No-Signal Problems

[Venner]

Hey all.

I have a Fortec 80cm dish & Fortec Classic NA receiver, which I've used just fine the last couple of years with Sadoun's universal LNB, as well as an Invacom QPH-031 LNB (I never have come to a conclusion whether one is better than the other...SNR is pretty similar.) STAB HH90 motor.

This winter we had some fierce windstorms, which spun my dish around and at one point even pulled the tripod I have my dish on out of the ground and flung it into the snow. (I had it secured by 3 foot long metal stakes! Pulled them right out of the ground.) Well, I don't watch much TV and I never got around to setting my system back up until now. I had just put it back upright and re-secured it.

I can't get a signal now, period.

Location: About 90 minutes west of Columbus, OH
Latitude: 40.8°N
Longitude: 83.8°W
Motor Latitude Angle: 40.8°
Azimuth (true): 180.0°
Azimuth (magn.): 186.6° using Compass
Declination angle: 6.3°
Dish elevation: 39°


I've swapped out all the coax cables, tried both my LNBs (uni/auto, QPH-031/10,750), tripod is level, motor angle correct, dish angle correct. The receiver moves the dish just fine. Nothing is bent or broken. No switch. Same clear line of sight.
It's driving me insane.

I usually use AMC3 (87W) as my test satellite, but I can't get a thing scanning east or west, tilting slightly up & down, on any of the frequencies. (The Patient Channel, Bloomberg, and the Urdo channels are usually pretty strong, even if the PBSes are borderline.) Tried the Hughes feeds on AMC9 just to get a friggin' signal, but nothing.

I could really appreciate any hints or advice. Any ideas what might be not working?

[Larry Acklin]

well-

The amc3 bird has been going through some changes lately.

The muslim channels all are different than last winter.
And I can't blind scan the PBS cluster.
And I cant get Montana, or any of the other alternate PBS providers

But Bloomberg is almost always up, and the Patient Channel is also.

My suggestion is to USALS to the right location (the motor thinks it is) and set the bloomberg transponder into the antenna setup screen.

Then do the up/dn L/R dance.

Larry

[Larry Acklin]

Also possible the dish or feed arm is bent to the point it wont focus or is off calibration to the scale on the mount.