The Aero Thread..

[Vipersan]

OK ...WARNING ...do Not buy one of these dishes unless you are prepared for a fair bit of work ..
Not only have the piercings been round and not square but looks like the mount holes for the tripod are also in the exact opposite locations to where they should be ..
Thus it might be possible to drill new holes but I suspect either the 2 side holes are wrong ...or the centre hole for the tripod is at the wrong end of the dish ..
To be honest its difficult to tell at this point due to the shape of the dish ..
...What I will say is that this company has no right selling what is clearly an imperfect dish ...and obviously defectively made ..
A novice would have absolutely no chance of rectifying these mistakes ...
rgds
VS

 

[Lazarus]

Sorry to hear this.

Buying dishes has been a bit of a bogey for you of late, it seems.

 

[Vipersan]

Getting somewhere I think ...
It certinly doesnt look like an offset dish ...
More like a laterally shortened PF ...
ie Oval ..
??
but as I said ..is difficult to judge by eye ..
but at least the support tripod can be fitted ...
Question is ....is it correctly placed ?
rgds

..Oh ..and there were some screws missing ..
the ones for the lnb bracket ..
x2

 

[Vipersan]

So ...
managed to lock a mux on Astra 3B at 8db ....but only by lowering the elevation to the max ...
So dish is now vertical ?
..and cannot go lower ...so anything East of this may well not be doable as it stands ..
The Elevation scale pointer currently reads 16.5 ...when it should be reading 24.4 ...
Yes this dish has been constructed wrongly ..
Bizzare indeed that they are selling it ...but there it is ..
Some enterprising pillock has bought a job lot of imperfect seconds and pushing them onto an unsuspecting public ..
to put it words Peter Griffin would understand ..
'You know what _really_ grinds my gears ?"

 

[Vipersan]

...So ..got a choice here I guess ..
I could try drilling another hole at the top ...reversing the tripod ..and mounting from the top ...
This may correct the problem ..IF ..the dish was drilled incorrectly ...
..and would possibly help keep water out of the lnb ..
Or I could mount the dish on a slope pointing into the ground ..
..
Either way ..I can't return this beast now ..so ...let the games begin..
doh!

 

[Lazarus]

Some dishes come with a reversible backplate, so you can avail yourself of whichever is the best range of adjustment for your Latitude.

So, is there a different scale on the other side of the bracket?

 

[Lazarus]

Actually, looking at your first pic, surely the backplate is on upside down?

Reversing it might give you a better adjustment range and it will raise the dish from sitting just above the slab.

 

[Vipersan]

No the scale on the other side is identical

..and ..cant see how it would help G ...
The hole spacings on the curved dish back brace only allow for mounting in one direction ...
The scale is embossed into this back brace ...so no ..
This to me is doesn't seem a possibility..

 

[Lazarus]

Oh, bu**er

 

[Vipersan]

Actually, looking at your first pic, surely the backplate is on upside down?

Reversing it might give you a better adjustment range and it will raise the dish from sitting just above the slab.

Therein lies the problem ...
You cant upend that backplate ..
The hole spacings are not evenly distributed..
The bulk of any backplate usually hangs lower ...not above the pivot point ...
If I could reverse it ...I would ...
but this would make nonesense of the upside down embossed scale anyway.

 

[Lazarus]

It's crap, my friend.

 

[Vipersan]

It's crap, my friend.

Agreed ...but it may well serve my purpose fixed at 25E ..
But ..certainly I would not advise anyone buy one for anything other than fixed use ....and then be prepared for some work...
This dish has been pierced wrongly imo ...
that back brace looks correct but should be higher up on the dish curve ...
It's just plain wrong..but I can maybe salvage it for 25E C band use..

 

[Vipersan]

So ...I've up ended the back plate ...which of course no longer aligns with all six holes ..
but I can pick up 4 of them ..
No surprise there ...
This means the scale is upside down and useless ...but there is always a trusty meter and guesswork to reply on ..
..plus I can now mount the dish higher off the slab..
I will have to drill 2 new holes in the reflector ...but that's later ..
In the meantime I'm seeing if I can now decline further ..
rgds
VS

 

[Lazarus]

So I'm not such a numpty after all? ;)

 

[Vipersan]

So I'm not such a numpty after all? ;)

Didn't suggest you were buddy ..
But obviously this pile of carp has been made wrong ...
So now it's a case of try n fix the flaws...
which are considerable.
I'm in with a shout IF the dish wasn't pierced upside down ..and the tripod at the wrong end ...
which is still a possibility..
sadly

 

[Lazarus]

One wonders what yer average punter would make of it ........ at least you have the ability to re-engineer stuff to make it do what you need it to.

Imagine a Sky ladder-monkey trying to install summat like that.

 

[Archive-8]

Yeah I can, on my flat in Sherborne, I have an 80cm dish, smr99g h2h mount, 24" t&k's on the wall.

Well the block is having roof repairs, and general building maintaince, and needs scaffolding up for quite a few months.

Well they told me that all the sky sat dishes are being relocated to the out side of the scaffolding. And they wanted to pay sky to take down my motor dish completely and, when it was time to put it back up, they wanted to use sky to do it!

I politely told them what I thought of that option! And said I would arrange the removal and re installing of it, but still think I should get £50 of the bill I am being charged for my share of the cost, of the building work.

 

[Lazarus]

Ah, the old Satellite = Sky mantra

 

[Vipersan]

I'm not sure this is performing as well as I'd hoped ..
So many variables when physically making changes ..
I currently have Astra 3B in focus ..
..but max signal is about 11db from 11836 H
Tricky to make comparisons atm ...as the 1.5 is missing its lnb ..
but is 11db what youd expect ?
nothing to compare to atm .
rgds
VS

 

[s-band]

I currently have Astra 3B in focus ..
..but max signal is about 11db from 11836 H

16dB on a 1.5m here which equates to 7.5dB higher at RF if you were using a TBS6983.
I'm not sure how the footprint varies between us.