Can you recommend a cheap effective satellite dish?

[JohnGH]

The title says it all really, except it would be useful to have both suction pad and magnetic attachment options. Just need the dish as mine is recently deceased. Nothing fancy. Simple, effective and reliable.

 

Any suggestions including where they can be bought would be appreciated.

 

Thanks,

 

john

[Kwacker]

We use the £50 kit from Aldi.

Seems to do the job well, with the benefit that the tuner is so small that I just glued it to the bottom of our wall-mounted TV making for a very tidy installation.

Generally, I can now align it intuitively after a squint at the Nicholson guide.

[bottle]

As long as the dish and its mounting is serviceable then all the other parts (LNB cable sockets) are available.

 

Now one man's cheap is another man's expensive so, what do you think. http://www.travelsat.me.uk/

[Sas]

We got the full Aldi kit ( dish tuner suction stuff etc etc) last week, reduced from 60 to 40 quid and it's fab!

Sas :-)

[JohnGH]

Thanks for the quick info, the only problem with Aldi is getting hold of them when they are available. I seem to miss out on the sat dishes.

 

Bottle, the one you suggest looks just the job though far more expensive than the Aldi option. One question though, how reliable are the magnetic and suction mounts i.e. do they stay in place or will they come unstuck in a bit of wind?

[Guest]

Thanks for the quick info, the only problem with Aldi is getting hold of them when they are available. I seem to miss out on the sat dishes.

 

Bottle, the one you suggest looks just the job though far more expensive than the Aldi option. One question though, how reliable are the magnetic and suction mounts i.e. do they stay in place or will they come unstuck in a bit of wind?

Suction mounts will be less effective if you have a non slip surface on your roof.

 

Magnetic mount would be better if you have one personally I wouldn't pay Travelsat prices but would fabricate something using a basic sky dish which you can get off eBay for about 20 or 30 quid.

[bottle]

The mag mount will 'hold' very well, of course it cannot be 100%, any mount would be vulnerable with the wind hitting the dish full frontal.

 

A suction mount and to a lesser extent the mag mount, require a smooth, flat surface.

 

The mag mount copes with my roof, that has a small curve.

[matty40s]

Suction mounts will be less effective if you have a non slip surface on your roof.

Magnetic mounts will be less effective if you have a wooden cabin.

[OldGoat]

The same (old) stuff often repeated.

For me the only dish that 'works' is a Triax 48cm with foldable arm that I mount on the front deck and remove to the cabin when we cruise.

It there are trees / hedgerow when we stop I put it on a pole.

 

It's a different approach but the OP didn't put any other constraints. We can record what we can't watch (provided we've stopped) and can record 3 channels and watch another. This is a requirement of My Management who wants to record some arty-farty programmes wile I watch summat else.

 

I'm sure there will be a host of folks, following, saying that a bit of wet string is just as effective.

 

So be it.

I have spoken.

 

 

[Guest]

Magnetic mounts will be less effective if you have a wooden cabin.

Indeed, and a GRP one.

[mickp]

I use a flag pole socket with locking bolt with a ali pole.any dish can then be attached.on top is a tv ant as i like both options...just a case of undo bolt turn dish for signal and nip up bolt,same for using log periodic

[mickp]

Also easily removed for cruising

[Kwacker]

I removed the rubber cup from the suction fitting in the kit then bolted the fitting to the overhang at the front of the roof through a conveniently pre-existing hole.

When cruising, I just slacken the clamp bolt and lay the dish flat with the LNB vertical, this arrangement will just clear the lowest bridge I know of on my patch which is on the Foxton staircase.

Edited October 15, 2014 by Kwacker

[Sas]

I know the Aldi stuff isn't easy to get hold of ( ie when it's gone it's gone!) but it might be worth giving them a call? The Lancaster store appeared to have quite a number to " shift"!

 

BTW, we can also record using the system and a USB stick....fab!

 

:-)

[Delta9]

You just need to replace the LNB there's no need to look for another dish and mounting system if you already have one...

[matty40s]

You need to find your local Aldi store that takes regional stock surpluses/slow moving stock and reduces them to clear.

Some of the reductions are 50-75/85%%.

They have new allocated stock coming in and some stores do not have space to store excess stock.

I am not telling you which ones they are , but they are there.

[Woodstock]

This may be a silly question- but here goes

 

Would the Aldi dish give me anything that my tv which has built in freeview doesn't?

[bottle]

Not unless you had Freesat tuner, either in the TV or as separate box.

 

Freesat and Freeview are different ways of getting the same thing or nearly the same thing.

 

Virtually all channels are the same the is just a few that are either Freesat or Freeview specific, the minor ones.

 

Freesat is from a satellite, dish required

 

Freeview is from a terrestrial transmitter, aerial required.

[alan_fincher]

Magnetic mount would be better if you have one personally I wouldn't pay Travelsat prices but would fabricate something using a basic sky dish which you can get off eBay for about 20 or 30 quid.

 

The potential issue there might be that the typical house based satellite dish is often a considerably larger diameter than the portable ones regularly used on boats and caravans.

 

The bigger the dish, the more precise the alignment to the satellite needs to be to not lose the signal, so it is quite possible you would find it harder to find a satellite in the first place, and that movement of the boat due to wind or people moving around inside will cause the transmission to break up more often than it would if the dish is smaller.

[Guest]

The potential issue there might be that the typical house based satellite dish is often a considerably larger diameter than the portable ones regularly used on boats and caravans.

The bigger the dish, the more precise the alignment to the satellite needs to be to not lose the signal, so it is quite possible you would find it harder to find a satellite in the first place, and that movement of the boat due to wind or people moving around inside will cause the transmission to break up more often than it would if the dish is smaller.

When we used a basic 60cm Sky dish we found it was surprisingly tolerant of boat movement. This is the type of dish I was referencing.

 

We have the same dish at home.

 

The Travelsat dish is 40cm according to their website but a heck of a lot more expensive.

Edited October 16, 2014 by The Dog House

[YamYam]

When we used a basic 60cm Sky dish we found it was surprisingly tolerant of boat movement. This is the type of dish I was referencing.

 

We have the same dish at home.

 

Agreed, I have a sky dish on mine (brand new off e bay for £11 Including postage). As I'm only on a three quarter pontoon there's quite a bit of movement but never lost the signal once