My son always says that weird things seem to happen in Maine, and from Monday afternoon thru yesterday evening, that proved true again. Late monday afternoon, around 5PM, I tried to turn on the local news, which we receive via our
DTV subscription, receiving off the
DTV 119 sat. I had been watching CNN off the 101 sat all afternoon, no problem. The local channels were breaking up badly, often losing signal completely for several minutes. I'm using a dual lnbf, feeding 2 different receivers, so I tried both, and both would lose signal at the same time approximately. I turned the receiver to the page where it monitors signal, and the 101 sat was up above 95%, but the 119 sat was fluxuating 30-50-30-0-30, etc, etc, ie VERY poor signal. I would have thought solar outage, except it was right around sunset. I thought that maybe a bird had bumped the dish, but the 101 sat was still strong. I opened a window (in the 5 deg weather), turned up the TV with the signal beeper so I could hear it, and went outside, and started moving the dish around, trying to improve the signal, but it was as good as I could get it. So I switched over to an OTA outside antenna to watch TV, but kept the sat signal in a PIP so I could monitor it. Some time around 6:30 or so, the signal returned to normal. The next morning, I checked the signal strength on the meter, and it was up in the 90-95% range.
WEIRD.
Then, yesterday, I wanted to record a program off the
AMC-3 PBS mux. I turned on my
Twinhan...... NOTHING ?!?!? I looked at the Ultra that is feeding the
Twinhan, and there was a signal, but it was just barely enough to occasionally lock, but not enough to give me a picture. I switched to my Lifetime, which is fed by my little Fortec 90. It gave a picture, but just barely, and it was breaking up. I moved my big dish to AMC-6, which is my due south, thinking that the strong winds had maybe changed my elevation. The channels on AMC-6, which are usually >90%, were down around 45-50... really poor. I went outside, and tried lifting and pulling down on the dish.... no improvement, things only got worse. I came inside, and stared at the TV for about 10 minutes trying to figure out what might be happening, and decided one more time to try to peak the sat.... AMC6. Bingo, it jumped up to >90% ?!?!?!?!? I went back to
AMC3, and tried to get PBS again. I was able to lock with all receivers, but it was still a bit on the weak side, but it was good enough to watch without errors. This morning, I checked
PBS, and it was back to as strong as I ever get it.
This is REALLY WEIRD. It's like all of my KU systems went out in the space of 24 hours, and then came back to normal, and all this time
C-band was fine. The ONLY thing that makes ANY sense to me, is that the scanner forum I read was reporting an AWACS plane working in the area (actually over a hundred miles away, but within receiving range), and some F-15s flying in my area, talking to the AWACS. Perhaps they have some weird kind of radar that interferes with sat systems, even though my dishes weren't aimed in that direction... would have had to have been VERY strong.... not very likely.
Anyway, this was all VERY WEIRD, and I don't have any reasonable explanation. Only unusualy thing was the weather. Skys were clear, but it was very windy, and the temperature was changing dramatically.... cold.... . But this morning it was even colder, and no problems with sat reception, so unless it was the changing temperature, that shouldn't have been an issue. However what MAY have been an issue is that with the wind, and VERY DRY air, there was a LOT of static potential everywhere. It was really freaking out one of my dogs, because every time the dog would try to sniff me, she'd get her nose zapped by the sparks. Everything was sparking when you'd touch it. Perhaps the static shut down my LNBFs???? But why only the KU LNBFs???
ANYWAY, WEIRD .
.png){kind=avatar}
Linear Mode
