[Seismo]

I've been having a heckuva time with my DirecTV lately. First, some of my HD channels started going out, now all my locals are out - both standard and HD.
I think I have some trees growing up in the way.
If I go to my HR20's satellite signal meter, here's what I see:

101° - Signal not acquired
110° - 56-57% on both tuners
119° - 94-95% on both tuners
99°(s) - Signal not acquired
103°(s) - Signal not acquired
103°(c) - Signal not acquired


If I knew where in the sky that the satellites were located it should help me figure out which trees to cut down. Has anyone seen such a diagram?

 

[evan_s]

www.dishpointer.com should help you out.

 

[Mertzen]

I'd say your dish is loose and has shifted. I've seen similar levels on loose dishes that moved an inch or so.

Can you get to your dish? Does it look loose? Does it have two support brackets ?

Plus in your neck of the woods trees would firts take out 119 and 110 in most situations.

 

[Seismo]

I'd say your dish is loose and has shifted. I've seen similar levels on loose dishes that moved an inch or so.

Can you get to your dish? Does it look loose? Does it have two support brackets ?

Plus in your neck of the woods trees would firts take out 119 and 110 in most situations.

It's possible that it's loose although it was just aligned about a month ago.
There are no support brackets. It's a 4x4 post I cemented into the ground 9 years ago.
Just to give you an idea - here's what my treeline looks like (just took this picture 10 minutes ago).

 

[RobertE]

Not the trees. Alignment or the LNB/switch has died.

 

[dshu82]

It is possible that the 4x4 has warped, especially considering it is 9 years old and in the middle of a GA summer. May be time to get it up on the house, or a pole mount.

Trees look far enough away.....

 

[EricJRW]

It is possible that the 4x4 has warped, especially considering it is 9 years old and in the middle of a GA summer. May be time to get it up on the house, or a pole mount.

Trees look far enough away.....

Steel is real... I would not trust a wood pole. :up_to_som :new_cussi

 

[BattleZone]

Yes, there is a reason why installers use steel posts instead of wood: you can count on a wooden post to warp and misalign the dish.

 

[2dogz]

It is possible that the 4x4 has warped, especially considering it is 9 years old and in the middle of a GA summer. May be time to get it up on the house, or a pole mount.

Trees look far enough away.....

A pressure treated 4x4 is going to do all its warping in the first six months or so after being put in the ground or attached to a deck. You would probably have to tweek the dish at 3 and/or 6 months after install (why D* doesn't like them) but should be stable after that with a rain cap on the top. Water is just not absorbed from the sides of the post much because of the way Mother Nature designed trees (water goes up, not left to right).

From the picture, although camera angles can be deceiving, it looks like the dish is seeing sats well above the trees.

 

[EricJRW]

A pressure treated 4x4 is going to do all its warping in the first six months or so after being put in the ground or attached to a deck. You would probably have to tweek the dish at 3 and/or 6 months after install (why D* doesn't like them) but should be stable after that with a rain cap on the top. Water is just not absorbed from the sides of the post much because of the way Mother Nature designed trees (water goes up, not left to right)..

And as long as it's sunk in the ground properly, and the ground is stable (granted this would affect steel as well). I have seen many a wooden post with a nice indentation in the concrete (above or below ground), which acts a wonderful place for water to sit, greatly adding to the rotting process. Ensuring water does not collect at the base is kinda important.

ps. Why is there only one dog in your avatar?

 

[Mertzen]

It's possible that it's loose although it was just aligned about a month ago.
There are no support brackets. It's a 4x4 post I cemented into the ground 9 years ago.
Just to give you an idea - here's what my treeline looks like (just took this picture 10 minutes ago).

Yeah that 'shouldn't' be a problem for the 99 - 101 - 103. If you have easy acces I'd play around with it and see if you can regain signal.

 

[2dogz]

And as long as it's sunk in the ground properly, and the ground is stable (granted this would affect steel as well). I have seen many a wooden post with a nice indentation in the concrete (above or below ground), which acts a wonderful place for water to sit, greatly adding to the rotting process. Ensuring water does not collect at the base is kinda important.

ps. Why is there only one dog in your avatar?

Good point on drainage. Dig hole, put in post, then put in cement, thus leaving a path for any water in post to escape into the ground. Stops rotting.

Also, when you buy PT lumber it is often dripping wet from the PT process. Best to allow it to air dry under cover from weather for a month or so to minimize warping.

I could go on about fence post and deck construction.

The avatar is my yellow lab, Banjo. My other dog, Lil-bit, is a black lab mix, and so black that most photos look like a black hole with two eyes looking at you. Tough to get them to pose together, also.

 

[ironwood]

One problem with a 4x4 post. There is no place to attach monopoles. Dish wont be stable even if post is solid.
With metal poles dish sits right on top of it so its only the matter of how solid the pole is itself. With wooden pole dish is probably attached with a regular foot/mast which is sticking out for about 2-3 feet. That creates more leverage and wind with bounce it around.

 

[Seismo]

Well, I took the advice and went out with the old DeWalt drill with a socket attachment and re-aligned. Turns out that was the problem.
I would turn a bolt, run inside and check the signal, run back out to the dish, turn again, etc...
I finally got most of my channels then it started thundering again so I went inside.
After it cleared up a little I went back out and did a little more work and got every single channel I'm paying for - standard AND HD channels.
I was really proud of myself.

Then another storm rolled through about an hour ago and I have lost all signal to every satellite (even 119, which I was getting before).
I'll wait 'til the sky clears up a little but it sounds like I do need that metal pole.

I tell you what, times like this I wish cable was offered where I live.

 

[ironwood]

If wood post is sturdy enough then all you need is attach metal pole to. It has to stick out just a foot above the post and you wanna make sure pole doesnt spin, you basically need just a few bolts or two metal straps on top and bottom and few screws.

 

[Seismo]

Well, last night around 11:30 I couldn't stand it any longer so I went out and adjusted some more. This time I never could get a signal on my HD receiver but my old DirecTV Tivo unit worked fine.
Not sure why I couldn't get 101° on my HR20 but could on the other receiver when they were both working great just a couple hours before.
I don't believe that my receiver just got fried. We did have lightning in the area but I didn't notice any power surges in the house.

Ah well. I'm going to try again this evening when I get home from work.

I'm also going to send a nasty-gram to DirecTV for making me wait 18 days before a technician will come out. That's right - I called yesterday and their earliest appointment to come out is July 28. In the meantime, I'm without local news and weather. I know it's just TV, but jeez...

 

[2dogz]

I agree. 18 days. Jeez. He must be at the beach.

Having 101W on one of two recivers usually points to something other than the dish. You need to check out the wiring looking for loose connections, etc.

Please describe your layout. How many total receivers, model numbers, receivers wired directly from dish, or are they wired from a multiswitch, which, in turn, is wired to the dish? OTA antenna?

Except for failure of some major part like the dish LNB, you can most likely get things working a whole lot sooner than 18 days yourself. There are lots of people on this forum that will help.

 

[Seismo]

Okay, I have one receiver in the living room - the HR20 HD-DVR receiver.
It has two lines coming into it - dual tuners.

In the bedroom I have one of the old DirecTV Tivo receivers. It also has dual tuners but I'm only bringing one line into it.

From the dish, I'm bringing 4 lines into the attic. One is not connected to anything. At one time I had it connected to a WB68 multiswitch but I think it was faulty because I had some major problems with it it, so I've just put female to female connectors on all the lines and all three are going to their respective receivers.
I have no OTA antenna. I live in the sticks where no signal could reach.

I just tried adjusting again. I got a 95% signal on the D*Tivo but still zero on any satellite on the HR20 (101, 110, 119, 103(c) ).
I took the b-band converters out and bypassed them altogether (I can get away with that for testing, right?) and rebooted the HR20. No luck. I only did that because I did have a bbc go bad on me in the past.

Just now I took the D*Tivo from the bedroom into the living room and connected up to the lines that were going to the HR20 - works like a charm. I tried both of the lines that were going to the HR20 - both work great.

A reasonable man would assume that the HR20's tuners are toast.

So, I can't believe my luck but it looks to me that an hour after I got my satellite aligned nearly perfectly, a storm knocked out my HR20.

It's a little uncanny for that to be the case but I can think of no other explanation.

 

[2dogz]

Okay, I have one receiver in the living room - the HR20 HD-DVR receiver.
It has two lines coming into it - dual tuners.

In the bedroom I have one of the old DirecTV Tivo receivers. It also has dual tuners but I'm only bringing one line into it.

From the dish, I'm bringing 4 lines into the attic. One is not connected to anything. At one time I had it connected to a WB68 multiswitch but I think it was faulty because I had some major problems with it it, so I've just put female to female connectors on all the lines and all three are going to their respective receivers.
I have no OTA antenna. I live in the sticks where no signal could reach.

I just tried adjusting again. I got a 95% signal on the D*Tivo but still zero on any satellite on the HR20 (101, 110, 119, 103(c) ).
I took the b-band converters out and bypassed them altogether (I can get away with that for testing, right?) and rebooted the HR20. No luck. I only did that because I did have a bbc go bad on me in the past.

Just now I took the D*Tivo from the bedroom into the living room and connected up to the lines that were going to the HR20 - works like a charm. I tried both of the lines that were going to the HR20 - both work great.

A reasonable man would assume that the HR20's tuners are toast.

So, I can't believe my luck but it looks to me that an hour after I got my satellite aligned nearly perfectly, a storm knocked out my HR20.

It's a little uncanny for that to be the case but I can think of no other explanation.

It sure does look like the HR20 has fliped over, all four feet up in the air, tongue hanging out. I had an HR20-100 die on me the exact same way the beginning of May. That you brought the DTivo and got it to work on the HR20s cables says it is not the wiring or dish.

What I did and what I recommend that you do is call D* with the old receiver sitting on top of the HR20 and explain that one works while the other doesn't. You need to expect that they will run through their troubleshooting flowchart, have to connect, reboot, disconnect, connect, reboot, etc. to demo that it's the box and not anything else. Expect to spend an hour going through this, be nice, be polite, it's a pain but they'll ship you a replacement box. Only cost you $20 shipping unless you have the protection plan, where it is free.

You'll get the box in a couple of business days, but much better than 18 days.

 

[ironwood]

HD DVR sitting without signal for a long time will not pick up signal even dish is realigned. It has to be reset but sometimes you need hard reset.
Unplug receiver for 15 minutes and try again. If it still doesnt show any signal then probably its dead