Satellite cable routing question

[Lindenberg]

'm going to remove the Motosat Executive dish from the roof of my 2000 Alpine and replace it with a dome unit. Does anyone know how the power and signal cables are routed from the roof to where the satellite receiver is located? Can the old cables be use as a pull rope to get the new cables up to the roof?

[Lindenberg]

'm going to remove the Motosat Executive dish from the roof of my 2000 Alpine and replace it with a dome unit. Does anyone know how the power and signal cables are routed from the roof to where the satellite receiver is located? Can the old cables be use as a pull rope to get the new cables up to the roof?

[dgerstel]

Tom,

I had the Motosat dish on my 2002. When I ordered my new coach I looked into the different dish antenna options. What I found was a lot of unhappy dome owners. On my new coach I plan on switching to a motosat dish as soon as Directv finalizes its changes to its HD satellites. I also looked into what I could do to fix the sluggish operation of my existing Motosat system and found that they have a new controller that will work with the existing dish. You didn't say why you wanted to change, but I do recommend you do a search on this subject to check the pros and cons of switching.

Dale

[Lindenberg]

Hi Dale,

The majority of my vacations are driving trips so my first preference is to get an in-motion dome unit so my wife and son have the option of watching while we drive. The Motosat dish I have on my coach now is located in front of the front A/C unit and it bounces around while I drive. I don't have a controller for the Motosat dish so to use it I would need to purchase a Nomad 2 Controller. Also, if I were to keep this dish I would need to move it behind the front A/C unit to get it out of the wind.

The other consideration is I'm trying to keep the satellite system Dish Network and Directv friendly. I currently have Dish Network and to watch all the channels I like to watch requires the dish to toggle between two satellites. The Motosat Executive dish I have used with a Nomad 2 Controller has problems when switching between satellites. So basically I'm starting from scratch.

The Winegard in-motion dome works with both service providers, can toggle between satellites, when parked, and will work with the HD satellites, with both providers. I got this information from a Winegard techniction.

Tom

[dgerstel]

Tom,

Looks like you already did all of the research and you are right the Motosat will not work for the in-motion. I had my dish moved back right after we got the coach in 2002 so I did not have the bounce problem. As I remember all of the cables went straight through the roof over the TV. I don't need the in-motion so I still plan on changing to the Motosat in the future, I don't want to have to deal with the rain and dew fade that I hear so much about. The new coach comes with a dome so I guess I will find out form myself.

Dale

[EngineerMike]

You may be able to reuse the existing cables, but may need to splice into the controller cable to fit the new end on it, and may need to lengthen the coax (I can't remember if I have one or two coax, possible a second for the rear TV; if so & you have only one coax now & you want that 2-TV functionality, forget reusing and pull all new). You can do a creditable weather-tight splice wrap with "X-treme Tape" which cold-vulcanizes to itself as you spiral wrap the splice.

[Cruzer]

Tom, I installed a KVH L3 on my Itasca Suncruiser. It was a lot of work because I needed to run dual coax, a pair of 12 volt power wires, plus a cat5 data cable up to the roof. I thought I could use Winnebago's OEM coax line as a pull cable but I could not because they had it fastened to the roof crossmember somehow. Granted, it was a Winnebago, not an Alpine.

My Tiffins came with the KingDome in-motion dome. They work with DirecTV or Dish and only use one coax cable to the dome itself. This single coax cable carries data, power, and dual LNB feeds. All the breakout work for power, etc is done down below. You can also get a HDTV converter for the breakout box. The 9762-LP in-motion dome is HDTV ready. The biggest advantage to this system is that you can use the existing coax cable and don't have to run anything else up to the roof. That's makes it very easy to install. Plus, it works well.