[HATS] Microwave Dish Aiming

[Ed Manuel (N5EM)]

Gang,

How to aim a dish.  After you read it, it seems simple enough but it had 
never occurred to me!

A very good tip to keep in mind.  Remember, this applies to symmetrical dishes.

Ed, N5EM




>----- Original Message -----
>From: "D & R Friend" <friends@squirrel.com.au>
>To: "Microwave" <microwave@wa1mba.org>
>Sent: Tuesday, July 24, 2001 6:44 AM
>Subject: [Microwave] Dish Aiming
>
>
> > Greetings to all.
> >
> > There's a lot of good advice given already on this subject.  That's beaut.
> >
> > One extra trick that I learned 'in the field' from my UK friend Harold
> > G3UYM is to sight across the face of the dish and add or subtract ninety
> > degrees as appropriate using a normal (but good quality) sighting compass.
> >
> > You do, of course, have to allow for the magnetic declination of the part
> > of the world where you are, and you do have to be away from metal car
> > bodies, etc.  (I've even found some iron-containing hills to be locally
> > awry when it comes to getting a true compass reference direction.)  The
>GPS
> > receiver method of finding the North reference is pretty useful too, as
> > well as simply taking bearings on known visible hills/objects of which the
> > true bearing is known beforehand.
> >
> > However, when you are sure of the correction you need to make to your
> > compass reading, the method of 'sighting across the face of the dish'
> > really does work, and it is much easier to accurately measure or 'sight'
> > that bearing than the imagined bearing of the 'beam' of energy emanating
> > from your dish.  (Symmetrical dishes only!)  From personal experience
> > operating portable on 10GHz both in the UK and in Australia (where the
> > amateur uWave population is much less...) I can vouch for the useability
>of
> > this method.  It's rather less expensive than installing a rifle sight and
> > it avoids the possibility of the sight being knocked askew without you
>knowing!
> >
> > The other thought is one of planning ahead.  When you have a list of all
> > the likely locations that you're likely to contact, you can facilitate
>your
> > portable operation by having a pre-prepared set of required bearings.  It
> > saves time if nothing else.
> >
> > Just a couple of thoughts.....
> >
> > Very best wishes,
> >
> > Doug Friend, VK4OE,
> > Brisbane, Australia.
> >

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