Pointing Direcway / Hughesnet dish

I have DirecWay and have moved the motor home from the NC coast to central OK. Edmond to be exact.

Lots of info on pointing the dish, no success yet but I'm still using NC settings on the mast and trying to sweep the southern sky for a signal. Thought I might get lucky.

Asking DirecWay only gets a call an installer response.

Anybody know what satellite for the OK area?
Or the elevation or other settings for a DirecWay 6000 for this area.

Miles

Same satellite Miles. You might move, but your account doesn't. The satellite/transponder to which you're assigned in NC is necessarily the same satellite/transponder you must access in OK.

Too bad you didn't say which satellite. As I could have given you the correct antenna angles from Edmond. You'll never never find the right signal using NC antenna settings in OK.

//greg//

Ok Greg - thanks for the info - so the question is what satellite does DirecWay use ?

I have looked up the list and none say DirecWay - if it is in my DirecWay info I have not found it yet but I will keep looking.

Retired Railroad Engineer

USMC 65 - 69

Assuming you have a blue and white DW icon down by the clock, right click it and select ABOUT - then click System Information. I'm interested in Satellite (and Transponder) Information

//greg//

Greg I don't have icon in my systems tray however my system info reads;

DW6000 info Satellite
Site ID: Transmit Path: Satellite
San: Outroute: Primary Number: Longitude: 117 West
Software Receive
Release Frequency: 1090.0 MHz
Number:
IP Address:
Subnet Mask:
NAT Subnet
Mask:

There is a little more info by this gives you an idea of the info I have available - I didn't include my personal site info that is on the left column

The icon location was offered, based on the assumption that you were a DW4000 subscriber. Not a problem though, you found the DW6000 info that helps me accomplish the same end; SatMex5, transponder 1090H.

These are rough angles mind you, since I don't know your exact lat/long within Edmond. But you should be off to a good start if you initially set in
AZ 205.6
EL 43.8
Pol 24.7

I can't stress enough that peaking the received signal level (RSL) is NOT the end of the job. You set in the 3 angles listed above, then peak RSL with AZ/EL angles. THEN you must fine tune the Pol for max ACP (manual). On SM5, the minimum acceptable ACP is 81. Sometimes this involves going back and "tweaking" the AZ and/or EL angles to arrive at the best compromise. Please realize that peaking for max ACP necessarily "costs" you some RSL.

Good luck

//greg//

Ok Greg,

Thanks for the info - for the record so to speak, the exact location of the dish is 35`45,900 N and 097`29,186 W at 958ft ASL - GPS Magellan.

The current settings on the dish are - 60.05 elevation and 39.05 on the polarisation. These are easy to find and read however the other number Azimuth 205.6 is not right in front of me as the other scales are.

I will study the dish mechanics and scale to night.

I guessed at your lat/long pretty close. Your Magellan points compute to identical look angles.

Azimuth marks can be located at the top of the antenna bracket, on the round portion that clamps onto the mounting arm or pole.

And I'd also like to take this opportunity to stress the importance of care in setting the pole mount perfectly plumb. If it's not 100% vertical in all directions, those AZ/EL/Pol numbers I gave you won't mean a thing. And a tip to prevent the pole from working loose in the hole; drill horizontally through the pole, about 6" from the bottom. Makes the holes big enough to accommodate at least a foot of steel rebar. Should keep the pole from turning in the hole, especially if you anchor it with Quikrete. After the hole is dug, fill it with water. Once hole is empty again, set in the pole - and fill the hole to within a few inches of the top - then cover with dirt or sod. No water. Plumb and brace the pole immediately. The water held by the damp soil, will then leach back in to - and set - the Quikrete. It will be solid enough to remove the braces, and mount the dish within 24 hours.

//greg//

Ok back to asking dumb questions what is the difference between azimuth and compass direction. Is azimuth the compass setting corrected for magnetic variations?

I had to level the bus ( build four pads ) and plumb a pole. Still trying but maybe time to call an installer.

Miles

Miles
My calculator gives the azimuth direction relative to magnetic north (as well as the true bearing). So, if you have a compass, just aim as per the magnetic bearing. East is 90, south is 180 and west is 270.
If you have a GPS try walking in a straight line for 50 yards and it should give you a true bearing to about +/-5 deg accuracy.
Finding the satellite is best done by setting the elevation first really accurately using the scale on the bracket and then swinging the dish boldly in the general azimuth direction to find the satellite. Having found it, you are only part done. You need to spend much more time peaking up really carefully. Good luck and take care if using ladders or tools high up. Best regards, Eric.

on 16. Sep 2004 at 16:49, mbmulloy wrote:

Stand on the north side of the pole, facing south. Use the compass to find Magnetic North. The azimuth I gave you should already have been corrected for magnetic deviation. Since South is 180 degrees, you know 205.6 has to be further around the compass - West. Using round numbers, your starting azimuth will be 26 degrees West of South. 180+26=206. South-South-West.

//greg//

I finally have my satellite dish and running. The help was much appreciated and the numbers were right on the money.

Speed: 631(down)/163(up) kbps
And I learned a great deal from the installer.
The dish TV installer who just happened to be across the street offered to point the dish from me, for $35.

It takes a lot better compass than I had -- I was not even close.
Again the installer said that having all the information - polarization elevation satellites identification made his job very easy and he was in and out 30 minutes.

That works out to about 70 bucks an hour.
Still I'd rather be retired.

I'm sure to follow this forum; as I intend to network the 6000 to at least one may be to two other computers.
Miles

on 24. Sep 2004 at 02:47, Miles Mulloy wrote:

I'm glad things worked out Miles, too bad that installer didn't feel charitable to share some of that $70/hr he pocketed.

But those numbers compel me to point out an incompatibility. That 163 (up) tells me that you've got SunJAVA installed. Since you're talking to a 128k buffer at NOC, 163 an obviously bogus test result, almost certainly obtained from a JAVA-based site. Download speeds are legit, it's just the upload numbers that are flakey. Has to do with SunJAVA not coping with DirecWay's compression algorithm on the customer side. For more representative results of upload speed testing, I suggest that you either revert to MSVM - or test at other than JAVA based sites.

And if you're interested, I might very possibly be able to help increase your download test results - for real.

//greg//

Well of course Greg -- increase my download speeds? It is the upload this certainly needs to upgrade or improvement.

As you can tell from my post, I'm more than willing to take on a job I can't do, but will try anyway.

Interested -- yes.

Miles

You're not going to do much to improve the uploads. I've never ever gotten more than 110kbps - and that was to a FTP server. Typically, they're half that or less - occasionally dropping to sub-modem speeds. Remember - a DirecWay connection is shared bandwidth.

You can squeeze a little more out of the uploads by increasing the default Windows MTU to 1500. The downloads are usually enhanced by increasing the default DirecWay RWIN. This can be done by manually editing the Windows registry, or by 3rd party utility. I suggest DrTCP or TCPOptimizer.

State your preference, and we can go from there

//greg//

Greg the reason for my interest in the increasing, if not the quantity of the uplink, then maybe there's something to be done for the quality; is because of my telephone over the Internet program.

Vonage telephone service is just so cheap and the quality of the reception is excellent however everyone complains about the delay and the broken quality of my transmissions.

My inquiries to the company about this discrepancy received the following response, Oh you are using direct way satellite broadband. but further discussion with the tech personnel assigned to my account revealed that it was a problem inherent in slow upload speeds with broadband satellite operations.

It is late at night, yes 10:30pm is late for me these days, I'm tired and I've just inherited a really fine Roland ep.9 piano. I can see my priorities changing as the need to play, compose and edit some compositions that have had to hang on the back burner while I completed a career in the railroad industry.

But never one to pass up an opportunity to ask the dumb question; would you elaborate on the definition of " DrTCP or TCPOptimizer.

mbm