Need help please....

[jpasint]

Ok, here goes another one of those “I’m ready to give up” posts. I purchased a Mercury II from Sadoun. It came with a “standard” dish and a generic LNB. I can’t get IA5 to save my you know what. I have not tried to tune in any other sats yet. I followed the install instructions for the Mercury II as per Sadoun’s site. Basically, they say to not touch any of the settings on the receiver. My antenna mount is level in both directions. I’m in 33073 area so I calculate my antenna should be pointed 224 degrees. Elevation is said to 54 degrees.
The signal level and signal quality meters on the receiver just bounce up and down from 0 to 4 and all in between that.
Is it possible I have a bad LNB or bad receiver? I guess that’s always possible and there is no way to know for sure. Or is it likely I just off? I have installed a good handful of DTV antennas and those were always a piece of cake!

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

Joe

[jpasint]

Thought I would add one more thing. I have the LNB turned what I think is 30 degrees CC. The LNB has 6 tick makes in each direction so I figured each was 5 degrees.

Thanks again.

Joe

[Lord_Perth]

I have the same receiver Joe. Mine works but I sure enough touched all the settings in the menu before I ever got it to work at all. I'm still trying to pull in sats other than echostar6.

I'd check and make sure that the LNB setting is right at least, then if you don't have it set to an active transponder, it is my understanding that you won't ever get a signal. I just bought mine too, and I understand your frustration for sure.

[jpasint]

Originally Posted by Lord_Perth

I have the same receiver Joe. Mine works but I sure enough touched all the settings in the menu before I ever got it to work at all. I'm still trying to pull in sats other than echostar6.

I'd check and make sure that the LNB setting is right at least, then if you don't have it set to an active transponder, it is my understanding that you won't ever get a signal. I just bought mine too, and I understand your frustration for sure.

Well, I checked lyngsat.com sure enough, the default transponder is active. Just can’t get any signal strength!

Take care.

Joe

[radiobob]

Joe:

Welcome to the elite club of Satellite Head Scratchers!

I think you may be off on your azimuth...assuming you are in the Pompano Beach area (unless I mis-typed your zip code), Sadoun's sat calculator (http://www.sadoun.com/Sat/Installati...Calculator.htm) gives me 214.3 degrees and another on-line calculator gave me 215 degrees. Since Sadoun is sponsoring this, let's give him the final word!

Your 30 deg skew (CCW as you face the dish) sounds right, as does your elevation. I'm not sure of the markings on your LNB mount, but you can always verify with a protractor or inclinometer (angle finder) to see if your skew is right.

So, grab that wrench and go outside...oh wait, I just checked your forecast...70% chance of rain!

Good luck,
bob

[jpasint]

Originally Posted by radiobob

Joe:

Welcome to the elite club of Satellite Head Scratchers!

I think you may be off on your azimuth...assuming you are in the Pompano Beach area (unless I mis-typed your zip code), Sadoun's sat calculator (http://www.sadoun.com/Sat/Installati...Calculator.htm) gives me 214.3 degrees and another on-line calculator gave me 215 degrees. Since Sadoun is sponsoring this, let's give him the final word!

Your 30 deg skew (CCW as you face the dish) sounds right, as does your elevation. I'm not sure of the markings on your LNB mount, but you can always verify with a protractor or inclinometer (angle finder) to see if your skew is right.

So, grab that wrench and go outside...oh wait, I just checked your forecast...70% chance of rain!

Good luck,
bob

Thanks Bob. Not much rain yet. I thought I needed to add about 10 degrees to the Azimuth due to “magnetic deviation” as per the NOTE: in calculator?

Even still, I think I rotated it every degree in between and still got no signal strength.

Take care.

Joe

[radiobob]

Originally Posted by jpasint

Thanks Bob. Not much rain yet. I thought I needed to add about 10 degrees to the Azimuth due to “magnetic deviation” as per the NOTE: in calculator?

Even still, I think I rotated it every degree in between and still got no signal strength.

Take care.

Joe

Yeah...indeed...I was talking geographic true rather than magnetic. As the former prez said, "I feel your pain". I'm getting some signals, but not what I should (and nada on IA5). Sigh...

[Iceberg]

what LNB do you have? Is there any writing on it? There are 2 types of LNB's out there (Standard and UNiversal) and if the receiver isn't set up with the correct LNB LO frequency, you won't get anything

Does it say something like 10750 on it oe 9750/10600? This is crucial in setting it up in the receiver setup (yes you can make changes in there)

[wejones]

Originally Posted by jpasint

I thought I needed to add about 10 degrees to the Azimuth due to “magnetic deviation” as per the NOTE: in calculator?

I think it's more like a bit less than 6 degrees, not 10.

Also, make sure you have lnb power turned on for that sat. The absolute signal levels are meaningless, and vary from receiver to receiver, but a reading of "0 to 4" sounds like the lnb is turned off. But I don't have that receiver, maybe it reads different levels than other receivers.

[jpasint]

Originally Posted by Iceberg

what LNB do you have? Is there any writing on it? There are 2 types of LNB's out there (Standard and UNiversal) and if the receiver isn't set up with the correct LNB LO frequency, you won't get anything

Does it say something like 10750 on it oe 9750/10600? This is crucial in setting it up in the receiver setup (yes you can make changes in there)

Thanks for the reply Iceberg and sorry for the delay in my response. I really do want to get this thing going for the wife.

The LNB has the following written on it:

Standard FSS Single LNBF

I/P – 11.7-12.2
O/P 950-1450 MHz
L.O. 10.75 GHz
KUL1

Hope that helps.

Also, I purchased an angle locator like the one sold at Sadoun (orange Johnson).
I found out that I can’t use it exactly as the locator reads because the dish is actually angled an additional 20 degrees or something like that. Can you explain that for me?

Again, I’m appreciating anything anyone can do to help.

Take care.

Joe

[jpasint]

Originally Posted by wejones

I think it's more like a bit less than 6 degrees, not 10.

Also, make sure you have lnb power turned on for that sat. The absolute signal levels are meaningless, and vary from receiver to receiver, but a reading of "0 to 4" sounds like the lnb is turned off. But I don't have that receiver, maybe it reads different levels than other receivers.

Bill, I do not see a setup option in the receiver to turn an LNB on or off. But it sure does seem like it is not working at all though. I get the same bouncing with the cable connected and without!

Take care.

Joe

[pmb1010]

Joe,

you need to get "quality" indication. The signal level is (as you have found) kinda meaningless. You could point the dish at the ground, and get some signal level.

As discussed above there are 2 selections for LNB type. Standard, and Universal. You should be picking "standard". It's important.
This pic shows Mercury II set to "Universal":
http://www.sadoun.com/Sat/Products/F...ryII%20(7).JPG

Put yours on Standard (or something like that).
That LO of 10.750 is what your reciever need to be set at to get it working properly.

[wejones]

Originally Posted by jpasint

Bill, I do not see a setup option in the receiver to turn an LNB on or off. But it sure does seem like it is not working at all though. I get the same bouncing with the cable connected and without!

Take care.

Joe

On the other Fortec receivers the LNB power on/off function is in the same window that PMB1010 posted. I was confused that it wasn't there, so I downloaded the manual. It looks like in the Mercury, that it is a system setting. Hit the Menu button, and select "System Setup", and there should be a "Others" tab. In this tab, there should be an option to turn LNB power on or off. This "should" default to "ON", however the fact that your signal level is less than "4", is really strange, and suggests to me that maybe somehow this got set to "OFF". If that is not the case, I'd check the coax between the lnb and the receiver for shorts or open or perhaps a bad connection, or (and this has happened to me), perhaps the little wire center conductor got folded over and wasn't making contact.

[Iceberg]

The LNB power needs to be at 13/18 or ON (my Classic says 13/18)
Also, ther LNB LO which says "UNI" as the deafult, needs to be 10750 (scroll through the options and it should be there)

[jpasint]

Originally Posted by Iceberg

The LNB power needs to be at 13/18 or ON (my Classic says 13/18)
Also, ther LNB LO which says "UNI" as the deafult, needs to be 10750 (scroll through the options and it should be there)

Ok guys. I’ll check the settings for LNB on/off and also change the LNB type to 10750.
It would be really helpful if I could find out the 100% proper way to use the angle indicator I purchased. That would rule out a huge part of this equation if I knew for certain that the elevation was correct.
Does anyone have an idea of how to compensate the preconfigured tilt of the dish? In other words, even though the arm that holds the LNB is right at 0 degrees, or 90 degrees to be exact, the dish itself is at something like 20 degrees. This is confirmed by the fact that the angle indicator etched into the dish mounting hardware indicates 20 or there abouts when the bracket is at 90 degrees. Does that make sense?
I also think I’m going to buy a signal strength meter if I cant get anything going tonight after I try what you guys suggest.


Thanks again guys.

Joe

[Iceberg]

It looks like your elevation is 54 (that’s what you put in the Original post) so the dish needs to be at 54 degrees on the scale. There should be an edge (maybe with a red mark on it). You need to line that up with 54. If there is no edge, then use the centre of the elevation nut

[elgemcdlf]

Ok we shall start with your compass. The dish will alter readings so make sure you are far enough away from the dish when determining direction. Next on the list is this is not DTV. The Echo birds have a much stronger signal. You also need to be very slow when adjusting.

Ok if I were you I would start with the settings listed on this site. Slowly rotate east to west as much as 90 degrees. See if you can catch signal. If you can scan and see what channels you have. Compare to lyngsat to determine what sat you are on. You now have something to go on. From that point you can determine where in the sky you are. You will know