Sat-finder problem.

Viscosity

Hi Lads,

I've been trying to set up a Fortrec Star kit I bought my uncle for xmas. I've aligned the dish at the angles given by dishpointer.com for the Astra 28.2 satellite but the signal quality has only been flickering between 1 and 20% no matter how often I've adjusted it.

I went back to Maplin and got a sat-finder meter and had another go earlier this morning. I followed the instructions and brought a cable from the LNB and the receiver. The sat finder didn't even register anything, it was just dead. The signal meter on the TV inside is still flickering though....Any ideas where I've gone wrong ?

It would be grand if I didn't have to travel from Galway back home to Wexford to try install it....Next time, I'll get someone else (more patient, better qualified) to do it!

Apogee

Firstly, dishpointer alone is not sufficient to align a dish. You need to set the elevation angle, roughly align the dish with dishpointer and then carefully adjust the azimuth until you see activity - this requires considerable patience, at least initially.
http://bytelive.com/wiki/tiki-index.php?page=How+to+align+a+satellite+dish


If your meter has an adjustable knob like below, make sure to turn it up to max when starting out and then readjust downwards if you hear any activity.
See link on how to use it:
http://www.satellite.ie/acatalog/Satfinder_satellite_meter.html

However, you would expect some activity on the meter, either from the backlight or a tone of some sort.

If there's no activity whatsoever, then check for a short circuit i.e. where the inner core of the coax is touching the outer mesh braid. Best to redo the f-connectors as shown:
http://homepage.eircom.net/~watty/satellite/sathowto-p8.htm

Having rechecked the cable and connectors, check that the meter is properly connected - this should be marked on the back of the meter - with one connector on the right for the LNBF lead and the other on the left for receiver. Also double check that you have connected the coax to the correct powered output on the receiver and not to the loop-thru.

If there's still no activity, then it looks like the receiver may be faulty. At this point, it might be best to take the receiver to an existing setup to test it out before returning it to the shop.