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Astra and its many satellites


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Hi,

Many thanks to those who have contributed thus far to my satellite education, I now have French and English TV in glorious colour on my UK PAL-only TV set.

I'm now wondering if I can add German TV (to help maintain my language skills) and have been looking at the possibility of tuning to Astra 1F. Can anybody tell me if this is possible by adding a double head to one of my two dishes? I think if I install a third dish the house will start to look like MI5 headquarters.

I'm currently tuned to Atlantic Bird (5 deg. West) and Astra 2D (28.2 deg. East).

By the way, looking at Lyngsat:

http://www.lyngsat.com/europe.html

it would appear that Astra have six different offerings at 19.2 deg. East. If I tune to 19.2 degrees, will I automatically pick up all six?

Thanks in advance for your help.

Charlie

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You should be able to add another lnb to your dish that's pointing to Astra 2 as long as it's not a Sky mini-dish.  You will be able to receive all of the German free to air channels and a few others on Astra 1.  The simplest way may be to purchase a new dish in place of your present one.  I have seen 80cm dishes with dual LNBs for Astra 1 and 2 in Bricomarché.
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  • 1 month later...

Robbie,

Thanks for your help, I've had a look a the dish that's currently tuned to Astra 2 (28.2 E) and I reckon it's 50cm across at most, although I don't think it's a Sky dish.

It would be particularly difficult to change this dish, so I'm wondering if I can do anything with the other dish tuned to Atlantic Bird 3 (5 W). I reckon it's an 80 cm dish, so could I add Astra 1 to this dish (or replace it so that I can get Astra 1 and Atlantic Bird 3)? Or is there a maximum difference in angles for twin heads?

I've seen some pretty strange (wide) looking dishes at electrical stores with up to three heads - is one of these likely to solve the problem?

Charlie

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I've just bought my self a motor for my dish for 99 euros inc postage from ebay (brand new). I haven't put it up yet, but if your reciever is diseqc 1.2 or USALS compatible (check manual), this could be a solution to your problem!

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Hi Babnik,

Another potential solution, I'm told is this:

http://www.castorama.fr/boutique/sku/sku.jhtml?elementId=Casto890153&productId=CastoECO0113&_requestid=30040

although I think I might struggle with the set-up.

My other choice is to try and pick up French TV with a freeview digital box via a normal ariel (we are on very low land, so I expect this to be difficult) and use the satellite dish that then becomes spare to pick up Astra 1. I foresee only only problem with this - my UK TV will only accept a PAL signal.

Does anyone know if any of the French terrestrial digital boxes will give out a PAL signal? (Philips maybe?)

Charlie

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My Astra saga continues....

I now have two dishes going into one digital receiver box. One dish is pointing at Astra 1 and the other at Astra 2.

Connected individually to the box, everything seems to work fine, the problem comes when I try to have both dishes into one box. Initially, I do a search for the Astra 2 channels and everything's fine - BBC and ITV, Men & Motors even. Once I search for the Astra 1 channels it all goes wrong. The Astra 1 channels all appear, but the Astra 2 channels, to some extent disappear. I lose all the BBC channels but still have the shopping channels.

I also lose all the menu functions and none of the channel information appears on screen any more.

Has anyone else here had trouble tuning Astra 1?

Charlie

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I have just registered on this site, having found it while searching for installation instructions on electric chauffe- eau.

Any lead towards such inf. will still be appreciated.

However, you all seem to know lots about the various satellite options, so where do I start with recieving UK TV in France please.

Bare in mind that I only have the 5 channels in UK, have never had a dish, card or cable TV. We have not bothered with TV in France, but having just stayed out here for almost a month, found it would be good to keep up on news and current affairs at least.

Regards

Calvados

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Hi Calvados,

If you want to receive UK TV in France, you'll need a satellite receiver and digital decoder. You can either pick them up at the large briocomarches (I use Leroy Merlin) or get one of the local TV/antenna shops to install one for you.

If (like me) you're not willing to pay a subscription, you'll only get all of the BBC channels (i.e. BBC 1-4 + children's channels and news 24) and ITV. To get Channels four and five, you'll have to pay a subscription. I find the freebies more than enough to keep up to date.

If you're installing yourself you'll want to tune to Astra 2D (28.2 degrees east). A full list of UK free channels and the Astra 2d channels can be found on Lyngsat:

http://www.lyngsat.com/freetv/United-Kingdom.html

Good luck.

Charlie

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Welcome to the site.You will receive more information by starting a new thread / making a new posting rather than adding unrelated questions to an exisitng thread.

To recieve UK TV in France the basic information is shown below.

http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/465511/ShowPost.aspx

If you want Channel 4 and Channel 5 then you need to source a digibox with a current issue FTV card ( Dark Blue card with styalised house and dish in yellow )  For BBC1,2,3 and 4 and ITV 1,2,3 and 4, but not C4 and C5 you can use a cheap French dish and digital/numeric decoder setup is marginal harder, quality is the same and on screen guide to programmes is not as good ( which is important if you are out full time but less so if you are over for a fortnight and bring Radio Times with you) You also get a good selection of UK radio

For instalation of a Chauffe D'Eau. You need a separate cable rigid ( cable) all the way from the Fusebox/ Tableau d'electricite with its own separate disjointer. Broadly you can put them anywhere because the water inside is presurised  but :

1. Good idea to put them as close as possible to bathroom or kitchen where hotwater will be used to minimise dead pipe runs and to lag any pipe runs

2. They burp/fart hot as the water is heated up and expands to the need to have somewhere to run a drain from them

3. A 200 litre hot water cylinder will weigh at least 220 kilos so do not attach them to a plasterboard wall with a couple of raw plugs. You can wall mount them but  most people are happier with them sitting on four legged stands which by some quirk of Gallic and German logic are called tripods 

 

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Further to Antons 'at least 220 kg' there is the empty weight on top

which means probably nearer 300 kg, you need SERIOUSLY meaty wall

brackets if you dont go the tripod (quadpod????) route.

A 'falling off the wall water heater' can seriously spoil your whole day!!!

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Many thanks to all of you for your prompt and hepful replies.

Point taken on opening new thread.

Have I got this right - any digital box from any French store will tune me in to UK channels - No need to bring over a UK box.

A French ami has given us a dish and box, but all I can find in English is CNN, am I pointing at the wrong satellite - only messed manually, somewhere east of south.

Regards

Calvados

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Hi All,

Never bothered with uk tv for the last 12 years, but son is staying there working and I am having to pay for the tv license so I might as well get uk tv.

I have bought a Systecdigi box  and dish from Leroy Merlin in Bordeaux, I have set it up, but I can not seem to get any of the cUK channels except BBC World etc. No ITV or the usual Beeb Channels.

I have pointed it Astra 2D I think, 28+degrees. I have manually put in the perameters as it does not pick them up on auto scan. But it just defaults and ignores my settings.

The box only mention it picks up 2A, does it have fixed settings? It must be able to be overriden! Or is that why it is cheap?

Somebody must know better than me.

Looking forward to all your help.

Thanks - Cheers

John Normy

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John

possibly you have 2 problems.

1. sounds like your dish is pointing at Astra analogue at 19° East

2.  Also sounds as if your box may be analgoue and not digital (numerique)

 

You say you can get BBC world.  Can you also get German channels?  if so this confirms that you are on the wrong satalite.

 

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Hi Andy

Thanks for the reply, the box is numerique, pretty sure we don't have it pointing to Astra at 19 degrees east as we did have it there and have moved it. But I will check when we are next over. I was concerned that the receiver had restriction on it.

Does anyone have any other ideas?

Thanks

John

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