This satellite receiver antenna -- Trav'ler DirecTV Slimline -- was installed on the roof of my MH about a year ago.After moving to a new location, the system routinely takes several (10-15 minutes) to find and lock onto satellites 101W, 99W, and 103W.It would indicate identifying 101W fairly early in the search, but then would disregard having found 101W and would continue to "search".The "search" process then mainly involved raising to a very high elevation, rotating 360 degrees of azimuth, lowering to a very low elevation, rotating 360 degrees, and continuing these actions without any apparent search logic.After going up, around, down, and around again and again for maybe another 15 minutes, the system would find and lock onto 101W and the other two satellites -- seemingly more by accident than by design.A week ago, the system was unable to find the satellites after "searching" for one hour.There was absolutely no line-of-sight obstruction.I called Winegard technical help, and was led through the process of stowing the dish, disconnecting and reconnecting the control cable at the control box, and then disconnecting and reconnecting the control cable in the access box at the base of the dish.The search mode was then activated and the satellites were acquired within three minutes.Two days later, after moving to a new location 90 miles to the NNW, it took 36 minutes to lock onto the satellites.There was absolutely no line-of-sight obstruction.The system identified 101W after 21 minutes, but then continued to "search" (high, fully around, low, fully around, etc., etc.).After 12 more minutes of "searching", satellite 119W was identified.After 3 more minutes, 101W and the other two satellites were found.Has anyone else using this product experienced such long lock-on times on a routine basis?Does anyone have any idea why my system takes so long?Thanks for your help,Ron

Its getting ready to fail! Im on my second one. Winegard, me, and finally a servicing dealer were after several thousand dollars in parts, shipping, and troubleshooting were unable to make it work. Winegard finally gave up and installed a new one. This one has been fine.But you might start with ensuring all connections are clean and tight. If that does not do it, replace the coax from the dish to the receiver. Failing that, try a new LNB. Also be sure nothing is loose or bent. A loose LNB arm, can create lots of problems.

Any chance your dish has collided with tree limbs or tangled with a crank up antenna? The reflector can get distorted and cause some really strange issues. You may not even be able to see the twist. Once locked on what are your signal strength levels? Finding what seemed to be a sloppy gear causing me to lose a couple of birds and moving the dish by hand rotationally just a tiny bit the signal would come and go on those mentioned. Remembering my dish had tangled with my over the air antenna I twisted the parabola a tiny bit and now it works fine again.

donn0128 wrote:Its getting ready to fail! Im on my second one. Winegard, me, and finally a servicing dealer were after several thousand dollars in parts, shipping, and troubleshooting were unable to make it work. Winegard finally gave up and installed a new one. This one has been fine.But you might start with ensuring all connections are clean and tight. If that does not do it, replace the coax from the dish to the receiver. Failing that, try a new LNB. Also be sure nothing is loose or bent. A loose LNB arm, can create lots of problems.Don, thanks for the information.How old was your system when it started showing problems?Were you also experiencing the long times to lock on?It seems quite strange that my system will "identify" 101W, but then continue searching for 10-20 minutes before finding it again.Ron

YC 1 wrote:Any chance your dish has collided with tree limbs or tangled with a crank up antenna? ---No, there have been no collisions.--- Once locked on what are your signal strength levels? ---101 gives 96-100, 99 gives 84-95, 103 gives 83-95.Finding what seemed to be a sloppy gear causing me to lose a couple of birds and moving the dish by hand rotationally just a tiny bit the signal would come and go on those mentioned. ---Thanks for you information.I'll go up on the roof to check for any slop.Ron

Winegard Trav'ler DirecTV Slimline | Good Sam Community

docj
Explorer
Feb 07, 2015
az99 wrote:
No mine just kept searching for any satellite if I remember correctly. Just kept spinning and tilting. After about 15 minutes I would turn it off and start over. I think it is very critical to level your unit before starting to search when moving long distances. Also be sure there is absolutely no movement. Like people walking around inside.
I think the unit remembers the positions it was last at and tries to start there for quick setup. When that fails to get a signal it seems totally lost at how to find the signal.

If you observe the dish while it is finding the satellites you can see quite clearly that it first returns to the position in which it last was pointed. This is helpful if you've decided, for example, to stow the dish because of a bad storm or if you wish to "tweak" the pointing after your RV has sat in one place for a while.

If it can't find a satellite at its last position it begins a complete search. The search begins with the elevation set mid-way between max and min positions and involves the dish rotating through 360 degrees at each of several elevations. How long this takes depends on where you are located. For example when we are in Canada and the elevation is quite low, it takes a while because the system won't get to that elevation until it tries quite a few larger ones.

As the system does its search it is constantly checking to see if the many satellites it sees are part of the DirecTV group. It ignores those that are not, but once it finds one of the DTV satellites it will optimize and then identify it. If the satellite found is not 101 it will next try to find 101. If 101 cannot be found the system will return to its search. If 101 is not found by the time the elevation min and max are reached, the system will return to its initial positions and begin the search again.

If the system finds 101, my SK3005 will then try to find 110 and 119. I can't say how the SK-SWM3 system works, but I suspect it still tries to find those birds. Once my system has found either or both of these other satellites it then sets the skew and optimizes it.

On occasion, if the system cannot find either 110 or 119 I have found it useful to put my system into manual mode so it can be made to point at only the 101 bird. The directions for manual pointing of the SK-3005 are clearly provided on page 4 of this user guide: SK3005 user guide I wouldn't be surprised if the instructions for doing this with a SK-SWM3 are similar.

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