some progress
And let us hope it was precision engineered!Robert,
JB
if the dish was "precision engineered" and looking again at your 75mm lens shot it could well be that you received E10A via a first sidelobe on the western side. Fingers crossed ...
Ernst
Ernst, I have a new engineer coming Sunday mid-forenoon – fingers crossed. I haven’t really kept up with current developments, having no reception, and I suspect a lot has changed since Christmas. Just assuming I get excellent SNR tomorrow, will I need to make any immediate changes to my cast-client.channels_bas.ini file? Prior to breakdown I had MSG HRIT, both GOES data, Himawari, IODC, Metop-B and -C. I know some of these have moved, but given that I’m getting (poor) reception on MSG HRIT at present I really need to see perhaps two other channels if I get a good SNR. Will I have enough on a seven-month-old *.ini file to get at least some of these? Full catch-up and editing once I get a signal.
If the SNR is really good, I’ll ask for a second cable, in anticipation of future developments.
Thanks for your continued help, I have all your notes edited, ready for the new man.
Robert
Sent: 07 July 2022 10:01
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
OK, misunderstood you Ernst. I’ll add the email below to the instructions I’m preparing for the new engineer. I don’t remember any instructions with the dish, it just came from a warehouse near Manchester the day after I ordered it. All cardboard and sticky tape – no instructions!
Robert
From:
MSG-1@groups.io <MSG-1@groups.io> On Behalf Of
Ernst Lobsiger via groups.io
Sent: 07 July 2022 06:53
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
I didn't suggest your dish is upside down :-). But when you buy a dish you normally have to assemble it by screwing the mount to it and also the LNB arm. Mecanically it makes sense how it looks on your pictures now and the dish elevation looks about as expected.
But the 4 screws that hold the parabola blade seem to allow Murphy to do his job. There are also antennas that have two elevation markings and depending on the elevation range you must use scale one or scale two and maybe even assemble the mount differently.
And tuning elevation is as sensitive as azimuth. So all I want to say is: Your next engineer must double check your antenna elevation as well. And for that purpose it's always helpful if you can find the original assembly manual for that dish. We certainly
all hope that with 'one thing at a time' you can get back to a far better SNR and receive your GOES16 images again.
Best regards,
Ernst
On 7 Jul 2022, at 10:00, Robert Moore <rsmoore@...> wrote:
OK, misunderstood you Ernst. I’ll add the email below to the instructions I’m preparing for the new engineer. I don’t remember any instructions with the dish, it just came from a warehouse near Manchester the day after I ordered it. All cardboard and sticky tape – no instructions!
Robert
From: MSG-1@groups.io <MSG-1@groups.io> On Behalf Of Ernst Lobsiger via groups.io
Sent: 07 July 2022 06:53
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
I didn't suggest your dish is upside down :-). But when you buy a dish you normally have to assemble it by screwing the mount to it and also the LNB arm. Mecanically it makes sense how it looks on your pictures now and the dish elevation looks about as expected. But the 4 screws that hold the parabola blade seem to allow Murphy to do his job. There are also antennas that have two elevation markings and depending on the elevation range you must use scale one or scale two and maybe even assemble the mount differently. And tuning elevation is as sensitive as azimuth. So all I want to say is: Your next engineer must double check your antenna elevation as well. And for that purpose it's always helpful if you can find the original assembly manual for that dish. We certainly all hope that with 'one thing at a time' you can get back to a far better SNR and receive your GOES16 images again.
Best regards,
Ernst
OK, misunderstood you Ernst. I’ll add the email below to the instructions I’m preparing for the new engineer. I don’t remember any instructions with the dish, it just came from a warehouse near Manchester the day after I ordered it. All cardboard and sticky tape – no instructions!
Robert
Sent: 07 July 2022 06:53
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
I didn't suggest your dish is upside down :-). But when you buy a dish you normally have to assemble it by screwing the mount to it and also the LNB arm. Mecanically it makes sense how it looks on your pictures now and the dish elevation looks about as expected.
But the 4 screws that hold the parabola blade seem to allow Murphy to do his job. There are also antennas that have two elevation markings and depending on the elevation range you must use scale one or scale two and maybe even assemble the mount differently.
And tuning elevation is as sensitive as azimuth. So all I want to say is: Your next engineer must double check your antenna elevation as well. And for that purpose it's always helpful if you can find the original assembly manual for that dish. We certainly
all hope that with 'one thing at a time' you can get back to a far better SNR and receive your GOES16 images again.
Best regards,
Ernst
I didn't suggest your dish is upside down :-). But when you buy a dish you normally have to assemble it by screwing the mount to it and also the LNB arm. Mecanically it makes sense how it looks on your pictures now and the dish elevation looks about as expected. But the 4 screws that hold the parabola blade seem to allow Murphy to do his job. There are also antennas that have two elevation markings and depending on the elevation range you must use scale one or scale two and maybe even assemble the mount differently. And tuning elevation is as sensitive as azimuth. So all I want to say is: Your next engineer must double check your antenna elevation as well. And for that purpose it's always helpful if you can find the original assembly manual for that dish. We certainly all hope that with 'one thing at a time' you can get back to a far better SNR and receive your GOES16 images again.
Best regards,
Ernst
I think, ‘one thing at a time’, Ernst. So far, with your notes, my picture and a new engineer I have high hopes of reception with the dish right way up. If the current errors are as drastic as you suggest, then when corrected them we might be able to lower the dish to its original position level with the guttering. Just before my troubles started I had excellent reception.
Robert
Sent: 06 July 2022 20:39
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
in addition to what I just said: I cannot see from behind how your dish does handle elevation setting. But it seems to me that, with a little help from Murphy,
you can even fix this mount upside down. Do you have any pointers to some documentation or manual of your dish. Does anybody else know this dish?
Ernst
in addition to what I just said: I cannot see from behind how your dish does handle elevation setting. But it seems to me that, with a little help from Murphy,
you can even fix this mount upside down. Do you have any pointers to some documentation or manual of your dish. Does anybody else know this dish?
Ernst
Provided these pictures have been taken the way you described and you do not have a summer fog that just starts behind your home, then these shots should give us hope:
-- I do not see any trees in the line of sight which means we can probably forget beam blocking from big trees opposite your street alltogether
-- If I zoom into your pictures I do see the dish is turned to the left (too far east). For azimuth 163.6° the LNB arm should be hidden by the mast!
-- Last but not least it appears to me your LNB is turned clockwise (CW) as seen from behind the dish. But for E10A -- east of your location --
we found a considerable Skew = -9.7° which means the LNB should be turned counterclockwise (CCW) by -9.7° as seen from behind the dish.
I suggest you point your next engineer to this thread. It has got a little bit long but don't let him tell you TLDR. For what it is worth I add a picture
from "Google Earth PRO" with a hand tuned *.kml file (*.kml is text, *.kmz is zipped *.kml). It doesn't tell us much, but it's good looking anyway.
Cheers,
Ernst
I think this is as good as it will get from ground level Ernst. Tripod set up with inclinometer mounted at my eye height. Checked centre of dish was at 28 degrees (thickness of scale marks used to approximate to 27.99) and on the 163.5 azimuth (closest to 163.63). Inclinometer replaced by camera. Two shots: dish-0 is using a standard four thirds 25 mm lens, dish-1 using a four thirds 75 mm lens. Both shots taken using cable release (bit over overkill really).
Robert
Sent: 06 July 2022 01:26
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
On Tue, Jul 5, 2022 at 04:10 PM, Robert Moore wrote:
I think the arrowed tree may be the right-hand tree of a gap we can see in your picture.
Robert,
the arrowed tree does not matter at all. Forget all the trees beyond the end of the red line in Robert_Moore_Antenna.kmz. You *must* also tell your "Google Earth PRO" not to tilt the view if you zoom in. It just makes the image unreadable. You change this setting
under: Tools/Options/Navigation/Do not tilt when zooming in (freely translated from my german "Google Earth PRO" version). The (possibly) offending trees are much closer than you seem to think. Maybe the method with the sun elevation and shadow will give
more insight if the wood is inaccessible anyway. Meanwhile it's certainly a good thing to try to make that image from the rear of your garden.
Remember: From the point you take the image (with your antenna in the center of the picture):
- The antenna must appear at azimuth 163.6°. Use the sun with passing time or your compass.
- The center of the antenna should be at elevation 27.9° as measured with your inclinometer
- The distance to your antenna does not matter, it is just used to adjust the inclination to 27.9°
If you cannot fullfill any of these points exactly, then make the picture anyway and comment on the problem you had and deviation you expect.
Good luck,
Ernst
Robert
From: MSG-1@groups.io <MSG-1@groups.io> On Behalf Of David J Taylor GM8ARV ?????????????? ???? via groups.io
Sent: 06 July 2022 16:29
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
On 06/07/2022 15:29, Robert Moore wrote:
Ernst I’m not sure the whole list is interested in forestry andIt's a problem which affects many users, and I've had complaints about it being a topic for discussion. I suggest continuing on-list.
gardening – do you think we should go off-list? My attempted email to you bounced.
Robert
Cheers,
David
--
SatSignal Software - Quality software for you
Web: https://www.satsignal.eu
Email: david-taylor@...
Twitter: @gm8arv
Ernst I’m not sure the whole list is interested in forestry and gardening – doIt's a problem which affects many users, and I've had complaints about it being
you think we should go off-list? My attempted email to you bounced.
Robert
a topic for discussion. I suggest continuing on-list.
Cheers,
David
--
SatSignal Software - Quality software for you
Web: https://www.satsignal.eu
Email: david-taylor@...
Twitter: @gm8arv
Ernst I’m not sure the whole list is interested in forestry and gardening – do you think we should go off-list? My attempted email to you bounced.
Robert
Sent: 06 July 2022 01:26
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
On Tue, Jul 5, 2022 at 04:10 PM, Robert Moore wrote:
I think the arrowed tree may be the right-hand tree of a gap we can see in your picture.
Robert,
the arrowed tree does not matter at all. Forget all the trees beyond the end of the red line in Robert_Moore_Antenna.kmz. You *must* also tell your "Google Earth PRO" not to tilt the view if you zoom in. It just makes the image unreadable. You change this setting
under: Tools/Options/Navigation/Do not tilt when zooming in (freely translated from my german "Google Earth PRO" version). The (possibly) offending trees are much closer than you seem to think. Maybe the method with the sun elevation and shadow will give
more insight if the wood is inaccessible anyway. Meanwhile it's certainly a good thing to try to make that image from the rear of your garden.
Remember: From the point you take the image (with your antenna in the center of the picture):
- The antenna must appear at azimuth 163.6°. Use the sun with passing time or your compass.
- The center of the antenna should be at elevation 27.9° as measured with your inclinometer
- The distance to your antenna does not matter, it is just used to adjust the inclination to 27.9°
If you cannot fullfill any of these points exactly, then make the picture anyway and comment on the problem you had and deviation you expect.
Good luck,
Ernst
From: George Sz <szgydezign@...>
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Sent: Mon, 4 Jul 2022 20:43
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
There are reasons I explicitly specified those two transponders (BFBS and AFP):
1. there are no such frequencies on 9°E
2. a sat TV installer tech may end up pointing to 9°E instead of 10°E and with a dish big enough, that 1° off may result in a big loss!
3. both of these TPs are standard DVB ones, no ACM/VCM so any decent sat meter can lock onto these without any issue
Robert,
I checked around your location and what you're saying makes a lot more sense now. Those trees are indeed very close to your dish. I'm not yet sure about the hill behind.
Regards,
George
I think the arrowed tree may be the right-hand tree of a gap we can see in your picture.Robert,
the arrowed tree does not matter at all. Forget all the trees beyond the end of the red line in Robert_Moore_Antenna.kmz. You *must* also tell your "Google Earth PRO" not to tilt the view if you zoom in. It just makes the image unreadable. You change this setting under: Tools/Options/Navigation/Do not tilt when zooming in (freely translated from my german "Google Earth PRO" version). The (possibly) offending trees are much closer than you seem to think. Maybe the method with the sun elevation and shadow will give more insight if the wood is inaccessible anyway. Meanwhile it's certainly a good thing to try to make that image from the rear of your garden.
Remember: From the point you take the image (with your antenna in the center of the picture):
- The antenna must appear at azimuth 163.6°. Use the sun with passing time or your compass.
- The center of the antenna should be at elevation 27.9° as measured with your inclinometer
- The distance to your antenna does not matter, it is just used to adjust the inclination to 27.9°
If you cannot fullfill any of these points exactly, then make the picture anyway and comment on the problem you had and deviation you expect.
Good luck,
Ernst
Back from my expedition Ernst – I walked 1.6 km but was never more than 300 metres from the dish (mainly 200 m). At the furthest point five large dogs rushed at me, barking furiously. They wanted to be petted and to play!
See attached screenshot: the white line is the only path through the wood and the trees are too close together to be measure. The arrowed tree was 26 metres tall – everything between would have been impossible to measure but was entirely inaccessible anyhow. I think the arrowed tree may be the right-hand tree of a gap we can see in your picture. Its top elevation would be 227 metres.
For a final resolution I think we’ll have to wait for the engineer to take a picture from dish-level but meanwhile I am going to have one more attempt from near the northern boundary of the garden.
Robert
Sent: 05 July 2022 22:27
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
On Tue, Jul 5, 2022 at 10:24 AM, Robert Moore wrote:
Thanks Ernst, it looks like you’ve been walking up my road!
Robert,
forgive me, I have also trespassed your garden :-). There is more "Google Earth PRO" can tell us. It can at least in part replace your inclinometer to estimate the height of trees. Let's look at the almost free standing pine accross the street. Drawing a line
from the top of the shadow to the top of the tree shows azimuth 162°. There is also a shadow of a telefone pole over the street (west of the pine) that shows an azimuth 167°. So let's take a mean value of 164.5° and *YES* we take that as the azimuth of the
sun when the sat image was taken. Now at the bottom of the screen you find the info that this image was taken April 22nd 2015. This is bad news as it means the trees are even bigger now. But it's also good news as we can go to the NOAA solar calculator and
find out that the time for this azimuth must have been 11:30 UTC and the elevation of the sun was 48.1°. Now for the height of the pine (2015!) it is as simple as that:
The height (measured from the elevation at the top of the shadow) is just the horizontal length of the shadow in meters (on the map) multiplied with tan(48.1°). In our case:
h = 19.14m * tan(48.1°) = 19.14m * 1.115 = 21.33m
This seems rather big but as I said, it's measured from the elevation of the top of the shadow while the tree stands maybe 4m uphill. I attach one more *.kmz that you can download and open by double click with "Google Earth PRO" installed. This of course is
just a blue print for what you can do outside now in summer 2022. Observe the shadows of the trees and where they originate from (protect your eyes and don't look directly in the sun!). You can go a little bit inside the top of the shadow and still see where
it originates from. Find out the according horizontal distance and note the time. Go to the NOAA solar calculator and find the elevation of the sun at the time you noted. Double check you use the same time zone. I always use UTC on all my GNU/Linux PCs and
try not to mess with MEZ and DST and the like. With the elevation found do the simple math above.
Cheers,
Ernst (the teacher)
P.S.
You can walk a street in "Google Earth PRO" by grabbing and pulling the yellow 'Oscar' top right down to the street with your mouse. Then you can look around and navigate with your mouse (also use the wheel). The images of the street in front of your home date
from September 2021 as displayed again at the bottom of the screen. And *YES*, if we look up we see rather big trees :-\ ...
Thanks Ernst, it looks like you’ve been walking up my road!Robert,
forgive me, I have also trespassed your garden :-). There is more "Google Earth PRO" can tell us. It can at least in part replace your inclinometer to estimate the height of trees. Let's look at the almost free standing pine accross the street. Drawing a line from the top of the shadow to the top of the tree shows azimuth 162°. There is also a shadow of a telefone pole over the street (west of the pine) that shows an azimuth 167°. So let's take a mean value of 164.5° and *YES* we take that as the azimuth of the sun when the sat image was taken. Now at the bottom of the screen you find the info that this image was taken April 22nd 2015. This is bad news as it means the trees are even bigger now. But it's also good news as we can go to the NOAA solar calculator and find out that the time for this azimuth must have been 11:30 UTC and the elevation of the sun was 48.1°. Now for the height of the pine (2015!) it is as simple as that:
The height (measured from the elevation at the top of the shadow) is just the horizontal length of the shadow in meters (on the map) multiplied with tan(48.1°). In our case:
h = 19.14m * tan(48.1°) = 19.14m * 1.115 = 21.33m
This seems rather big but as I said, it's measured from the elevation of the top of the shadow while the tree stands maybe 4m uphill. I attach one more *.kmz that you can download and open by double click with "Google Earth PRO" installed. This of course is just a blue print for what you can do outside now in summer 2022. Observe the shadows of the trees and where they originate from (protect your eyes and don't look directly in the sun!). You can go a little bit inside the top of the shadow and still see where it originates from. Find out the according horizontal distance and note the time. Go to the NOAA solar calculator and find the elevation of the sun at the time you noted. Double check you use the same time zone. I always use UTC on all my GNU/Linux PCs and try not to mess with MEZ and DST and the like. With the elevation found do the simple math above.
Cheers,
Ernst (the teacher)
P.S.
You can walk a street in "Google Earth PRO" by grabbing and pulling the yellow 'Oscar' top right down to the street with your mouse. Then you can look around and navigate with your mouse (also use the wheel). The images of the street in front of your home date from September 2021 as displayed again at the bottom of the screen. And *YES*, if we look up we see rather big trees :-\ ...
Thanks Ernst, it looks like you’ve been walking up my road! Spot on for the dish position. I’ve been out amongst the trees this afternoon – I have to sort out my notes first (and cook dinner) but hope to report back later this evening.
Robert
Sent: 05 July 2022 16:10
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
as you make no secret of your position I took your permission for granted to attach the things below. I may still be wrong but in the first google image I think I spotted your (old) antenna. Then I found the gap in the trees you said all your engineers pointed
at for best reception. It seems to me that this notch is rather far left from what your antenna should aim to. On the other hand right of the gap are indeed the biggest trees. You have a very large garden and you have stated that during a discussion in message
#10243 exactly in these words. So I'am now almost convinced you can make the image from behind your antenna I asked you for -- even omitting the UK "No trespassing!" problem -- if you go to the northern part of your garden. For an exact azimuth use the sun
passing over your antenna mast at times you find on these two links below. For elevation use your inclinometer that should point with 27.9° to the center of your antenna. If possible use a tripod for your camera. Configure it for small angle views and put
the antenna in the center of the image. I just hope this works. It's certainly worth a try.
Only dishpointer.eu has the additional sun passing times!
These times are only valid for the day you click the link
(for future passing times use the NOAA solar calculator).
Dishpointer.com says for your antenna position and E10A:
Azimuth 163.6° / Elevation 27.9° / Skew -9.7°
https://www.dishpointer.eu/
https://gml.noaa.gov/grad/solcalc/
I attach two *.kmz files you can play with. Just double click them with your "Google Earth PRO" installed. They should appear left under temporary locations. You can then also right click these entries and display the terrain profiles. Make sure you have terrain
switched on. In case of problems Google will tell you step by step how to do that.
From the NOAA solar calculator you see that your next complete outage is October 13th 2022 at 11:00:43 UTC. That's where you can exactly see the sun centered/covered by your antenna from the special point in your garden. There are also a couple of solar outage
calculators on the net John might know more about than I do. A last hint: As the offending trees are rather close you see quite sharp shadows on the google images. So one possible check is also to see (during the time of the next outage, or a few days before
and after) whether your dish is still illuminated in plain sun or whether the shadow already reached your dish (for this experiment there should be enough leafs left on the trees in October).
Good luck,
Ernst
as you make no secret of your position I took your permission for granted to attach the things below. I may still be wrong but in the first google image I think I spotted your (old) antenna. Then I found the gap in the trees you said all your engineers pointed at for best reception. It seems to me that this notch is rather far left from what your antenna should aim to. On the other hand right of the gap are indeed the biggest trees. You have a very large garden and you have stated that during a discussion in message #10243 exactly in these words. So I'am now almost convinced you can make the image from behind your antenna I asked you for -- even omitting the UK "No trespassing!" problem -- if you go to the northern part of your garden. For an exact azimuth use the sun passing over your antenna mast at times you find on these two links below. For elevation use your inclinometer that should point with 27.9° to the center of your antenna. If possible use a tripod for your camera. Configure it for small angle views and put the antenna in the center of the image. I just hope this works. It's certainly worth a try.
Only dishpointer.eu has the additional sun passing times!
These times are only valid for the day you click the link
(for future passing times use the NOAA solar calculator).
Dishpointer.com says for your antenna position and E10A:
Azimuth 163.6° / Elevation 27.9° / Skew -9.7°
https://www.dishpointer.eu/
https://gml.noaa.gov/grad/solcalc/
I attach two *.kmz files you can play with. Just double click them with your "Google Earth PRO" installed. They should appear left under temporary locations. You can then also right click these entries and display the terrain profiles. Make sure you have terrain switched on. In case of problems Google will tell you step by step how to do that.
From the NOAA solar calculator you see that your next complete outage is October 13th 2022 at 11:00:43 UTC. That's where you can exactly see the sun centered/covered by your antenna from the special point in your garden. There are also a couple of solar outage calculators on the net John might know more about than I do. A last hint: As the offending trees are rather close you see quite sharp shadows on the google images. So one possible check is also to see (during the time of the next outage, or a few days before and after) whether your dish is still illuminated in plain sun or whether the shadow already reached your dish (for this experiment there should be enough leafs left on the trees in October).
Good luck,
Ernst
Thanks Ernst, off to measure some tree heights tomorrow – weather permitting.
Robert
Sent: 04 July 2022 21:15
To: MSG-1@groups.io
Subject: Re: [MSG-1] some progress
Robert,
sorry, Google gave me the wrong Carmel in North Wales also with a hill in SE. So use my two screen shots just as cheat sheets for Google Earth and dishpointer. Your situation at the location you gave us is now indeed very tight and might depend on whether those
trees are 20m or actually 30m high. There is also a slight difference if I make the calculation with your numbers or with the digital elevation model Google Earth uses. Please note that dishpointer also gives a consireable skew for your position.
Ernst
sorry, Google gave me the wrong Carmel in North Wales also with a hill in SE. So use my two screen shots just as cheat sheets for Google Earth and dishpointer. Your situation at the location you gave us is now indeed very tight and might depend on whether those trees are 20m or actually 30m high. There is also a slight difference if I make the calculation with your numbers or with the digital elevation model Google Earth uses. Please note that dishpointer also gives a consireable skew for your position.
Ernst