Tuning receiver for FTA channels

[FrdLnd]

Hi Everyone

I'm having great difficulty in tuning my digital satellite receiver to receive Astra2D. My receiver is a Prestige @Sat (Atsat) DiSeqC 1.0 & 1.2 compatible model and is about 3 years old. The supplied manual is worse than useless and their website even more so. I used the receiver in the UK to receive Astra FTA and Hotbird transmissions using the normal twin LNB dish and it seemed to work alright. It was tuned (with some difficulty ) by the aerial fitter.

I've now moved to mid-west France, which according to the footprint maps is in a good signal area and only requires a 70cm dish, and would like to use the receiver to pick up BBC and ITV programmes. Even though I speak and understand French reasonably well, I simply must escape French terrestial TV which by common consent, amongst the French no less, is mind-munbingly awful. I've therefore set up my 90cm offset type dish from the UK set-up (correctly I think? ) for 31deg (19deg actual) elevation and 38deg east (magnetic south) and have removed one of the two LNB's (the off-centre one).

Although though the purchased inline satelllite meter shows a good reading, the search facility on the receiver fails to pick and tune itself to any signal or any channel whatsoever! Of course, there's a whole list of menus and sub-menus with LNB type, frequencies, burst tone, 0/12 volt, polarisation angle etc etc which is all double dutch to me :? and which the manual miserably fails to explain what to do with in the on-screen menus, so anyone out there who can help, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE. After 4 fruitless days in getting the sodding thing to work, I'm rapidly loosing the few loose strands left on my already near-bald bonce!

By the way, as calls to any landline in the UK or the EU are free from my phone, if it's any help, I can call anyone who can help on the phone and he/she can talk me through the correct procedure.

Many thanks

PS I've already looked up the glossary on the forum, but knowing the meaning of the terms and knowing what the hell to do with them are two entirely different things for this 'ere beginner!

[Jimdefruit]

Welcome to the forum FrdLnd. I may have misread your post, but the angles you are specifying appear to be a long way out.

Mid West France is not so very far off 0 deg so for Astra 2D you should still be pointing somewhere near 28.2 deg East. Obviously the actual angle will depend upon your actual location and not 38 degrees.

There are many satellites up there so you will probably get a signal but the channels are at different frequencies. If you have all the channels set up in your receiver, try setting the receiver to frequency 10773 H 22000 for BBC1 and move the dish to get the signal. Easy if you can see a tv from the dish position. Not so easy if you cant. The lnb will need to be rotated to the right looking from the front of the dish, to get the best signal but you should get something if vertical.

[FrdLnd]

Thanks for the reply Jim.

The Azimouth and elevation angles were the result of calcuations done on a webpage which takes longitude & latitude and gives you the results which does make sense. The angle will be different from the std 28deg bcos if you imagine standing on a clockface at say 12 o'clock looking at say the fig 5 on the clockface (which is let's say 28deg E of S, south being the fig 6), if you now move towards the centre of the clockface (ie along the same longtitude), the angle gradually gets more, so at 6 o'clock, or just before in fact, the figure 5 is 90deg due E of S. Therefore at the centre of the clock (say Italy), the fig 5 is nearer 50degs due E of S.

As to the other matter, there's a list of satellites on the setup menu which includes Astra 2 (at 28 deg). All the manual explains is to choose the right satellite and go into automatic search. No explanation of how to set frequencies, polirization etc (which is where I'm having the difficulty) and the auto search returns zilch.

[Jimdefruit]

That assumption is wrong. It would be true if the satellite was close relative to your angular distance from the zero meridian however, the distance is so great that you can consider your angular distance from the zero meridian and just add or subtract that angle from the satellite angle to calculate your required dish angle.

If you are located 5 deg east of the zero meridian then to get the satellite at 28.2 East, you would point your dish at 23.8 east.

[FrdLnd]

Thanks Jimdefruit

I'll give a try tomorrow. As my longtitude is 0:39:41E, I assume that the the dish has to point more or less at 28deg E? Is that true north or magnetic north angle and does it make any difference anyway?
The same site that calculated the azimuth also reckoned on an elevation of 31degs for the latitude of 45:31:46N which for an offset of 22degs on the dish makes it 19degs. Is that wrong too?

[Jimdefruit]

If you point 28 degrees east of true south you should be close and you can adjust from that position very slowly and a tiny bit at a time to maximise the signal. The reason for the slowly is that the electronics are not instant.

I think true south is about 2 degrees away from magnetic but I cant recall tonight which way.

One of the 'geeks' will probably reply and correct me.

[BlackHawk]

Hi FrdLnd
If you are near Perigueux, the azimuth angle to 2D is 143.75 degrees (true){36.25 degrees east of south (true)}. The look angle (elevation) to the satellite is 31 degrees, from this you have to deduct the offset angle of your dish (something about 20-22 degrees. Hence your dish face will be laying back at approx 8-11 degrees from the vertical. The LNB skew for 2D is 17.5 degrees clockwise when facing the dish
BH

[nanochickin]

I'm in South France on holiday atm (langudoc) and i cant get a sniff of anything off 2D

Getting good reception of Astra 1 and Hotbird on a 43cm Sky dish. Loads of stuff open atm on my TM1000D on D+ in English

I'm guessing either your in a bad spot for reception or you dish isn 't setup correctly

Sorry i can't help you as i cant even use this french keyboard correctly. Have you tried tuning into anything off the other astra 2 birds. Check Lyngsat to see whats on the other birds and tune into a channel that can easily be picked up in europe and then go from there



Nano

[FrdLnd]

Thanks all those who've replied

I actually live in Nontron, which is abt 30 miles due north of Perigueux. I've not yet had a chance to try out either the 28deg E or have another go at the 36deg E as suggested by Blackhawk.

If one has perfect sight, ie without obstructions, trees etc in the way, and a decent 90cm dish, is it still possible to be in a blind spot?

Thing is I did try the 36degE 31deg elevation earlier and not a peep. My problem is that I don't know where the fault, if any, lies. For example, does one have to input transponders frequencies and other data into the receiever before doing a search or is it just a matter of pressing the auto-search option on the menu and it's all done automatically? When I go into the 'Installing New Channels", the screen comes up with a long list of satellites and one has to picked one before doing a search. I picked Astra 2D naturally, though the screen shows UK dish angles. There's a submenu called TP (which I assume stands for Transponder) with frequencies, polarisation etc etc data which I don't know what the hell I'm supposed to do with. And this is just the beginning! then I've to input DiSeqc data (there's just the one lnb, so I've assumed it's option 'None'), and the list just goes on and on and on.

by the way, nanochicken, what does "Loads of stuff open atm on my TM1000D on D+ in English" mean please?

[Jimdefruit]

I have just checked the satellite angle help guide that is most frequently used and found a major error.

The guide gives a magnetic declination of about 7 degrees and that is correct for a location 60 deg west. However, the magnetic declination for your location is 1 deg 10 minutes west today so the actual difference between magnetic and true south is about one degree.