Improving the signal.

[Boxbhoy]

WTF is going on. The Alsat instruction booklet shows the word 'elevation' on the side of the bracket yet my bracket says latitude on both sides.

Am I thick?

[ramjet]

no , you are not thick !!

mine says the same in the booklet, yet I have been out with my ladders to double check everything and my motor clearly states LATITUDE on both sides and is set to 52 degrees as in the pictures I will upload. my dish is a triax and is set to just under 28 degrees. the motor was aligned on thor at 0.8w when I did mine but that is not my true south position as I am further west like you

so if we start from another angle , if you look at my side on picture (the first one) I have parked the motor on thor on bbc world news and the music channel, and you can clearly see that the dish mounting pole (spigot) from the motor is almost plumb, or very slightly tilted away from my scaffold pole, this means it never gets closer than plumb compared to the mounting pole, this is what you are aiming to do also

so I would suggest you put your box onto bbc world news and let the motor go to where it thinks is 0.8w, after this do not adjust the motor electrically (do not use any buttons or the box remote control), only by physical movement of the mount itself

set the dish to say 28 degrees to 30 degrees, and adjust the motor "elevation" to get the spigot to point almost plumb towards the floor, then move the whole motor mount left or right on the pole brackets (where the brackets clamp the pole) until you can see and hear bbc world news on a tv close by on the ground. then peak this signal with slight tweaks to the dish elevation , the large pole mounting points and possibly a very small change on the motor elevation itself

at least this way you can try to get a strong signal on thor, which is the whole point of this exercise (the starting point)

if you find that you have to move the motor electrically by the buttons, or by the sat box to peak it on thor (like you did previously), then you have not lined it up on thor, the fact is that no left or right adjustment is ever necessary when aligning the motor on thor, its done by manually moving the motor mount left or right as required

you will notice I have tried to give you the best pics I can of my superior motor and dish mount for comparison to yours, although I am 4 degrees south of you by latitude the fact is that the physics mean yours will be the same as mine when your motor mount is correct, or as close as needs be given you are further north than me

when you are on thor, if you stand to the side you will notice the dish is almost "plumb" , ie:- vertical - not tilted back or forward, as you will see in my picture

the reason I keep repeating things and not saying anything new is because there is only the correct info we can give, but I agree the booklet is at odds with the markings on the motor itself, one saying elevation and the other saying latitude

I hope this helps anyway, as we are all agreed that your pictures do indicate it looks "wrong" as you have done it


and ignore any black hammerite spray paint on my pictures, that was done by me afterwards to protect the metalwork and paint job against rusting

[Boxbhoy]

Thanks for that Ramjet.

The sad thing is my setup appears to match yours yet is still no good.

After your last post I adjusted the dish manually on the motor spigot to get the THOR signal to 94% (As opposed to using the buttons)

Again when the motor moves the signal gets gradually worse. 10E is around 40%. By 13E I get nothing.

I think I need to look at the dish bracket. It's reading 18 degrees on one side and 25 on the other. I need to rectify that before I do anything else.

Thanks for that post Ramjet. I appreciate the help.

[ramjet]

Thanks for that Ramjet.

The sad thing is my setup appears to match yours yet is still no good.

After your last post I adjusted the dish manually on the motor spigot to get the THOR signal to 94% (As opposed to using the buttons)

Again when the motor moves the signal gets gradually worse. 10E is around 40%. By 13E I get nothing.

I think I need to look at the dish bracket. It's reading 18 degrees on one side and 25 on the other. I need to rectify that before I do anything else.

Thanks for that post Ramjet. I appreciate the help.

unfortunately, you should not have moved the dish on the motor spigot , but on the pole mount (I can hear the "DOHHHH" from here )

the dish has to be in line when its on the motor spigot , you will see thin centre lines where its been made or welded on the motor spigot, and the dish arm has to line up so that the motor and dish and lnb arm are all "in line" pointing away from the motor pole, you are helped with a "line" underneath that spigot too

once that dish mount is lined up and locked up on the motor spigot, you never , never slacken it


so in simple terms , you adjust the following 3 points

1) the motor mount where the u bolts go around the scaffold pole and are tightened with nuts onto the "bridge" that spans the u bolts

2) the motor elevation (the latitude as marked on the motor plates)

3) the dish elevation adjuster

if you bought the orbital dish that digicon linked to, it has an offset of 25 degrees, whereas my triax is 26 degrees, but that makes only 1 degree of difference, so not much different

I would align the dish on the motor spigot so the motor and dish and lnb arm are all "in line" , then turn the motor mount left or right on the mounting pole to peak thor again, then retest a few other sats

you can see this alignment in this video in post #36 in this thread here http://www.digital-kaos.co.uk/forums...86/index3.html at about 5.10 into the video itself. I have grabbed a screenshot and added it as the 4th picture attachment

the only difference being that he is using a top mount stab motor, whereas our spigot points downwards and not upwards, the principle of that alignment is still the same

to stop the motor "wiggling" down the mounting pole, place a car exhaust u bracket under it and lock it to the pole, this will enable you to swing the motor left and right easily (you will see a split "collar" under mine on the scaffold pole under the lower "bridge" )

[alec]

Even if everything like pole or motor settings are out, if you elevate the dish and manual left and right, you should tuned it to a better signal on that Sat, like a fixed dish. The other problems show up when you move off that Sat and your tracking is out Check the position of the LNB, and connections. It should be at neutral position at true south. The position of the LNB varies from different makes. In fact check on True south that when you behind the motor it is in line with dish and LNB

[Boxbhoy]

I cant get the dish elevation to read the same on both sides of the bracket and am at a loss on what to adjust now.

Everything else looks straight but to be honest because of where the dish is I cant see the LNB and Motor pole at the same time.

I dont see how I'll ever confirm everything is aligned. (There is also no mark on the dish bracket to line up with the split line on the motor pole)

I think I'll try and get a decent signal on 28E and just use the thing as a fixed dish.

[ramjet]

I cant get the dish elevation to read the same on both sides of the bracket and am at a loss on what to adjust now.

Everything else looks straight but to be honest because of where the dish is I cant see the LNB and Motor pole at the same time.

I dont see how I'll ever confirm everything is aligned. (There is also no mark on the dish bracket to line up with the split line on the motor pole)

I think I'll try and get a decent signal on 28E and just use the thing as a fixed dish.

the elevations wont be the same on the dish elevation , they are and will be different and you use one or the other (I cannot tell you which side as I have never seen or fitted your dish)

you can stand below and see if its all in alignment but the time to have done that was on the ground as you see in that video clip

if you look at the bridges on the spigot clamp and mark the middle , this should align with the weld marks on that spigot and if you adjust both sides equally you will get the correct alignment as per picture 4 above

you were close when you got thor at 92% but you adjusted the wrong adjuster, ie:- you adjusted the dish mount on the spigot instead of the rear motor mount as seen in the video clip

the thing about making these mistakes is you learn a lot, and you arent the only one to struggle with this, we have all been there and there are other threads on here where they are struggling too

if you keep it simple, align the motor to the dish and lnb arm as per picture 4 , have the spigot roughly plumb or slightly flared up and get bbc world news on thor at say 92% then you cannot be far out

[Boxbhoy]

28e.jpg

Check out the angle when the motor turns it to 28E It's pointing down, that cant be right?

I can move it all over the shop and dont get a sausage. That's after improving the signal on THOR 0.8W to 92% and sending it to 28E

[digicon]

I think the best thing to do here is take the whole thing down and start again but first send the motor back to '0' before you do anything, if the motor bracket is set on 56? and set the Orbital dish to around 27? and place the motor in-line with the dish as in the last Photo that ramjet posted from the video, Then carry the whole rig up and place back on the pole locate roughly south tighten but not fully tighten motor to pole. Go inside the house and move your dish to 0.8? west and then from there either move the whole rig around the pole very slightly until you peak the signal tighten again and try some other sats.

Good Luck

[Boxbhoy]

I think the best thing to do here is take the whole thing down and start again but first send the motor back to '0' before you do anything, if the motor bracket is set on 56? and set the Orbital dish to around 27? and place the motor in-line with the dish as in the last Photo that ramjet posted from the video, Then carry the whole rig up and place back on the pole locate roughly south tighten but not fully tighten motor to pole. Go inside the house and move your dish to 0.8? west and then from there either move the whole rig around the pole very slightly until you peak the signal tighten again and try some other sats.

Good Luck

Taking it down and putting it up again is not an option. I had to pay the local ariel guy ?50 to put the assembly up. The top of the pole is too high for me to lift it over on my own.

I have the number of a local guy who could align it all for a few quid but I'm not sure I want to go ahead with something I cant tweak myself.

I'll perserve trying to align it but if I cant crack it this weekend it's coming down (mibbee the hard way) and I'll mibbe stick up a smaller fixed dish.

thanks for all the help and advice.

[the goat]

hi, I had problems with setting up my motorised system when I changed dish and VU+ Dou Clone, after lots of re-checking, taking down and putting up again and again, I found it was the images I had loaded, I've found only 1 image that works for me and my setup, If you are sure that everyone is setup right it could be worth trying a different image

[Boxbhoy]

hi, I had problems with setting up my motorised system when I changed dish and VU+ Dou Clone, after lots of re-checking, taking down and putting up again and again, I found it was the images I had loaded, I've found only 1 image that works for me and my setup, If you are sure that everyone is setup right it could be worth trying a different image

That's spooky. I think I may have a problem with either my receiver or image (or motor?) that is the underlying problem.

I yet again tried to square everything up and managed to get THOR 0.8W showing 92% signal. Again the motor is not tracking correctly and gets steadily worse up to about 10E then gives no signal.

So, I thought I would have a play with the receiver (DM800HD SE E-Star Sim) and just treat the dish as a fixed dish on THOR 0.8W.

When I did a manual scan I get 8 foreign channels. I know I should be getting more, including BBC World News which Ramjet has mentioned a few times.

I then loaded the most up to date satellite.xml & Bouquet for 0.8W I can find. Now I have a long list of channels on 0.8W including 4 or 5 BBC Worlds. When I try to go to one of these channels I get 'Tune failed'

I then go back to the satellite finder and see that my signal on THOR 0.8W is now 0%.

I check the dish and it has not moved. After a bit of head scratching I changed my Longitude in the tuner config. to 4.16 W (from 3.16W) just to see if it makes any difference. Low and behold my signal jumps from 0% to 65%. I then changed the longitude back to 3.16W and the signal goes back to 92%.

When I try and tune in a channel again - signal back to 0%.

Something wrong there eh?

I'm using the image that came loaded with the box, Openpli 3.0. I think tonight I'll try and flash a different one.

[ramjet]

I know this may not help but I never trust a linux box for this task, I now use a spiderbox when lining up motors, but previously I used a technomate 1500 (both are simple to use, reliable and you can check signal and quality onscreen on the spiderbox by pressing the info button once or twice. I am sure other boxes can easily be used so just giving an opinion based on my experiences

those dm800 estars are clones as dmm havent made the 800 for years, so no idea how good they are, or the images or files on them, my genuine 800 has the edg image on it but is on a fixed feed from 28e, not from my motor

I would have installed the motorised version of the latest catseye lists using dreamboxedit too, which I have on my genuine duo

as you have a good signal on thor, its worth checking the box as you say. bear in mind that the motor and dish elevations affect the arc and you can have a pronounced sharp arc or a flatter arc, meaning you can miss satellites

if I can find the picture of this phenomenon I will post it

edit, here are some pics of it explaining more of those details, hope it helps

[Boxbhoy]

Thanks again Ramjet.

So, I flashed a new image (blackhole) and the behaviour is the same. It's very odd.
I scan on thor 0.8W at 90% signal and get 28 foreign channels. I then load the catseye bouquet for 0.8W and try and go to bbc world. Tune Failed. I then go back to Satfinder and the signal has dropped to 0%. On this image though rather than a flat 0% the signal pulses up and down every 3 seconds or so. If I then move the dish to the next sat and back it goes back to a stable 90%.

Where do I go from here? It looks like I have problems other than alignment. Dodgy LNB?

My LNB is this one: INVERTO BLACK ULTRA HIGH-GAIN SINGLE LNB | eBay

cheers.

[ramjet]

should be fine with the inverto, got one myself (the twin)

when you scan thor and get only a few channels , how and why are you absolutely sure its thor ?
do you get bbc world news and the music channel and btv1 ? (all fta)

when you put in the catseye motorised list, its up to date so you should have no problems with his list, certainly not tune fail

I think it has an up to date satellites xml file too, and BH should work ok as I use it on my vu duo with the catseye lists

one problem I notice in your replies is you rarely elaborate on what you say you see, remember , we cannot see what you see so we have to question everything

thor at 0.8w has hundreds of channels , not 28 , but we always start with the fta channels liike I mentioned before , so I am not even convinced that your 92% reading is thor at all

so when you say you get 28 channels , name some of the fta ones seen, so we can check your findings, because another member here said he was on thor and it turned out he was on 23.5 east and not 0.8 west !

As I said earlier, I wouldnt even attempt what you are doing with a linux box , I would rather do it with an old SD box like the tm1500 or clarke 1500

too many variables on a linux box, and you are using a clone box which I wouldnt trust anyway

also, note that under satfinder you have to be on an active transponder on the satellite, otherwise you may get bad results

your lnb is controlled by 4 possible states , horizontal and vertical , and 13 volts and 18 volts, and 22 khz tone switching too
so maybe your estar hasnt been set correctly to operate your universal lnb ? who knows ?
maybe you have a fault on the coax cable like a strand of wire shorting out between the outer braid and inner core ? - who knows ?
maybe the lnb is faulty, although I doubt it ? - who knows

finally , concentrate on getting these 3 channels from 0.8 west thor before going any further (what I told you earlier)

0.8w showing good signals on 11900H 28000 music channel and 11862H 28000 bbc world news and 11247V 24500 btv-1 (all fta channels)