[flyingtigerfan]

I'm sure this question hasn't been asked more than 1,000 times.

I have the slimline dish at home, and 3 HD DVRs connected to an SWM-8.

The dish is on a pole in the ground in the back yard - one of the only places to get good line of sight to all 5 satellite locations. It was installed almost exactly a year ago when I moved into a new home that I built. In that time, I've noticed some pretty early rain fade on all locations not named 101. I check the signal strengths, and they're pretty darned good on 101 - 90s for all active TPs and even some high 90s.

The rest of them are not as good. Some TPs in the 80s, most in the low to mid 70s. Not talking about spotbeams - CONUS only. DirecTV CSR says those are normal. He was extremely nice, and not overly bright - suspect he was very new.

I checked the pole outside and it appears to be tilted (not plumb). I see a ding in it, so there's a chance the landscaping guy hit it or something way back when (I had the yard installed after the dish).

So after that long backstory...

1) If I try to get the pole plumb again, is this dish so impossible to align that I can't do it myself (assuming I take a TV outside)?
2) Should I be happy with what I have?

I suspect D* will not come and re-align it.

Thanks!

 

[Mertzen]

1) If I try to get the pole plumb again, is this dish so impossible to align that I can't do it myself (assuming I take a TV outside)?

Unless the mast is really bent you can probably offset it by EL/AZ adjustments.

2) Should I be happy with what I have?

One should never be happy.:lol:

I suspect D* will not come and re-align it.

Nope unless there are major break ups anything above 70 is 'normal'

 

[eakes]

The normal Directv line is that "70 is good". Well, that's true if it's not raining but a good heavy fog could take the signal out with that signal strength.

I have installed several original one LNB dishes, a number of 3 LNB dishes and two Slimline 5 LNB dishes. By far the easiest to get peak signal on is the Slimline. The other dishes require a "bump" technique to align - very few are actually peaked. The Slimline has fine adjustments for elevation and azimuth which makes peaking a lot easier.

One must start with a plumb mount. Stick a level on the pole and if it is not then it needs to be made plumb. This probably means starting over, new hole, new pole, concrete, etc. Once the pole is plumb, install the antenna mount and move the fine adjustments to the approximate center of their range. Set tilt and elevation to setting given in the setup menu of a receiver. Use a compass to set the approximate azimuth for the dish. Put the receiver on an individual transponder signal meter on 101. Rotate the dish in azimuth until you see a signal. Move slowly as there is a lag between antenna movement and a change registering on the signal meter. Once you have a signal in the 70s or so, check to be sure you are on 101 and not one of the other satellites (check that channels such as 200 or CNNSD are being received). Reset to one of the weaker transponders on 101 and peak the signal. Once peaked, switch to the 101 transponder listing an make a note of the signal strengths - should be between 90 to 100. Now switch to the 119 transponder list, if the signals are in the same range as 101 (should be) then you do not have to adjust tilt. If they are not in the same range then adjust tilt slightly until they are.
Now switch to the 103 transponders. As before, select a single transponder signal meter and using the fine adjustments peak the signal. You should wind up with all 103 transponders in the high 80s to mid 90s.

You can now check transponders on all satellites. Except for the spot beams everything else should be between mid 80s to 100.

Be sure to tighten all hardware to prevent the dish moving in the breeze.

Disconnect all but the 'test' receiver while attempting alignment. A 1/2" nut driver is the best tool for the fine adjustment.

 

[flyingtigerfan]

Thanks. I may need to do that - and I appreciate your comments. I'm hoping I can bump it back into position - what I might be able to do is straighten the pole (I don't think it's bent, but I do think it's off kilter) by digging a hole around the whole thing and pouring in some additional concrete. Then I can re-align from there.

Technically, I shouldn't need to re-align if I can get the pole plumb, but I don't expect I can hold everything in tolerance!

 

[tkrandall]

see post #9 in

http://www.dbstalk.com/showthread.php?t=134976

This procedure worked very well for me and a colleague of mine just this week. Make sure mast is plumb. If your mast is truly plumb and you set the elavation for your site, then you can probably avoid the gross adjustment step for elevation (just do fine tune later), but it would not hurt to do it.

edit: "eakes", above, has a good summary as well. I started writing this posting over an hour ago and got distracted with other items.

 

[flipptyfloppity]

If the pole is bent, you're probably in a lot of trouble. You can point well on an slightly un-plumb pole, but if it's actually bent noticeably, it's probably off enough you won't be able to get it. And worse yet, it might be unstable now.

The above posts aren't great on what bolts are what.

I did this for 99c a few days ago. Here's the scoop:

Loosen elevation (uptilt) and azimuth (rotation) fine bolts (all 1/2"). These are pairs of bolts. The azimuth are on the bottom on the dish end of the mount, the elevation are on the left and right on the dish end of the mount. There's a single elevation bolt holding the long elevation lag screw to the mount. Don't loosen that.

(step a) Set meter to 101. Rotate elevation and azimuth fine controls (the bolts with numbered dials around them, 3/8" heads) until you get a peak reading.

(step b) Now check 99(c) and 119. If you aren't happy with those numbers, then you need to loosen two of the three tilt bolts (that let you rotate the dish CW and CCW as you look at it from behind). Loosen the top two. these are also 1/2" bolts. Now rotate the dish in little bits until you get as high of readings as you can on 119, 110 and 99(c). Lock down one of the bolts (you now have two locked down on tilt).

(step c) Now decide if your 119, 110 or 99c numbers are the worst. Set the signal readings to the worse of the three. Now adjust the azimuth and elevation fine adjustments again. Adjust azimuth first, then adjust elevation, then try azimuth again and then elevation again. You probably won't need to go around more than twice on that.

Go back and check all of 99, 110, 119 and 101.

If 101 stinks, go back to step a and go again. 101 is mostly impervious to all the tilt stuff so you clearly messed up your elevation and azimuth rather grossly.
If 101 is good but one of 99, 110 or 119 is no good, you probably have your tilt wrong, go back to step b and proceed again.

Now tighten the remaining tilt bolt and the azimuth and elevation fine adjustment bolts. If the figures are still good, you are done.

There are a few caveats:
It's possible to run out of fine adjustment range. For example, check the far end of the elevation lag screw if you are backing it out a lot. It's possible you'll unscrew it completely and the dish will flop over in an ugly fashion. You can run out of azimuth adjustment range too, but it's not as drastic. For azimuth it's obvious what to do. For elevation, you need to tighten down the two elevation lock down bolts you loosened, then loosen the other elevation bolt (the one I said not to loosen above) so you can back off the elevation screw a lot without changing the dish position. Then tighten that bolt back down and loosen the two lock downs again and proceed to adjust the fine elevation adjustment some more.

If you are using your D* box as your feedback, you need to get to the live signal meters (the one that reads two bar graphs at once), not the field of numbers. If you can't see them from your dish spot, then you'll need someone to call them out to you and then you'll have to move VERY SLOWLY as the bars have lag and the communications has lag.

It is possible to point a dish properly even on a pretty screwed up (non-plumb) pole. It's just that the three controls will interact with each other quite a lot and you'll have to iterate on the adjustments (from step b or a) several times. Although this may take a while, it's usually quicker than trying to adjust the pole itself.

 

[flipptyfloppity]

And one more thing, it's not as tough as it sounds from all the text. As long as you are only making fine adjustments, it's actually pretty straightforward and easy, it's just time consuming and involves working on a ladder is all.

 

[flyingtigerfan]

Thanks to all. The pole has been like it is now for almost a year. The 101 satellites come in great - and as long as it's a sunny day the rest of them do too. But although 110 and 119 would fade out in rain faster than 101 even at my old house, they really disappear quickly here as do 103 and 99.

I'll fiddle with it, screw it up, and cuss. But at least I'll do it before football season.

Again, I appreciate all of the input.