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Satellite Launches and Retirements
Eutelsat Hot Bird 13F & 13G
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<blockquote data-quote="Fisty McB" data-source="post: 1144682" data-attributes="member: 389824"><p>Can definitely vouch for this. The UK & Ireland spot beams on the Astra 2E/F/G satellites are <em>ridiculously</em> strong. Maybe a touch less stronger than the old DBS birds of the early 90's , but within the planned service area of the beam they are by far the most powerful Ku-Band signals in the Clarke Belt in my experience. Eutelsat have published the footprints of the 2E & 2F satellites that show more detail than Astra's own published footptint, and they show a 58 dbW contour essentially covering the whole of the UK & Ireland except for the Shetland Isles & maybe the extreme SW corners of Co. Kerry - I'd guess that the centre of the beam (in around the Isle of Man) is hitting >60 dbW. Even the European beams on these satellites are pretty powerful, albeit less than the spot beams, even the wide European beam on Astra 2G. I've no issues with reception on a 45cm dish here in Co. Tyrone for all services from 28E, even those on the 2G European beam. At worst, you might lose reception of the weakest signals no more than a handful of times per year due to heavy rain, and the strongest once or twice a year. There are exceptional circumstances that can happen, a few years back I had my motorised 120cm dish trained on 28E during a thunderous rainstorm and everything was lost, even that size of a dish couldn't win in that battle. Nonetheless, a properly installed 45cm dish or a Sky Zone 1 dish (the mk4 version is roughly equivalent to a 50cm standard offset dish in my calculations) will easily give service from 28E in the UK & Ireland in over 99% of locations for >99.9% of the time.</p><p></p><p>However, this can take into account the general climate of the areas being served. The temperate climate of the British & Irish Isles sees plenty of rain, but rarely sees vast amounts fall in a very short period of time, so rain fade conditions should be calculated to take this into account. In my experience, if your SNR reception of a transponder is at least 3db higher than the minimum needed in dry conditions, you should be fine in all but the most torrential rain in this part of the world for Ku-Band reception in most cases.</p><p></p><p></p><p></p><p>In windy conditions, smaller dishes actually have two advantages over larger dishes - (1) they have a lower wind load, meaning that they are less likely to temporarily deform from their parabolic shape when facing strong winds, as well as putting less stress on any mounts they are on - particularly so when the dish is mounted on a pole above a bracket usually affixed to a wall and thus subject to some wobble. (2) Smaller dishes have a wider 3db beamwidth compared to larger dishes. This not only makes them a little easier to initially align (assuming a lack of interference from nearby birds), but also allows a little more "give" to be had if such a dish is temporarily put out of alignment being on a shaky pole. A similar principle applies to dishes on ships that are designed to receive from geostationary satellites - these dishes are affixed to a stabilisation system that continiously adjusts from the movement of the ship as it travels to ensure that the dish remains pointed to a particular spot in the sky. However, they are not absolutely perfect and a little amount of legroom is desirable to ensure that during certain periods of heavy seas where the pitch & roll of the ship can vary a lot, reaction times from the stabiliser are good enough so that reception from the wanted satellite(s) is not lost. In this sense it is best to use the smallest dish practical, usually at a similar size to domestic installations on dry land assuming an equal dbW value..</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Fisty McB, post: 1144682, member: 389824"] Can definitely vouch for this. The UK & Ireland spot beams on the Astra 2E/F/G satellites are [I]ridiculously[/I] strong. Maybe a touch less stronger than the old DBS birds of the early 90's , but within the planned service area of the beam they are by far the most powerful Ku-Band signals in the Clarke Belt in my experience. Eutelsat have published the footprints of the 2E & 2F satellites that show more detail than Astra's own published footptint, and they show a 58 dbW contour essentially covering the whole of the UK & Ireland except for the Shetland Isles & maybe the extreme SW corners of Co. Kerry - I'd guess that the centre of the beam (in around the Isle of Man) is hitting >60 dbW. Even the European beams on these satellites are pretty powerful, albeit less than the spot beams, even the wide European beam on Astra 2G. I've no issues with reception on a 45cm dish here in Co. Tyrone for all services from 28E, even those on the 2G European beam. At worst, you might lose reception of the weakest signals no more than a handful of times per year due to heavy rain, and the strongest once or twice a year. There are exceptional circumstances that can happen, a few years back I had my motorised 120cm dish trained on 28E during a thunderous rainstorm and everything was lost, even that size of a dish couldn't win in that battle. Nonetheless, a properly installed 45cm dish or a Sky Zone 1 dish (the mk4 version is roughly equivalent to a 50cm standard offset dish in my calculations) will easily give service from 28E in the UK & Ireland in over 99% of locations for >99.9% of the time. However, this can take into account the general climate of the areas being served. The temperate climate of the British & Irish Isles sees plenty of rain, but rarely sees vast amounts fall in a very short period of time, so rain fade conditions should be calculated to take this into account. In my experience, if your SNR reception of a transponder is at least 3db higher than the minimum needed in dry conditions, you should be fine in all but the most torrential rain in this part of the world for Ku-Band reception in most cases. In windy conditions, smaller dishes actually have two advantages over larger dishes - (1) they have a lower wind load, meaning that they are less likely to temporarily deform from their parabolic shape when facing strong winds, as well as putting less stress on any mounts they are on - particularly so when the dish is mounted on a pole above a bracket usually affixed to a wall and thus subject to some wobble. (2) Smaller dishes have a wider 3db beamwidth compared to larger dishes. This not only makes them a little easier to initially align (assuming a lack of interference from nearby birds), but also allows a little more "give" to be had if such a dish is temporarily put out of alignment being on a shaky pole. A similar principle applies to dishes on ships that are designed to receive from geostationary satellites - these dishes are affixed to a stabilisation system that continiously adjusts from the movement of the ship as it travels to ensure that the dish remains pointed to a particular spot in the sky. However, they are not absolutely perfect and a little amount of legroom is desirable to ensure that during certain periods of heavy seas where the pitch & roll of the ship can vary a lot, reaction times from the stabiliser are good enough so that reception from the wanted satellite(s) is not lost. In this sense it is best to use the smallest dish practical, usually at a similar size to domestic installations on dry land assuming an equal dbW value.. [/QUOTE]
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Eutelsat Hot Bird 13F & 13G
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