No Eurobird 1 at 28.5°E

[Davei]

I've just made my first attempt at setting up a multi-bracket on a Triax TD78 dish - with three LNBs for the 13°, 19.2° and 28.2-5° respectively.

I've got both the Astra 1 and Hotbird satellites coming in good and strong. The Astra 2 sats are also good and strong. But I'm not getting any channels at all off Eurobird 1 (which, of course, is supposed to be received on the same LNB as Astra 2). Is this simply a case of having to slide the relevant LNB some 1-3° to the right on the bracket? Or might there be something else that's preventing Eurobird 1 reception? Any thoughts would be appreciated.

[Jimdefruit]

You would get channels from 28.5 with the dish/lnb setup aimed at 28.2. Have you actually scanned the channels on 28.2 to make sure you are not picking up another satellite?

[Mickha]

Try scanning Zone Horror, 11261 H 27500.

[Davei]

I've tried scanning the Zone Horror transponder frequency - and two or three others. In every case I get 'no service found'. Reception on the Astra 2 sats (28.2) is fine.

[Davei]

I've now tried adjusting the LNB - no luck. I've tried mounting the dish a little higher - some luck. With the dish higher up I could just about get some Eurobird 1 channels, but they kept breaking up. Meanwhile, I'd lost the Astra 2 channels (BBC News 24 down to 61% SNR). There was a compromise height and LNB position, but this got both Eurobird 1 and Astra 2 with SNR values ranging from 71% to 76% with frequent break-up of picture (as you'd expect with those values).

This is a bit of a mystery. Could it be a problem with the LNB itself? It's a Star Sat twin universal (focus too narrow, perhaps?).

Anyway, I've got everything back almost as it was, though the signals received by each of the three LNBs are a little down on what they were (but still adequate).

(Oh, and by the way, how come signal-to-noise ratio is expressed as a percentage?!)

[BGonaSTICK]

Sounds like just a little more tweaking required. Focus on skew and LNB location (height just as much as lateral position).

Astra 2 should knock your receiver over - make sure you have the slope of the multi-LNB arm right - the 28.x LNB should be maybe 2 or 3 cms higher than the Hotbird one - as 'Astra2' sats are lower in the sky.

SNR percentage? Yeah, It's a little screwed up.

[Davei]

Thanks, Stick. I will do some more playing about with the set up, though I probably won't get a chance till next week. I am a little surprised, though, that getting 28.2-5°E is being so difficult when both 19.2°E and 13°E were so easy - it was almost as if they aligned themselves!

[Satmann1]

I am presuming you have an 80cm dish as you are rotating from 19 degrees east Astra 1 to 28.2 or 28.5 east Astra 2 & Eurobird. In which case you may find that as you get all the astra 2 channels you have 100% signal stength and 90% signal quality even on Eurobird using a digibox. Depending on your location of course. Using an 80CM dish you should get the lot without a problem. It is very unlikely that you are aligned to another satellite since you would not get the Astra 2 channels that you say you get. But I find it hard to believe that you do not get any Eurobird channels at all. This sounds like an LNB fault. If you have already tweeked the LNB to 7 oclock as seen from the back then you should have improved the signal from 90% to 100% and quality from 80% to 90% on both Astra 2 and Eurobird. I would estimate. But if you still get break up on True Movies, 1 & 2 and True Entertainment and other Eurobird channels whilst the others from astra 2 are booming through, then the answer in my opinion can only be one or both of two things and one I've mentioned already.
1. LNB faulty.
2. Branch of tree or other object just obscuring the weaker download from Eurobird intermittantly to the dish, so you cannot find a difference in the strength and quality of the signal. VERY LIKELY.

It is unlikely to be your receiver.

Interested to know how you get on with this one.

[Satmann1]

You have an 80cm dish equivalent triax 78cm. Try using 1 LNB only on your dish, and finding Eurobird 1. If it doesn't work then try the other two LNBs in the same way. If it still doesn't work then it is unlikely to be an LNB problem. it is unlikely that your LNB is not aligned to the signals as you say you receive astra 2 OK. It sounds to me as though your dish is either not big enough for a three LNB set up in your location, or you have not tweeked the LNB you are using from Astra 2 and Eurobird 1 to 7 oclock as seen from the back. If you have tried a single LNB and get the signals OK, then it is most likely that you need a 1 metre dish in your location, or there is a branch of a tree just obscuring the signals from Eurobird. I am not of the opinion that if such was the case you would not receive any signals at all from the satellites. I have personally experimented with this opinion and cannot agree with it.

My last response you can ignore as I submitted it whilst editing it. bearing in mind you only get 20 minutes to edit and I could not correct it. I would sooner spend half an hour and be of some useful service than spend 20 minutes and submit rubbish!
One more thing, It is unlikely to be your receiver.

[Satmann1]

One very important thing I forgot to mention in my last response. If you have a cordless digital telephone with the receiver on the base unit, make sure the base unit is positioned well away from your receiver / digibox. A common fault is to include both the cordless digital phone and the receiver on the same shelf, or even within 2 metres of each other. This will cause break up of signal from Eurobird 1. Please don't ask me why...just don't do it.