Need Advice re Satellite Line of Sight & Effect on Reception

[Bluesky 07]

We've had Dish for years. First, a question. If I understand it correctly in this context, the term "line of sight" is not a laser shot type thing because the dish is getting signals from several satellites. This became more clear when I checked a dish pointing app that has an AR function where you can view the sky and see the satellites' locations. So it seems you need kind of a fan-shaped oval of clear sky big enough to cover 3 different satellite locations. Is that right?

We recently lost many of our HD channels, though some still work. Went through a chat session with Dish and they concluded that a tech needs to come out. Well, no, I'm not paying them $95 or even the $8 monthly "protection plan" to make their service, which uses their equipment, work. And yes, I know the less-stubborn solution would be to pay them the $8 for a month and get it fixed. Not doing it.

Using the app, it looks like we're good with 110 and 119 but the section of sky where 129 is located may be - it's tough to tell - blocked by some tree branches. Spent 45 minutes aiming yesterday and best signal strength I can get is around 50. The 110 and 119 sats show okay on the signal screen but 129 does not. Plus, when I thought about it, that tree has grown and the problem started around the time the trees leafed out.

Would interference with only the 129 satellite cause these symptoms? Want to be as certain as possible because the branches are high up and will not be easy to prune.

Thanks for any insight.

 

[ThorInc]

Yep, the specific problem can definitely be caused by tree branches.

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[1engineer]

We've had Dish for years. First, a question. If I understand it correctly in this context, the term "line of sight" is not a laser shot type thing because the dish is getting signals from several satellites. This became more clear when I checked a dish pointing app that has an AR function where you can view the sky and see the satellites' locations. So it seems you need kind of a fan-shaped oval of clear sky big enough to cover 3 different satellite locations. Is that right?

We recently lost many of our HD channels, though some still work. Went through a chat session with Dish and they concluded that a tech needs to come out. Well, no, I'm not paying them $95 or even the $8 monthly "protection plan" to make their service, which uses their equipment, work. And yes, I know the less-stubborn solution would be to pay them the $8 for a month and get it fixed. Not doing it.

Using the app, it looks like we're good with 110 and 119 but the section of sky where 129 is located may be - it's tough to tell - blocked by some tree branches. Spent 45 minutes aiming yesterday and best signal strength I can get is around 50. The 110 and 119 sats show okay on the signal screen but 129 does not. Plus, when I thought about it, that tree has grown and the problem started around the time the trees leafed out.

Would interference with only the 129 satellite cause these symptoms? Want to be as certain as possible because the branches are high up and will not be easy to prune.

Thanks for any insight.

Yes. Trees get in the way.

 

[Bluesky 07]

Thanks. I know branches can cause interference. The question is more about the size and shape of the necessary sight line from the dish. It's making more sense now that I've seen the AR view of the satellite positions. Looks like the skew adjustment aligns the oval dish with the arc of the orbit and the clear zone needs to be an oval cone expanding out from the edges of the dish. Yes?

EDIT: Bought pole pruner, trimmed tree, solved problem.