dish is still dead on and hasn't moved. Wind is nil. If NASA works flawlessly then MeTV should too.

Do they shut off in the daytime??

I'm not touching ANYTHING because I know everything here is right and correct. I'm hoping they will be back later.
I was really wanting to watch Perry Mason.

Oh well. I'll get a few hours sleep and hope for the best.

Please tell me this is will fix itself.

Thanks!

 

[Phottoman]

HA, since when does ANYTHING "fix it's self?"

Dee, did you try the slight pulling up from in front of the dish and see if that improved your signal? And pushing down (just slightly in either case) to see if THAT improved your signal?

You might want to try that again.

And it is NOT TRUE that because one channel is still there that another should be too. You will remember when you first got signal from this satellite but there was still some tweaking to be done?

I would suggest that you go back to METV and try the pulling and pushing test, NOT on a strong signal like NASA.

If your signal improves, you will have to move the entire dish (again) but you are SO-O-O-O-O close.

Photto

 

[Blindowl1234]

I've always have to wait for This Tv to sort of pop in...It sits there with a blank screen and eventually there it is....Blind

 

[Phottoman]

Yeah, Blind, but she said she was watching it and it went away.

Photto

 

[Dee_Ann]

Yes. It was working really, really great all night and morning without issue then just dropped out. No wind, no rain, no bad weather other than a bit overcast. All the ku dishes are working fine, even the finicky PBS S2 channels on 125.

MeTV had been very sharp and strong then, POOF! Gone.
I'm in my jammies In bed about to go to sleep for the day so further tests will have to wait till this evening when I get up for the "day". I keep weird hours.

I need to get that 10 foot dish going and be done with the kiddie games and toy dishes. I wish I could afford to pick up that monster dish we found out in the country last year. I'm sure it's 16 foot. THAT would do it!!

 

[sergei]

I"ve got THIS ( Solomon and Sheba )on right now on my 8 foot dish with a quality signal of 76 and I've never so far had any issue getting it, so either your dish is out of adjustment or perhaps the lnb/lnbf needs a little adjusting.

 

[Dee_Ann]

Oh I read something about it's best to have a "pll" type lnb.
True, yes no?? Suggestions for a GOOD lnb that does c and ku and uses voltage to change polarity like this cheap one I have??

The cheap one I bought changes polarity with 13/18 volts just like a ku type. That solves the rotater problem for the horizontal and verticals.

I've been trying to get by on cheap eBay bargain basement junk from china. I think that's a big part of my problems.

Thanks!!

 

[Phottoman]

From what I can understand with the combo LNBF for KU and C Band, they are a real twist to work correctly. The majority of people that I have read in this and other forums have had a LOT of trouble. If you already have that installed, I would just use the C Band side.

I can understand your need and want to go cheaply, heck we all do that. I have been trying for a couple of days to make something work that I really shouldn't waste my time on, but keep trying because the "solution" will cost me $11.95 shipped free, now HOW cheap is THAT?

Photto

 

[PopcornNMore]

I don't know why others aren't experiencing this, but like Dee my "MeTV" and "RTV" channels sometimes drop completely off and then return several hours later having full signal strength. Every other channel on that satellite remains with a very strong signal while "MeTV" and "RTV" channels are out. They return with no adjustment to the dish. It does this roughly 2 times a month usually on a Sunday like they did yesterday.