Astra 2F: Iberia & Balearics Discussion

[spain-boy]

Hi .Hope this is the right place to pose this novice question .
Holiday home is in north costa brava.
I know that at some point a dish upgrade might be required when Astra2 signal changes .

Last time there in april needed to adjust the dish mounted on the flat roof as the local strong wind had blown it out of kilter .
Got a local engineer finally arrived to tune it in properly - it worked out at about 1euro per second in charges
So the question is.... as a "professional" finder/signal meter costs £thousands......can I buy my own cheaper ( say £100 or under )
that would be good enough for me to learn how to retune myself when the wind blows the dish out again ?

And what features / spec should I seek ?

 

[Lazarus]

A dish of the size stated in your profile can be tweaked without a meter at all, provided you can see the results on the receiver (or have them reported to you). But yes, a cheap meter - even a 10€ needle indicator one - can be used for optimising.

With much bigger dishes (well above 1m) then a quality meter with all the bells and whistles would be a better proposition.

Finally, if the wind keeps blowing the dish out of position, that suggests it isn't adequately mounted - perhaps the cause needs attention ............... ??

 

[spain-boy]

The local wind is called tramontana and is known to on occasions to blow walls over , so even with correct mounting on the flat roof ( the only possible mounting point due to trees ) it is likely to get deflected .
I did consider building a solid wind deflecting wall , but until I know if I will ultimately need to get a much larger dish when the signal change happens
it is not worthwhile .
So....assuming in the future , a larger dish ( I have heard rumours of 1.2 to 2.4 m , the truth is no one knows ) will be required .

I will need a better quality meter than a needle type , so what "whistles and bells" do you recomend ?

 

[Lazarus]

Tramontana, eh?

I've just Googled it (other Search Engines are available) >>> "The continuous howling noise of the tramontane is said to have a disturbing effect upon the psyche" ............... and fixed dishes, it seems.

Not an expert in Meters, so you'll need to wait for the big boys on that.

 

[Huevos]

So the question is.... as a "professional" finder/signal meter costs £thousands......can I buy my own cheaper ( say £100 or under )
that would be good enough for me to learn how to retune myself when the wind blows the dish out again ?

No you can't tune it with a cheap meter or squawker. You need something that can get digital lock on the signal or has a spectrum analyzer. The reason is 30E and 26E have very strong transponders so it is not possible to zero in on 28E using a squawker, or other device that does not check digital lock.

 

[Juan69]

Spain boy a Magic Finder Plus is a very easy meter to use and is able to identify and name any satellites as you attempt to adjust the dish. Very useful for an amateur such as myself.

 

[spain-boy]

Thanks for replies .
I am keen to learn , so excuse my ignorance ..........

Sleepy hollow -what is digital lock , and how much must I spend for something that checks digital lock ?

Juan69 - tried to look up magic finder plus 3, got some images which looked the part for ease of use , but I didnt find anywhere to buy one - any ideas ?

Any other thoughts would be appreciated .

 

[Huevos]

what is digital lock

You are in a noisy bar with a friend...

1, it's so noisy you can't hear a word he says,
2, you hear some of what he says, but not enough to understand the message,
3, you hear just enough that you can work out with 100% certainty exactly what the message is,
4, you hear exactly what he says and don't need to fill in any blanks.

Digital lock is when the receiver or meter is operating at level 3 or above. To know you have digital lock requires a meter that incorporates a digital decoder. As the meter goes up in price the information it gives about how well the decoding is going increases.

 

[Juan69]

Beautifully explained. Gosh you are good !

 

[spain-boy]

Thanks - now wiser as to the description of issue , however ,
still none the wiser as to what the actual minimum spec ( numbers and units ) required to successfully do the tuning at level 3 ,
and ball park figure to buy such a piece of kit new or used .

 

[Huevos]

still none the wiser as to what the actual minimum spec ( numbers and units ) required to successfully do the tuning at level 3 ,
and ball park figure to buy such a piece of kit new or used .

That depends on the error correction level transmitted with wanted signal. This is different from one transponder to another so you will have to look it up on Lyngsat.

Ball park figure all depends what you want. To get you a meter at a level that is better than using a squawker and STB in combination you need to spend about 300€ (Satlook lite, or similar). And to get something really decent with a realtime spectrum analyzer you need to spend about 3 times that. In between you have meters that are pretty good, like the Satlook Micro, that give plenty of info, but the spectrum is not realtime.

 

[joddle]

^{Well - I'm back to the UK for a longish break during which time 2E should be sent up and hopefully will be sqwalking so I am relying on you guys to keep this thread up to date with plenty of reception reports so I know what kit to bring back with me in September should it be needed!!!!}

 

[Huevos]

Might not be switched on by then if 2F is anything to go by. I'm quite looking forward to it. And even if the worst comes to the worst, 2F is already carrying BBC1 HD, ITV1 HD, ITV1+1, C4HD, C5, etc, etc.

 

[interested newbie]

ITV and ITV3 on Sky gone in Algarve

 

[woborny]

reports from all over spain about loss of ITV, but also people in some areas of in the UK have also lost ITV.

so it looks to be an ITV problem.

 

[Mr Hoover]

There's a problem with ITV1 SD regions on satellite at the moment.
ITV2 SD is back on,ITV 4 SD is ok,ITV 1 London on 973 is OK (for non London area boxes).
ITV 3 SD Off.
Hugh

 

[interested newbie]

Thank you, I contacted quite a lot of people but I'm glad to know it may not be forever.

 

[Cala d'or]

There's a problem with ITV1 SD regions on satellite at the moment.
ITV2 SD is back on,ITV 4 SD is ok,ITV 1 London on 973 is OK (for non London area boxes).
ITV 3 SD Off.
Hugh

I have just returned from Mallorca where I was only there for 4 days and I had problems with ITV Granada HD which is on 10994H. Across 2F in april I was getting a meter reading for Quality of 10.2 which equates to about 70% on my Humax HDR . All the other 2F tps were ok . Sig 90% Q 70 % but 10994 was 90% sig and Q 40% and breaking up. I didn't have my meter with me hence all the % figures . Any ideas , I can see that there have been some issues with signal.

 

[Juan69]

I ´ve never had 10994 H here in Murcia. Most everything else except for the five cluster seems OK.

 

[joddle]

Just tested 10994H on my Humax in Valencia - getting 80% SS and 100% quality on the box using 10db of in line attenuator.