"Men & Movies" Poor Signal (via Satellite)

This article provides tips to improve "Men and Movies" reception in the UK via satellite when using a standard Sky dish.

Background

Weak signal problems plague "Men & Movies" reception in the UK and most are caused by poor Sky dish installation or LNB misalignment, resulting in low signal quality during rain.

At present both Sky+ HD and Freesat reception can be problematic as both UK TV services receive the same signal. During bad weather a "no satellite signal is being received" on-screen message may be seen on Sky+ HD, or a "no or bad signal" message on a Humax Foxsat HDR.

If your "Men and Movies" picture is breaking up during rain, careful dish realignment and LNB adjustments should solve the problem, in all but the most extreme weather conditions.

Causes of Poor "Men & Movies" Signal

A poor satellite signal of "Men and Movies" in the UK can be caused by a combination of factors:

Transmission is via Eurobird 1 - "Men and Movies" is currently transmitted on the Eurobird 1 satellite at 28.5 degrees East; 0.3 degrees further east in orbital position than the Astra satellites (at 28.2E) which carry most other Sky TV and Freesat services.
Currently if the azimuth of your satellite dish is slightly misaligned a fraction west of 28.2E, the signal strength from Eurobird 1 at 0.3 degress further east will be weak, so check your dish alignment is spot on with a low cost satellite meter, then weather-proof the LNB connectors with Self Amalgamating Tape after checking dish alignment.
Highest frequency transponder - "Men and Movies" is on one of the highest frequency satellite transponders (12.560GHz V) so LNB noise figure and efficiency can be worse. The coaxial cable losses from the LNB to your set top box are higher at these frequencies too, so long coaxial cable runs can cause problems. So can the use of twin RG6 cable which has higher signal losses. WF100 coaxial cable is recommended for all satellite TV installations.
The LNB Skew angle is different - The LNB Skew angle for Eurobird 1 is about 7 degrees more than that required by the Astra satellites (20 degrees Skew angle for Eurobird 1 versus 13 degrees for Astra 28.2E in London). As Sky LNB's are always set to a default position at installation, Eurobird 1 reception is never optimised and as a consequence UK reception is frequently poor.
To make matters worse Eurobird transmits on both horizontal and vertical polarisation on 12.560Ghz making cross-polarisation interference more of a possibility and the LNB skew angle more critical. Careful skew angle adjustment is needed to optimally align the LNB for reception of vertical and horizontal channels. The skew angle itself is set according to the satellite's position in geostationary orbit, when viewed from the installed location of the dish.

How to Use the Dish Alignment Tool

Choose a satellite from the top row of the widget I.E. 28.2E Astra 2A | Astra B | Astra 2D
Enter your location - such as Birmingham, UK into the second row and hit the 'Return key'
Read off the precise dish azimuth and LNB skew angle for your particular location

Dish Size & Alignment

According to the Eurobird 1 satellite footprint, a minimum 50cm dish size should provide reliable Eurobird reception in most parts of the UK, but in practice the signal strength from Eurobird tends to be weaker than the Astra 28.2E satellites.

Importantly, the Astra satellites also have a different skew angle than Eurobird 1 - around a 7 degrees skew angle difference in fact, so the usual default skew setting of "3" for a Sky LNB for most of England is incorrect for Eurobird 1.

Where the LNB angle on the front of your dish may appear to be at 7 O'clock, the skew angle for Eurobird 1 is slightly more; at around 7:30.

You can accurately check the skew angle for Eurobird 1 28.5E at your particular UK location using the widget (left).

How to Men & Movies Signal

At my Newbury, Berkshire location I managed to achieve a 10% higher signal quality reading by changing the LNB Skew on my Sky dish from position "3" to position "2" which increases the skew angle slightly. LNB adjustment should only be done after dish alignment has been checked with a cheap satellite meter.

The Skew setting will depend on where you are in the UK, for example Cornwall in SW England requires 4 degrees more LNB skew than London, so the Sky LNB may already be set to "2" and therefore need moving to position "1" to increase the Skew angle. North east Scotland normally uses a Sky LNB Skew setting of 4, so a new position of "3" should be tried.

LNB skew adjustment is done by carefully loosening the screw which clamps the LNB and rotating it to the next preset notch (see picture below).

After making this change the signal quality on "Men and Movies" is now 80% and signal strength is 90% during dry weather. The all-important signal quality now only deteriorates to 50% during heavy rain, which means no more picture break up is present. The "no signal or bad signal" message is no longer displayed on my Humax Foxsat HDR Freesat Recorder!

The LNB skew adjustment seems to have significantly improved rain margin and not at the expense of the Astra satellites, which still have between 90 and 100% signal quality across the board.

However, given my findings it's questionable whether a 43cm dish is really big enough for reliable Eurobird 1 reception during bad weather in the southern UK.

LNB Signal Overload

Interestingly, I found that the Octo LNB (with 8 outputs) fitted to my dish has an in-built line amplifier which seems to cause slight signal overload on my Humax Freesat box, due to short coaxial cable runs from the dish to the receiver. This is surprising given that I am using a normal 43cm Sky dish!

This came to light when I noticed that signal attenuation caused by inserting the satellite meter between the LNB and the Humax Foxsat HDR improved the signal quality on "Men and Movies" by around 10%.

As a result I now have two 6dB inline satellite attenuators which actually improve signal quality on all channels (but especially on weak Eurobird 1 channels like "CBS Reality"). Signal strength is still 90 - 100% on Astra TV channels.

Comments Welcomed

I hope this article helps to improve your "Men and Movies" signal via Sky or Freesat! If not, try a Zone 2 60cm Sky dish which will provide much greater signal strength.

Feel free to send me comments about your experiences with "Men & Movies" reception using our Contact Form.