Lightning storm

vanman99

Hi, need help anybody. There was a savage thunder and lightning storm today which either hit my dish, phoneline or power because the signal from my sky dish has completly gone. I also have a free sat box hooked up and the rsignal to both is dead. I've tried putting across new wires hoping this might help but i'm guessing the lighning sent a power surge of some sort in to the box and ruined it. I phoned sky and they want to charge me to come out and fix it (i'm with them 4 years, they get enough of my hard earned cash), has anyone else experienced this problem or know a solution. Any help would be most welcome.

Vanman99

Invincible

Sorry to hear of your bad luck,don't know a solution,but get a surge protector to run your sat connections through,save your receiver next time.

Boggles

Plug the sky box out for half an hour, plug it back in, don't touch it for 10-15 minutes. Turn it on, see if your in business.

If it is still fried, ring Sky again, and tell them the box is dead, completely dead no power going to it, don't mention any storm or anything. The only check they can do is the power source, say you checked that and you switched the power cable, no difference

They will say they will send out an engineer at x amount, act completely shocked, say you paying sky 4 years, blah, blah, you saw a flyer that gives new customers sky boxes for free, tell them there not looking after there current customers, blah, blah. Ask for cancellation department, repeat your rant if necessary.

What usually happens then is you get a very understanding Rep who will send out an engineer free of charge.

Good luck.

emaherx

are both boxes not powering on?
or are they powering on with no sigal being recevied displayed on the screen.
If its just a case of no signal being received then I'd say its more likley that the dish moved in the storm.

If you could plug one of you'r receivers into a propoerly aligned dish for a few min you could rule out the receviers. Possibly a friend or neighbours.

And then work on realigning the dish

watty

Domestic surge protectors won't generally help and may impair signals. Some mains ones are dangerous.

LNB (bit at the dish) can fail due to high static level during a storm.

mumhaabu

If you still getting nothing after the prescribed period above, take both boxes around to a friends neighbours house (where Sky is working properly) and test them there this will ascertain whether you have Box or Dish/LNB trouble. If you have Box trouble then try get Sky to replace it for free.

I had to do this once and Sky wouldn't budge so I actually cancelled, within three days I had a call "Sir, we see you have cancelled why so?" Got a free repair and a months free viewing thrown in also, (I've been with Sky since the big dish analog days). If you still don't get Sky to budge, take out a new subscription in your Irish name or the missus's (if have one). I'd recommend this only if your box is blown, if it is the LNB you can buy a single LNB from around €20 on eBay and just change it yourself. Alternativly could also upgrade to Sky+ instead for €49, there are several options available.

If your Freesat box is blown, I'd say your out of luck on that one unless you have home insurance contents cover which may be worth a try! Don't mention the lightning to Sky!

oops! emaherx beat me to it on trying the neighbours dish.

Invincible

watty wrote: »

Domestic surge protectors won't generally help and may impair signals. Some mains ones are dangerous.

LNB (bit at the dish) can fail due to high static level during a storm.

I did'nt know that surge protectors could impair signal,i have a Belkin mains powered.Could this be the reason some channels display "no satellite signal is being received"(ch4+1),(zone reality),(true movies),(true movies 2),(movies for men),(mov for men+1)? Thank's for any info.

muffler

vanman99 wrote: »

Hi, need help anybody. There was a savage thunder and lightning storm today which either hit my dish, phoneline or power because the signal from my sky dish has completly gone. I also have a free sat box hooked up and the rsignal to both is dead. I've tried putting across new wires hoping this might help but i'm guessing the lighning sent a power surge of some sort in to the box and ruined it. I phoned sky and they want to charge me to come out and fix it (i'm with them 4 years, they get enough of my hard earned cash), has anyone else experienced this problem or know a solution. Any help would be most welcome.

Vanman99

This happened to me a few months ago. Rang sky and we did different tests and downloads etc but the box was fucked. I claimed for new box, dish and lnb off the house insurance and had no problems.

steveon

sorry posted in wrong section...removed post...

Sam Radford

Invincible wrote: »

I did'nt know that surge protectors could impair signal. I have a Belkin mains powered. Could this be the reason some channels display "no satellite signal is being received"(ch4+1), (zone reality), (true movies), (true movies 2), (movies for men), (mov for men+1)?

Very likely. Try disconnecting it, then you'll know. :rolleyes:

Darth Maul

Invincible wrote: »

I did'nt know that surge protectors could impair signal,i have a Belkin mains powered.Could this be the reason some channels display "no satellite signal is being received"(ch4+1),(zone reality),(true movies),(true movies 2),(movies for men),(mov for men+1)? Thank's for any info.

just a quick one on that, was called out to a house last week for a customer that was having the same problem on those channels, (break up and no signal) put the meter on the dish and it was slightly off but realigning it didn't fix those channels, replaced the LNB, still no better, replaced the box and still a problem with those channels, Customer then mentioned the installer who put the system in (person is known for his dodgy work) so went in to the attic to check the cable run, and found that the cable had a join in it, he had joined it by twisting the cable together and wrapping it with tape. when I replaced this with a proper F to F connector join, it solved the problem on those channels.

Darth Maul

vanman99 wrote: »

Hi, need help anybody. There was a savage thunder and lightning storm today which either hit my dish, phoneline or power because the signal from my sky dish has completly gone. I also have a free sat box hooked up and the rsignal to both is dead. I've tried putting across new wires hoping this might help but i'm guessing the lighning sent a power surge of some sort in to the box and ruined it. I phoned sky and they want to charge me to come out and fix it (i'm with them 4 years, they get enough of my hard earned cash), has anyone else experienced this problem or know a solution. Any help would be most welcome.

Vanman99

I would nearly guarantee that its the LNB, Quad LNB's seem to be very prone to failure during lighting storms,

vanman99

Thanks for that. Have replaced the twin lnb with the original single LNB but the sky box isn't picking up anything at all. So I've put the free sat box on that cable and it works fine, I can pick up all the freeview channels. Don't suppose you know what the excat alignment is for sky, it's possible the dish moved with the very heavy rain after i was working on it and i've tried adjusting up and down but still nothing on the sky box.
Just a quick question then, on the bracket at the back of the satellite dish attached to the wall where i can loosen the bolts to move the satellite up and down there are numbers in 10's from what looks to be 0 to 45,(i'm assuming these are degrees), what degree setting should it be to recieve sky? At the moment and before i changed it it was fixed roughly between 10 and 11 and i think i've it back in the right position but can anyone confirm what that setting should be?