New house, new dish project

[Archived-1]

Hi C/J, ive just started work on my garden and from floor to the center of the dish is just over 6ft and its solid, and as you know I only have one post in the ground,

 

[Captain Jack]

Thanks Martin - looks good!

Due to it being a rental property, to avoid digging holes I am currently veering towards using my heavy duty tripod stand with a couple of kerb stones at 40kg each on each of the three legs - should hold the dish down. Still don't know how high it has to go to get over the house but I do have a decent western view of the sky beyond 30W, even from ground level, so looking forward for some C band hunting that way.

As the pole is 3 inches in diameter, I was thinking of sticking a 2 inch scaffold pole inside and hold it with some exhaust reducers for more stability.

Already had the stand sandblasted and primed so it's ready for painting and putting up!

 

[Huevos]

CJ, off-topic, but what image are you using on the Vu+ Uno? And have you got a twin tuner in it?

 

[Captain Jack]

I use the latest VIX on there with an original single tuner unit it came with when I bought it.

For hunting, I'll probably invest in a TM5402HD or perhaps a PC card.

 

[Huevos]

For hunting, I'll probably invest in a TM5402HD or perhaps a PC card.

For feeds ViX is king. Due to the filters it can separate the feeds from the regular transponders, and avoid anything that is coming from adjacent satellites. Pity the single tuner in the Vu isn't too sensitive though. I've been playing with the twin tuner lately and it does seem a bit more sensitive. I'm picking up a few more borderline channels in C-band compared with the single tuner.

PC card sounds good.

 

[Captain Jack]

Just been to the house and the situation from the back of the garden is not as bleak as I thought. Here are the shots of DishPointer app from the location where I think I will put the dish at my height level - about 1.8m from the ground.



Looks like the eastern front is out of the question but I maaay be able to squeeze in up to 50E - hopefully 55E. From the same location, the far western front is behind the trees/bushes so I could put my prime focus on the side of the garden where I get a much better view.



Of course, there also the option of putting a smaller DiSEqC motor driven dish (Gibby 1m?) on the side of the house. On that wall, the eastern view is unlimited and the dish doesn't even have to be sitting over the house roof line, as long as it can see over the neighbour's double garage. Putting it over the roof line would give me pretty much 100% of the available arc but that would put the dish in plain view. Not that 1m isn't allowed... hm...

 

[Captain Jack]

Sit rep - done a site survey with a loosely aligned Penta 85 at different heights and here's the result:

At around 1m height, I can receive from around 45W to 13E but at reduced power towards the eastern satellites. Nothing at all beyond 13E at this level (dish pointing at 1W).

View attachment 56402

At around 2m height, I can receive from 45W to 28E and then 45/46E at reduced power. I cannot receive anything from 36E/39E/42E. I am guessing the arc clips the roof-line as per dishpointer photos in the previous post. Though, I am sure I can get 36/39/42E cluster by moving the pole/dish further to the right but the dish would then be visible by the neighbour behind me.

View attachment 56403

So here's the dilemma. Do I 1) risk putting the 1.2m dish in the garden with a limited view to the east at a 2m height with more but not perfect visibility or do I 2) put it at lower height level away from view and put a 1m Gibby up on the wall to the side of the house to receive the eastern side? The only issue there is that I won't have any C-band access in the east, though western parts will be OK. From the side of the house, my eastern view is good:



I am tempted to go for option 2) but would like to hear your thoughts.

 

[Captain Jack]

Will be going for option 2 - the wife came home, saw the Penta in the garden, which happened to be right in front of the kitchen window and went "Wow, that's big!" (oo-errr!). Even though the 1.2m is even bigger! So will keep it as low key as possible - paint it to blend with the fence and put the 1m on the side of the house, hidden-ish away from view.

 

[timo_w2s]

Yeah, I think I'd do that too. Tricky to know what would work best though but sometimes you have to compromise a little anyway.

 

[Captain Jack]

If the rain manages to hold off, I'll make a start on the installation today. Tomorrow should be a better day if not today. Getting some paint so I can spray the dish with something fence coloured as well as the mount itself.

 

[Lazarus]

Looking forward to progress reports and pics.

 

[timo_w2s]

Yep, keep us updated.

 

[Captain Jack]

My car blowing up stopped play.... either the turbo has gone or one of the intercooler pipes. Time to investigate

 

[Lazarus]

Oh dear - I hope that's not going to be too expensive, CJ.

 

[Captain Jack]

Bottom intercooler hose/pipe has split - a new one a £60 but trying to find a used one from some breakers....

Rain stopped play and I've been called out to work Managed to spray paint the stand in black so it's a start.

 

[hdp160]

For my penny worth it would definitely be bottom of the garden.

Perhaps an IBC tank if you can beg borrow or whatever one. 1/2 filled with water (or sand) for foundation?

Certainly easy to relocate later. (and plenty of opportunities for attachment.

 

[Captain Jack]

Welp, it's up. Started at 7am(!) today as the sky was blue and it's looking like it's going to rain now.

Started off arranging the kerbs I bought for the best stand support. Started with this:

View attachment 56523

But changed it in the end and final arrangement was thus:

View attachment 56524

Feels fairly sturdy - I don't think it will be going anywhere. The kerbs are 40kg each and the mount itself weights at least 15kg. The SDS drill and drillbit made drilling into them very easy. I would still be drilling now with a standard masonry bit!

Spray painted the dish and ran out of paint... doesn't look too bad even if it is unfinished! Now the fun started. I put the jack arm that came with the polar mount and it was in real need of refurbishment. It worked but was incredibly loud so I decided to strip it. While doing that, I also stripped my finger....



Moving on... took the thing apart, brushed, cleaned and greased the rod (oo-err!) and it was better, noise-wise but had a lot of play in it, so I abandoned it in favour of another one I had. This one came with the Precision 1.2m dish and is HEAVY DUTY. But it's whisper quiet - amazingly quiet. My new SuperJack didn't sound this quiet. The only problem I have with it is the reed sensor. It's some glass one(?) and quite temperamental - I have to have it just so in order for it to work. Can I replace it with a standard one? There's still a normal magnetic wheel spinning, so I don't see why I couldn't.

The other concern I have is that that actuation is heavy - I think it's too heavy for the CM polar mount, though it seems to be sat quite solidly on it. There's very little play when it's folded but increases to quite a lot when extended. A little too much for my liking but there's not much towards the east that I can see anyway. Once I adapt a C band LNB onto it, I'll see how much I can see towards the west and adjust the jack on its holder.

Here are the final pictures:

View attachment 56527 View attachment 56528

Satellites I can see are everything from 45W to 28E-ish in Ku, possibly further towards the west with C band but I couldn't see anything on 61W due to trees. Signal starts to fade from 13E onwards but still strong. I couldn't see 21.5E or 23E on my FS1 meter for some reason (maybe out of date transponder). Nothing from 26E either... Could get a lock on 33E, 36E and 42E but it's quite weak. I guess the roof is shadowing a lot of the signal. Could see signal on 39E but only 2dB on Fs1 and no lock.

Speaking of Fs1 - it's quite a nifty little meter! I like it and is very quick at locking the signal, even when I am going full speed across the arc.

And speaking of Manhattan Plaza ST500... urgh, what a horrible software. Everything is all over the place. So temperamental and very user unfriendly. I am sure it's OK once I work it out but I won't be doing that. The only reason I used it is because it has a 36V positioner and I still need to order a Vbox/Gbox..whatever they are called now.

Currently have a BU LNB on there but once I wire everything up and fine tune alignment, I'll experiment with the feedhorn and C120 BU conversion....

Now, let's see what the wife says when she comes home....

 

[Lazarus]

Nice work CJ

 

[pride21]

coming along nicely CJ,when my reed sensor went i replaced it with one from maplin and it works ok.

 

[Captain Jack]

Thanks. I have a question. For a better accuracy, what's the best hole to put the actuator in? The one on the edge or the second one?