Channel Master signal meter.

[wejones]

I've posted before about wishing that there was a signal meter that was better than the little SF95 thing, but didn't want to spend the money on one of the "smart" meters that identify satellites, or a spectrum analyzer. I just wanted a meter that was more sensitive than the SF95, and was affordable.

Well the closest thing to what I wanted, which was sold at Sadoun was the Perfect Vision PVSF3, ie

http://www.sadoun.com/Sat/Products/Perfect/PVSF3.htm

however, I had no need for monitoring two lnbs at the same time, so it seemed like this was slighty more than I needed. I was hoping that Sadoun might have a single lnb version of this, but apparently not. So I did a google, and found that Channel Master sells the single version of this meter, ie the 1007IFD, which is considerably cheaper than the "Dual" meter.

I just picked up one of these meters, not at Sadoun, but perhaps Sadoun might consider stocking the single lnb version of the Perfect Vision meter in the future. Anyway, I just tried it out. I hooked it up to my 90CM dish, which was on a satellite which according to either the SF95, or the meter on my Fortec receiver, was peaked on the sat, ie doing the push up, pull down, side to side thing showed no improvement. However when I connected the 1007IFD, even a slight push/pull on the dish showed that I wasn't quite peaked. I'm not sure that this meter is any more sensitive, however it definately shows smaller increments in signal, which is what is needed for accurate alignment.

The other nice thing about this meter, is that it has a battery, and can power the lnbf without connection to the receiver, and can switch between 13V/18V, and inject a 22KHz signal as well. It also can measure the lnbf voltage and current supplied by the receiver when used in that mode. Put this on my big dish, and found that I was only getting about 15 or 16V out to the LNB through my 250' of COAX. Anyway, this is just what I've been looking for. I'm sure that the functionality of the PVSF3 is the same, however the extra cost of getting 2 meters makes it less cost effective.

Anyway, hopefully Sadoun might consider this model in the future, as I'm sure that there are a lot of people looking for a meter better than the SF95, but don't want to spend as much as the PVSF3 or other sophistocated meters.

Can't wait for a dry day to go give my dish an alignment tuneup.

[rainman]

nice looking meter Bill let us know how it work's out.

[bobkat]

I used one of those babies for years until I dropped it 40 feet off a roof - porked the meter but the beeper still worked....

Those meters are "OK" (barely) for casual DIY alignments but for day-in-day-out installs only a Birdog will suffice.

kat

[elgemcdlf]

Amazing the varience in price from site to site. I actually found it for more than Sadoun sells the double for. Nice looking meter may have to try one out. I'll loan you my 18" drill bit if you loan me your meter

[rainman]

Originally Posted by bobkat

I used one of those babies for years until I dropped it 40 feet off a roof - porked the meter but the beeper still worked....

Those meters are "OK" (barely) for casual DIY alignments but for day-in-day-out installs only a Birdog will suffice.

kat

thanks kat for the short reveiw should work nicely for me.

[wejones]

The single sheet of paper manual for this meter, says to have no more than 40' between the meter and the LNB. This is logical relative to the thing working as a level meter, as I know that the SF95 doesn't work at all when placed 200+' from the LNB. But I thought that I could try using the meter at the receiver, ie 200+' from the receiver, not for level, but to observe my Diseqc switch switching, and observe the voltage coming from the receiver with H/V polarities.
Well, when I did this, while on 13V polarity, I'd switch inputs, and you could see the voltage appear and dissappear when I'd switch between inputs 1 and 4 on my diseqC switch. You could also see the 22KHz light light up when the DiseqC commands were being sent, which is handy.
However then I tried switching from 13V polarity to 18V polarity. The meter jumped up a bit past 18V, and the 18V light lit up for just an instant, at which time the voltage died completely. I was afraid that something was getting shorted out or something so I disconneccted the meter, and replaced it with a regular "T" splitter, with a regular voltmeter there to observe the voltage. Doing this, it showed the voltage as 18V, ie no problem. I'm not sure what is going on here, ie whether the meter has some built in circuitry to avoid excess power consumption or something, and the meter cut the power, or perhaps the meter was interferring with my DiseqC switch, causing the switch to change or something.
Anyway, I got confused, and discontinued the experiment until I had a chance to think about it. I think I'll try again with the meter prior to the switch, and then again with a regular meter to monitor what is happening. I am almost thinking that this might actually be related to a problem with my Twinhan receiver. In the past week, I had a situation where when using my OLD diseqC switch, I could only get reception on one polarity. At the time, I assumed that it was a problem with the switch, but now, I'm wondering if somehow the switch electronics is causing the Twinhan to shut down it's LNB power.
Anyway, it was strange behavior, but it shows how a meter like this with voltage and 22KHz readout can be a quite useful tool.

[wejones]

Well I got to try this meter today for a real alignment. Due to spring freeze/thaw, summer tree trimming followed by haphazard alignment, then a wind storm that threw my whole system out of whack, I was in really bad shape alignment wise, so I took the new meter out today. At first, I got VERY confused, because it appeared that I was right on, with respect to my due south elevation, so I went to a western sat, and tried to adjust the mount on the pole, but I was having problems, in that when I'd adjust Ku, it would take me WAY off where C-band was aligned. So it finally dawned on me that somehow my focal length had been knocked off. So I got up by the LNB, and tried to get the FL adjusted. After I did that, C-band and Ku were at the same place. ( Ie what happens is that if the FL is off, the sweet spot for Ku is more like a donut instead of a spot, and will be offset a bit.) Anyway, after adjusting the FL, I was getting pretty good reception on my westerly sats. But then I went back to my southerly sats, and was getting nothing. Ie last time I adjusted my due south elevation, I was using the Ku donut sweet spot, whereas the actual sweet spot should have been the center of the donut, or a minimum. So I re-adjusted the due south elevation. BINGO Best signals I've had for a long time. I'm sure I'm going to have to go back and fine tune the westerly sats again, but that should be a quick adjustment.
But the new meter was great. With the old SF95 thing you'd have to make big changes before it would give a different signal, so you it was harder to peak the alignment. But the new meter is sensitive enough that I can barely touch the dish, and detect a change in the meter's response.
I still think that the SF95 is a very useful tool, but the Channel Master meter makes alignment much easier. It doesn't tell you what sat you are on, but that's seldom been a problem for me.

[rainman]

cool sounds like one of these meters will be in my future plans.

[N4ST]

I had purchased a Channel Master 1007IFD for other purposes, but when I got involved with FTA it has been great for that. The battery power feature is very handy, but like many other rechargeable battery devices if you havn't charged it for a few months and grab it for a quick test, the battery will be dead (or fading fast). The SF95 type meters are fine for the stronger DBS satellites and fit in my tool box easier.

[Dishtechman]

can I use Channel Master 1007IFD for dp+ and dish 1000 ?

[wejones]

Originally Posted by Dishtechman

can I use Channel Master 1007IFD for dp+ and dish 1000 ?

Meter wise it *should* work fine with any system, and if you control via the dishnet receiver, the meter will give a reading. However I'm not familiar with the switching used in those two systems, and Dishnet uses some strange techniques to select different satellites, and sometimes band-shifts them to higher freqs, so if you use the meter to power and control the lnbfs, I'm not sure how to get it to swithc sats. The band shifting shouldn't be a problem, since I think it has a pretty wide bandwidth, but I'm not positive what you have to do to switch LNBs to get the other satellites. I used to have a document explaining how some dishnet systems work, but that was before they even did band shifting, so I don't know how it works now. Hopefully someone knows. The Channel Master does have 22khz capability though, and usually the satellite switching uses some combination of 22khz and voltage.