Connecting Satellite Dish ? Bighorn 3055

tomm00 · Mar 18, 2010

I have tried to connect an external satellite dish (DishNetwork, DishPro 1000.2) to the trailer via the "satellite" connectors in the service bay and cannot get a signal through to the cabinet in the curbside slide. I used a signal tracer and no signal comes through for any combination of the two "satellite" connectors in the service bay and the two connectors in the cabinet beside the TV shelf in the living room.
Also tried the "cable" input connector and no joy. Also there is a connector on the side wall of the fireplace (also has a phone jack) What is that for?
I would appreciate any help and/or insight.

wdk450 · Mar 18, 2010

Tomm00
Doesn't sound good, and pulling coax can be a bear (from what I have read).

Use your warranty!!

DXprowler · Mar 18, 2010

I'm not sure if this will help you as I don't have a 3055 but a 3410RE. In the Ent center there should be a plate with 2 coax connectors and on mine the top is for Sat and the bottom is for the off air antenna/cable. Now there should be another coax coming out of the wall and that is for the radio antenna. On mine it's just a cable coming out of the wall with no connector on a plate. In the UDC the connector to the left, of the 4, is Sat 1 (to the living room Ent center). The diagram in the UDC should tell you this but a continuity check will certainly verify that the line is OK. The cable line won't allow a continuity check because it's interfered with the amplifier in the bedroom. I don't know if you need 2 coax feeds for HD, as I do, but if you do there is an easier solution to running another feed. From researching on how others added another Sat line I posted a thread a few days ago on my approach in the Television section if you need more info.

Bobby A · Mar 18, 2010

tomm00 said:
I have tried to connect an external satellite dish (DishNetwork, DishPro 1000.2) to the trailer via the "satellite" connectors in the service bay and cannot get a signal through to the cabinet in the curbside slide. I used a signal tracer and no signal comes through for any combination of the two "satellite" connectors in the service bay and the two connectors in the cabinet beside the TV shelf in the living room.
Also tried the "cable" input connector and no joy. Also there is a connector on the side wall of the fireplace (also has a phone jack) What is that for?
I would appreciate any help and/or insight.

Not sure if your setup on your rig is like mine but I have dish Network also. 1st thing try running your cable directly from your dish to the dish receiver and see if you can get a signal that way. I think when I got my rig they had the TV wires wrong, so make sure that wireing is right also. If you need more help PM me tomorrow afternoon and I can check out how mine is wired. I know I do have mine wired with the HDMI and Optical cable. My TV is the Samsung TV and Samsung combo DVD/CD/FM tuner system, it works great after I got all the wireing straitened out.

dbylinski · Mar 19, 2010

In our '09 3055 we use two sat. boxes. The one in the entertainment center fees the livingroom TV. The one in the bedroom feeds the Bedroom TV and the basement TV. We did run a dedicated sat wire to the basement (not a problem) and use the sat box to switch from sat. to park cable.
The basement TV feed was run from the TV across the shelf, into the left cabinet, into the closet, down the wall, out of the closet under the dresser, into the sink vanity and down into the basement through the plumbing access. A very neat install with no visible wires. We use an infrared to radio frequency device so we can change the channels outside with the sat. remote.

I think one box would be doable if you use a splitter and backfeed the signal thorugh the antenna jack at the living room TV. I believe we did this before we got the second box. Both TV's get the same channel that way so we installed the other box to fix that.

ChopperBill · Mar 19, 2010

They make a 2 way splitter with a slide switch (Lowes about $2) that I used at home to run one satellite connection to the garage and my computer room. Just slide the switch to which ever you want to use. Would work great for the bedroom/storage bay TV's. The 3610 we ordered with the bed room TV options has mounts in the bedroom and storage bay so you can move the TV easily. My slide switch deal is ideal for this situation.

kbar350 · Apr 24, 2010

tomm00,

I have dish network and when i first set up all the tv stuff I had a similar problem. The satellite connector to the bedroom worked fine the signal went right through. However the living room sat tv line had a short in it. There are several things to check this out. First Heartland uses RG6 cable which is what is needed, however they don't use the good ends on the end of the cables. You will need RG6 Type F Compression cable tv ends http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1vZ1xgk/R-100605441/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053 a cable tv wire stripper http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100605450 and a Type F Compression tool http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc1vZ1xgk/R-100661782/h_d2/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053 . All of this is available at home centers and any electrical supply house near you. These connectors do not come off like the heartland ones when there on there on. They also flow more data for better picture and HD viewing. Now you will need to go behind each connector on the coach, behind the UDC and in the bedroom and living room. When you don't use one of these style wire strippers you can get the fine sliver grounding braid warped around the copper center wire, this is the short! I went around the coach and did every connector 5 behind UDC, 1 in Basement, 2 in bedroom, and two in living room. Still no signal to the living room. Then I realized that the sat cable behind the UDC was white and the Sat cable in the living room was black, when the pop outs are put on they are spliced in so I followed the cables still black as they run outside under the extended pop-out and if you drop the underbelly a little where the wires enter the frame there are the splice black wire to white. you can pull the slack out of the frame and redo these 4 ends also. That is where I found my short. The sat cable end from the UDC had the fine sliver ground wires wrapped around the copper center wire. Look right into the cable tv ends and you will be able to see this if there is a short. Put the new ends on and connected the wires back together and now the living room tv got the sat signal from the UDC.
Hopefully this will work for you too. I rather do things myself and my dealer is about 100 miles away. Now your coach could also have a wire that is cut into by a screw or something as well and that would require running new lines. But give it a shot and let us know how it goes. When I return home I will try to post a pic of the cable end that had the short.

Regards,

RhettM · Apr 24, 2010

I recently had the same issue hooking up my Dish network satellite dish. I worked on it all day long and came to find the receptacle was incorrectly labeled from the factory. I simply plugged the sat dish into the cable in port and everything worked as it should. It was a simple fix to re-label the connections, but it was one of the last places I looked.

RhettM · Apr 24, 2010

try reversing the outside connection, plug the sat dish into the cable in. My unit was mis labeled from the factory

Cimriver · May 21, 2010

kbar350 said:
tomm00,

I have dish network and when i first set up all the tv stuff I had a similar problem. The satellite connector to the bedroom worked fine the signal went right through. However the living room sat tv line had a short in it. There are several things to check this out. First Heartland uses RG6 cable which is what is needed, however they don't use the good ends on the end of the cables. You will need RG6 Type F Compression cable tv ends http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc...splay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053 a cable tv wire stripper http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs...langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100605450 and a Type F Compression tool http://www.homedepot.com/h_d1/N-5yc...splay?langId=-1&storeId=10051&catalogId=10053 . All of this is available at home centers and any electrical supply house near you. These connectors do not come off like the heartland ones when there on there on. They also flow more data for better picture and HD viewing. Now you will need to go behind each connector on the coach, behind the UDC and in the bedroom and living room. When you don't use one of these style wire strippers you can get the fine sliver grounding braid warped around the copper center wire, this is the short! I went around the coach and did every connector 5 behind UDC, 1 in Basement, 2 in bedroom, and two in living room. Still no signal to the living room. Then I realized that the sat cable behind the UDC was white and the Sat cable in the living room was black, when the pop outs are put on they are spliced in so I followed the cables still black as they run outside under the extended pop-out and if you drop the underbelly a little where the wires enter the frame there are the splice black wire to white. you can pull the slack out of the frame and redo these 4 ends also. That is where I found my short. The sat cable end from the UDC had the fine sliver ground wires wrapped around the copper center wire. Look right into the cable tv ends and you will be able to see this if there is a short. Put the new ends on and connected the wires back together and now the living room tv got the sat signal from the UDC.
Hopefully this will work for you too. I rather do things myself and my dealer is about 100 miles away. Now your coach could also have a wire that is cut into by a screw or something as well and that would require running new lines. But give it a shot and let us know how it goes. When I return home I will try to post a pic of the cable end that had the short.

Regards,

This is exactly the problem I found today. After replacing every connector I could find with the good compression connectors from Home Depot, I read this post. I also dropped the underbelly and found the splices where the cable goes into the slide. I replaced all four (one had a short - shield to center conductor) my satellite connection the the living room worked. Many of the other connectors I replaced were very poorly terminated. The cable basically feel out of three of them. This is extrremely shoddy work and an avoidable problem for Heartland owners.

If you have a new Heartland product and haven't tried the cable or satellite connectors, you really should before you are out of warranty.

Connecting Satellite Dish ? Bighorn 3055

tomm00

TomM

wdk450

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DXprowler

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Bobby A

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dbylinski

NE Reg Dir Retired

ChopperBill

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kbar350

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RhettM

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RhettM

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Cimriver

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