Intellian i4 Satellite dish

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Intellian i4 Satellite dish
Intellian i4 Satellite dish.jpg
Participants Melan
Skills
Status Active
Niche Sdr
Purpose
Tool No
Location the roof
Cost
Tool category

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Intellian i4 Satellite Dish

The Intellian i4 is a motorised Ku-band maritime satellite TV antenna system installed on the NURDspace roof. Acquired secondhand via Marktplaats, it functions as a fully steerable ground station capable of pointing at any satellite on the geostationary arc on command.

Hardware

Antenna

  • Model: Intellian i4 (compact motorised VSAT-style pedestal mount)
  • Band: Ku-band (10.7–12.75 GHz receive)
  • LNB output (IF): 950–2150 MHz
  • Mount: Full azimuth + elevation motorised pedestal (designed for maritime/land-mobile use)

Antenna Control Unit (ACU)

  • RS-232 serial interface (19200 baud, 8N1)
  • Ethernet port (TCP/IP, 10.208.2.223:4002) (preferred for scripting)
  • Official control software: Aptus (Windows-only; works via Wine)

Control Protocol

The ACU speaks a straightforward ASCII framed protocol over serial or TCP. Commands are wrapped in curly braces with a checksum suffix.

Key Commands

Command Description Notes
{QP} Query current antenna position Returns azimuth + elevation
{AP az el} Send antenna position response az/el in ×100 format (e.g. 18000 = 180.00°)
{GO az el} Go to position az/el in ×100 format
{SH heading type} Set heading reference type 7 = Ground Test
{GN} Gyro/heading query Returns heading in ×100 format

Azimuth and elevation values are always ×100 integers (e.g. 16250 = 162.50°).

Demonstrated Uses

Watching Chinese Propaganda Beamed from Astra 1L

One of the first use cases was watching CGTN HD via Astra 1L.

Clarke Belt Sky Scan

The dish has been used to produce 2D heatmap images of the geostationary arc by sweeping azimuth 140°–230° at elevation ~20–33° while logging RF signal level. Multiple satellites are clearly resolved as distinct bright blobs.

Signal level was read from the ACU's internal AGC output (not via SDR), building up a power-vs-position map as the dish swept. A future goal is to replace the ACU signal level readout with a modified satellite finder connected to an Arduino + ADC for more direct RF power measurement.

Clarke Belt sky scan geostationary arc, azimuth 140°–230°

Goals

Auto-Skew

It might be interesting to add auto-skew control to the LNB.

dontlookup Integration

The plan is to use the dish with the dontlookup project to capture and analyse satellite internet traffic.

IRC Plugin

It would be cool to have an IRC plugin showing the coordinates the dish is currently pointed at, and optionally signal levels.

Move the dish

The dish's current position on the roof might not be the optimal location, we might have to move the dish.

Pretend-to-be-a-boat

Add a MCU + RS422 to the NMEA IN on the ACU and pretend our heading is 0° so the dish can calculate the correct offsets.

Links