H180, 6foot dish, C&Ku Analog, DVB & DCII

[pmb1010]

Originally Posted by Vitruvius

Oh the wind was amazing this past Sunday. So much whistling and racket, that I thought it was going to blow my house off its foundation. I think it spun my 31" inch dish out of alignment.

The wind blew down a big 90 foot tree 2 doors down from me (one of the 5 big "sticks" of what used to be in my way of G10R). It lays across my neighbors yard. He's 89 so I know I'll be out there when spring comes helping cut it up.

And, it did blow my 6 foot/H180 motor out of alignment. Someone warned me that the combo was fragile, it's not fullly broken but it does seem quite sloppy at this point. I've had to adjust it on the pole a couple times now. Not sure what's out of alignment exactly, it's 9 degrees out and I dont want to drag the receiver/TV out there.

[pmb1010]

Will take pictures and post later.

We again had some major winds today (gusts up to, and probably over 30mph) and I look out, there's the 6 foot dish on the ground.
The H180 motor broke at the casting between the base, and the motor part with the gears - literally split in 2 pieces. Sure doesn't look like it's fabricated strong enough, if what I looked at was the point of failure.
With the temp currently 20 below zero (with the wind) diagnosis of this will have to wait.

Someone else warned me about the weakness of this motor. Now I know. I cannot recommend anyone buy this motor anywhere there's wind. It won't survive.

My 4 foot and HH120 motor is still on the pole it's been on for a long time. It's not active right now and out alignment, but that will now be my dish to ressurect when it gets warmer.

The dish doesn't look too bad, the mounting arms for the LNBF are collapsed. I'm sure they will need to be replaced. Sux...

--- Was looking at the Polar mount for the 6 foot dish. Might be thinking of retrofitting it onto this as the H180 is going to be scrap now... I can't see where it pivots from the pictures on Sadoun's site for it. Maybe it's just the view of the JPG's.

[rainman]

Hate to here it PMB we had some 40 mph winds here yesterday luckly my dishes survived maybe look around and find yourself a used mesh dish may withstand the winds a little better.

[pmb1010]

it wasn't the dish - it was the mount (motor) that failed!

[elgemcdlf]

Originally Posted by pmb1010

it wasn't the dish - it was the mount (motor) that failed!

Actually it probably was the dish. Being a solid dish it caught wind instead of much passing through as a mesh dish does. This caused untold stress on the motor casing which led to breakage. The motor casing itself may be of poor design but the dish catching all that air definitely helped with the demise.

I would not think a motor rated for the size dish it had installed would break under 30mph winds.

[Vitruvius]

This has me worried. We had tremendous winds yesterday and I have mounted my 180cm dish with HH180 motor on a nice 2 1/2" pole. I haven't connected the wires yet so it is not in use. I didn't check the dish and motor yet.
The weather man said we were to get 50 mph winds....

PMB, could you have had a defective motor assembly? I'll let you know as soon as I can check it how my dish is.

[rainman]

Originally Posted by elgemcdlf

Actually it probably was the dish. Being a solid dish it caught wind instead of much passing through as a mesh dish does. This caused untold stress on the motor casing which led to breakage. The motor casing itself may be of poor design but the dish catching all that air definitely helped with the demise.

I would not think a motor rated for the size dish it had installed would break under 30mph winds.

plus the polar mounts on these dishes ar a whole lot stronger.

[lumpkin666]

Originally Posted by elgemcdlf

Actually it probably was the dish. Being a solid dish it caught wind instead of much passing through as a mesh dish does. This caused untold stress on the motor casing which led to breakage. The motor casing itself may be of poor design but the dish catching all that air definitely helped with the demise. .

Maybe with small winds, but I've read about this several times, and it seems that at a certain wind velocity, a mesh dish does not allow wind to pass through the small holes enough to make the wind strain any lighter. An article I had read on this subject referred to the mesh dish as being "seen" as a solid in the respect of wind resistance beginning at a relatively low wind speed.

[ayelvington]

I am really watching this closely since this is the identical system that I currently have stored waiting for installation. I'm very interested to see the photos since they will tell a lot.

Very sorry to hear about your neighbor's tree (even if it was blocking G10R). I'm curious to hear if the owner misses it.

Sorry to hear about your loss. I'm really going to start looking for a used BUD to liberate and re-use.

Al

[pmb1010]

Here are a couple pictures of the failure area on the motor.
It's literally split in half.
I put a red box around the area thats common to both halves.

It's only about 1/8", with maybe 3 or 4 1/4" ribs of whatever the material is - zinc or aluminum. In my opinion, that is woefully inadequate.

What I think happened is the wind would cycle the dish up & down, just enough to stress the area shown. Just like bending a paperclip back & forth, eventually it stress fails and breaks.

When it warms up (it's still 20 degrees here, but at least the sun was shining) I'll remove the motor from the 6 foot dish and put the halves back together to see if things could be stregthened, perhaps by drilling the base and bolting on a steel support plate with a dozen small pan head screws.

[elgemcdlf]

That doesn't look like a very good design. I would have thought large U-bolts going all the way through the housing. I do believe if the motor was mounted in that fashion it would not have let go.

[Vitruvius]

I am yelling and screaming myself... The winds snapped my newly installed motor in a very similar way. Snapped right at the point where the adjusting bolt anchors to the bottom cast aluminum motor casing. The wind swung the dish over and bent it. This is a horrible design and is obviously not meant to hold the 180cm dish even though the motor is named HH180. I hope Sadoun can help us out on this. I spent about 16 hours setting this assembly up and I never had it working.

[pmb1010]

What a shame. I feel bad for you.

I'll probably put the motor in a box and send it to the president of Moteck with a sarcastic "thank you" note.

[rainman]

Yeah that look like it could have been prevented if they would have used a little steel in it. Maybe a letter to Motec might get them thinking about a recall on the motor or at least a upgrade to a little bit of steel.

[1captain]

Originally Posted by lumpkin666

Maybe with small winds, but I've read about this several times, and it seems that at a certain wind velocity, a mesh dish does not allow wind to pass through the small holes enough to make the wind strain any lighter. An article I had read on this subject referred to the mesh dish as being "seen" as a solid in the respect of wind resistance beginning at a relatively low wind speed.

Yes you are 100 percent correct, on the wind speed a mess dish is the same a solid dish at 60mph or more, an most dishes here (south FL) that fail with high winds turns the mess dish into a clam, an solids will bend, if not spin around on the pole.

but in the picture it looks like a poor design, of the parts that broke, cant see for sure in picture if it was made out of pot (kind of looks like it) metal, an pot metal doent take any bending at all then it breaks. an if it was steel probably be ok.

[Vitruvius]

I emailed the company, Moteck and will see what they say about their poor design. Attached are pictures of my damaged motor and kinked dish... I will be contacting Sadoun.

[Vitruvius]

PMB1010, What have you done with your dish and motor? Have you reinstalled the assembly? I just finished some wiring I had to do and may set up the 6 ft dish as a fixed dish. I don't know about getting another motor..
I wonder if the dish can be converted to a polar mount with an acuator attached to it.

[pmb1010]

nothing.
I put my 30" and SM312D motor back up on the pole this was on, so I could watch something.

I have not decided what to do, in light of DVB-S2 and rumors of 6' not being big enough.
Yes you can put polar mount on w/actuator, to fix my dish up with that setup was about $150 from Sadoun.
I just don't want to put good money after bad.

So it sits in my summer screen room. I'll have to do something with it soom, either put it back up or take it apart and store it. And here I went and cut down that big tree that was in the way.
I am *very* disappointed in the outcome of all this.

[Vitruvius]

Ok, I tried fixing the motor. I got some epoxy and 1-1/2" steel angles and epoxied them to the bottom plate that was broken. I bent the plate right around the pivot point of the adjusting bolt. I also had to do some minor wiring repair. It seemed to hold. I was excited that this may work. I re-installed the motor on the pole and put the dish on the repaired motor. Wow... it looked good. Then I went to the neighbor's for a little while and when I returned I found the dish slumped over again. The epoxy had ripped apart. Cheap stuff I guess.

I sent the motor back to Sadoun, and they are sending me a new one, which I suspect may break again... Perhaps the dish will be destined to be a fixed installation. I'll need to be very selective on which satellite to align to.... I am tempted to aim to 127 to view BBC... any suggestions?

[rainman]

Is there anyway you can brace the new motor before you install it?

[Vitruvius]

yes, I could reinforce the new motor the same way I tried to fix the broken one. I could epoxy some steel to the bottom.

One thing that also may help.... the way the motor is put together, it has three points - 2 bolts are the hinge point for aiming the dish, and the 3rd point is a long adjusting bolt held to a pivoting point at the bottom plate of the motor. Once the dish is pointed properly, I guess all the bolts should be tightened to their max, hinge and pivot. Ideally the 2 hinge bolts should use locking washers. This would still put a lot of force on the three points and the casting could still break.

All this, I am just thinking out loud. Once the dish is pointed properly and the bolts are anchored... I could put additional angle bracing up to the motor somehow and fasten them to the anchor bolts around the pole. That may take some of the forces away from the cast plate...

[Vitruvius]

Ok, I finally installed the 180cm dish on the new H180 motor (thank you Sadoun) and spent 10 hours on Sunday trying to get some signal... Very cool... I don't know how close to arc I am, but I did pick up 4 sats, 127, 123, 121 and 89. I think I found 87, but with 27 quality. For some strange reason I couldn't find other sats, like 97 or SatMex.
Most all the signals were about 35 and I got picture. There was one sat that I was buzzing with 65 quality...

It was pretty difficult to get on arc, and some of the problem is that there aren't dedicated C-band setups in the Mercury II. I had to create some, and not all the transponders are in the receiver, which I was using for aiming. I suspect I am not totally on arc since I couldn't get 43 or 72, or even 97...

Sure enough, at the end of the day we had one of our windy summer rain storms. I hope it didn't knock me too much out of alignement. I'll check this weekend. I am very nervous about this H180 motor and the occational wind running through my property. Perhaps I should have lowered the mounting pole.

This next weekend I'll try hooking up all the wires to the house and my two other Ku dishes. Fun with a Diseqc Switch... Thanks for all your help on this thread... Good info not found in any product manuals...

[ronpar]

Originally Posted by Vitruvius

If you do a search on the internet, there are manufacturers of heating elements for satellite dishes. I've seen them for the small dishes up to 38" dishes... Didn't find any for big dishes yet...

that whould work great but you can also tie a plastic tarp around the dish just like they put them on small 18'' dish's you will not loose your signal just like you don't loose it on the 18'' dish. ice will not freeze to the plastic tarp like it will metal sure you may have to go knock off the snow and ice but it will not mess up your signal as much if it were on the dish. and it will not be as hard to knock off the snow and ice. so you don't have to beat your dish to death to get the ice off

[Vitruvius]

Hmm.. very interesting... a tarp? Will signal still get through the tarp?

Say, PMB, I am sorry you didn't get your 180cm up and working. I finally got mine working with a replacement motor. I installed the motor and am crossing my fingers as to the wind loads. But now I am getting a whole slew of sats with the 180cm and H180. I can get 58 C, 72, 93, 95, 97, 101, 103, 113, 116, 121, 123, 125, 127, 129, 131, 135. There are a couple that don't come in too strong and I don't have all the Ku bands set up yet. I don't get all stations on the Ku Bands. For instance, on 97 I only get about 30 of the stations that are on Ku band... the important ones... FTV, MHZ do come in...
Perhaps I am not completely on the Ku arc. Any suggestions on how to adjust the install? I am afraid to mess with it actually..

[Vitruvius]

Ok, yes the H180 motor does seem to be a bit flimsy but this is what I am doing with it...
The bracket is bolted very tight to my 2 1/2" schedule 40 pipe.
At the end of the day, I park the dish facing into the wind at 125 or 135. This moves the dish over to the right side of the bracket. There are three points of connection to the motor from the bracket. The two heavier connections are the two bolts at the pivoting point of the bottom of the motor. I have these bolts very tight and at the 135 sat they are perpendicular to the dish and help with bracing it towards the wind. The strain is accross the bolts and not in the hinging direction. The adjusting arm, which is the third and last point of connection to the bottom of the motor is bolted to position and may not get as much strain on it if it were in alignment to where the wind is coming from.

fingers crossed... If anyone has any better ideas I'd love to hear them.

[pmb1010]

Originally Posted by Vitruvius

If anyone has any better ideas I'd love to hear them.

remove motor and put in trash.
Replace with real system.

Seriously good luck with it. It is a poor design.

I put my four footer back up on the spot where the 6 footer was. My 30" was experincing too much rain fade on G10R. For as many times as I've set this stuff up I cannot get the thing on the arc so at this point its adjusted and dialed into G10R sort of manually. I can move between G10R and White Springs. Good enough for now.
The mount is no longer plumb so I suspect that is the root cause.

I did not have any problems on Ku on the 6 footer when I had it setup. It worked really good in fact it was a shame it had to fall apart the way it did. Kinda soured me on the whole aspect of this FTA stuff.

[Vitruvius]

PMB, LOL... Yes I know, just the install of the 6 fter is a lot of work... I was so tired and the thing took a couple of days, and with the pole already in the ground...
It sounds like you should use your EMT pipe for the small dish..
Finding arc is always tough.. for me anyway. I can never get that small meter to find anything for me... I tune and it gives me nothing so I end up pulling my receiver and a 20" tv outdoors... That's a lot of work.

Can't you set up your 180cm as a fixed with the pedestal that came with it? I saw an interesting setup where they used a wooden pallet that they bolted it to, and then weighed it down with block. Not too attractive, but it is a BUD.

I kept with the same motor because Sadoun did not have a separate polar mount so I would have had to buy a whole new dish... I can't believe I found the arc... C-band with only Diseqc 1.2 is not as easy as USALS.

[pmb1010]

I cut the 6 footer's stand up to use as brackets to mount the motor (mistake as noted someplace on this thread).
So I'd have to fabricate something for fixed mode.

I dont know how well I'd use it fixed though. I watched a lot of showtime on C band when it was still on analog in the clear.

if I went thru all the trouble to work on it I'd do something where I can use an acutator. Its money I cant afford to spend right now. Need new roof on the house.

[ronpar]

it seems like sense they replaced sat 10r with sat gallaxy 18 the pic is not as strong on ku band. the pic keeps breaking up. and yes a tarp should work. and i have a 10' dish

[Vitruvius]

These pictures were in February 2008. The Fortec 180cm dish with HH180 motor crashed. The motor snapped in the wind. The motor may not have broken if the base plate was steel plate instead of cast aluminum.

See what happened next with the replacement HH180 motor.