do trees affect signal ?????????

i know this sounds a bit weird but has anymore ever heard of tress getting in the way of the sky signal as when the sky man came to fit me up with my dish and sky box he told me he couldn't get a signal as a tree on opposite side of the road was blocking it. Could this be correct, or was he just trying to get out of the work as i live in a 3 storey house and he would have to fit dish on 3rd floor, sounds like a cop-out to me what do you reckon ?

[Bluevanman]

Yes, trees can affect the signal.Even a thin one such as a silver birch will block it completely. How tall is this tree?

[vex]

Basically he is right trees, water, snow, people! etc all block signals.

This was a common problem with Skys early Analogue installs.

Sky Launched in the Autumn.
Large take up throughout the winter.
Significant reception problems in the spring as all the leaves on the trees came out.

The tree is quite tall but fairly thin leaves on branches, i have had to put up with the over inflated prices from NTL for 3 years and really hoped that after they trimmed all the trees back i would be ok. Has anyone got any ideas as to how i can overcome this problem as i am about to buy a hidef television and really want sky for its hidef broadcasts in 2006

[vex]

Unfortunately other than lopping a bit off the trees every year there is little you could do.

Have you enquired about an install from a non sky dealer rather than one of skys monkeys? (Sorry to quality sky installers on here)

They may be able to look at a different location, with longer cable runs that a sky guy really would not want to take on due to time / money / effort calculations

i would cut the bl.... thing down but as its on the road i don't think the local council would approve. Does anyone know of a quality private installer in the s.e london area who could come and have a look for me and see if theres any hope for me otherwise its more money to NTL and i really begrudge giving them my hard earned cash.

P.S - On another note does anyone know if NTL are planning hidef broadcasts ?

Sky just rang to say that they are going to send a specialist team round who deal with placing sky dishes in v.high places ie: the roof etc. Im a bit amazed actually as i didn't think they were that bothered. Well they are coming on tuesday so will let you know what happens, if you're interested !!!.

[Cynthia 7]

Just to say I am grateful for this thread. Since all the trees came into leaf about a month ago we have received no signal on occasional days when the rain was heavy and constant. To receive Sky some years ago we had to remove one very high tree and lop branches from others. Our garden is surrounded by very high trees and the dish could not be put on the roof due to an enormous yew tree and others blocking the signal. Eventually the dish was put in the garden on a high pole.

Why I am grateful for this thread is that my husband wants to bring Sky out as he is convinced that there is something wrong with the dish or the lnb. He keeps on about it, and last Friday evening, when we missed Heimat, he picked up the phone to request a Sky visit, but eventually put it down as I made such a fuss. I know that we may have to remove yet another tree or two and I hate to do that.

Now he has read this thread he realises the fault lies with us, not the installation and I can get some peace! Thanks guys.

[crocodile]

You can search for industry approved installers here.

The plot thickens.........
Just come home from a day out to find a sky engineer installing sky tv next door. Told him about the problems of getting a signal and he couldn't understand the problem as he had almost finished the install and had got a perfect signal and picture which i saw for myself. Their dish is within a foot or two of where my engineer was trying to put the dish for my house so it looks like my previous thoughts were right i got a lazy engineer who really could not be bothered to make the effort.
By the way i have to pay an extra £40 for the specialist team from sky to deal with special high installations, funny that isn't it !!!.

[Nick_UK]

When I read your post, I thought, "My, that's some tree !", because I have a walnut tree about 20 feet from my dish, and the dish points at the tree. The dish is about 16 feet off the ground, and the tree must be 30 feet high, and I don't get any problems.