[amsat-bb] Satellite TV actuator for amateur dishes

[Alain De Carolis <alain@xxxxxxxx>]

Hello all,

I have a 8 feet dish that need to be azimuth/elevation rotated.

For the azimuth I will use an amateur rotator mounted at the base of a mast 
enclosed in the center of a square tower.

For elevation I got a Superjack QARL 3624+, a standard satellite TV actuator 
24" long. 
This actuator has some kind of sensor that determines its actual position for 
another unit that reads it out and points the dish to the needed position.

I am not very familiar with TV hardware since I dont own a tv set since 1999, 
so I dont even know how those control boxes looks like (not to mention how 
they work). Unfortunately the istructions of the actuator are intended for a 
consumer audience so they dont provide any detail of the enclosed "sensor".

Is it possible to use such sensor to determine the antenna elevation with the 
precision of 1 degree? 
The only alternative I see is to install the classic auxiliary pot... but I 
would like to avoid reinventing the wheel.

Thank you

Alain De Carolis
iz6byy/ww3ww
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