Does this boil down to that the crystals are not QC’d before they are installed in the LNB circuitry, and what we get as a final product is purely luck of the draw?
Mines tweaked to 12.1029308GHz on my existing Maverick 1.
Frequency (MHz) 12102.931
Freq Offset (Hz) 856
Freq Offset (post-AFC) (Hz) -508
The crystals are definitely QCed to meet their specs. It’s just that some of the crystals perform much better than their specs. Those are the ones that require no fine tuning.
Just a reminder on the selection of lnbf. This forum group discussed the importance of the lnbf with the cheaper DRO versus the newer PLL models.
Obviously we want the best, but I have both types running… It does mean that I have to manually make custom frequency selections quite often (usually if the temperature changes).
Here is a link to an article the two variations
We are causing some interference with another SES customer. The service needs to be shutdown while we troubleshoot.
Aha!!
That explains it!! Was working fine on my bench this morning. I go down to the garage to update the V3.03 RX to the latest 5.08 firmware. Nada. Not a twitter. Spent all morning fighting with it. Even swapped in the V3.05 RX (which might be better but I like the LCD on the 3.03 - plus, it mounts on my wall with a 3D printed case unlike the 3.05).
This always happens when I get renewed interest in this project. I seem to miss major milestones and changes such as the frequency change and this outage and spend hours going around in circles trying to work out what’s wrong. Could be worse, could be ham radio 
Your not the only one, Mark. I was making measurements this morning with a new in-line amp Jim @ac8dg recommended and though it failed. Just like you I tore the entire setup apart before I though to look at Jerry’s @maxboysdad terminal and discovered he had nada too.
Bottom line was Murphy’s Law rules!! Ken
I’m glad about that! Not that you had to tear it all apart but that I was not the only one to be bitten.
Interference? How so? It’s not like we are actually doing the up/downlink work. That’s provided by the owner of the bird. We simply ship them the data for onward broadcast. So if they say “tune to 12.1234GHz” one would expect them to know exactly what they are doing and not cause issues to any of their other customers?
Actually, we are doing the uplink work. We generate an intermediate frequency, which is then passed through an RF chain, where it is upconverted to around 14 GHz. The satellite is a bent pipe and basically reflects anything that is sent to it, after a small frequency conversion. The IF we generated had a small spur in it, which we are resolving.
We are back on the air, though the power level is slightly less. We were uplinking at a bit too much power previously.
Ken, I received my la-2150, it increased the rssi by 20db, no change in SNR
30ft RG-6 feedline
No in-line (-76 rssi)
With LA-2150 (-55 rssi)
The diagnostic screen “[ OK ] LNB detected, normal current flow: 0x23”
did not change with adding the in-line amp
Wow! I did not expect that. When I was in that game (I worked for Sky in the UK way back when) we used to send it to the teleport for them to uplink. That way Astra controlled everything and it all worked. It was only when doing ENG work that we sent things up ourselves.
And I can confirm that I am back online!
Same results here with Pico Digital LA-2150D - - a 20 dB increase in signal level and significant improvement in SNR.
-
No Amp DC v3.05 with Maverick on 80cm parabolic dish 400 feet of RG-6 R Rssi = -99 dBm; and SNR = +4.75
-
With LA-2150D DC v3.05 with Maverick on 80cm parabolic dish 400 feet of RG-6 Rssi = -79 dBm; and SNR = +9.25
The in-line amplifier is a real plus. I’ll add back my other 100 feet! 
Ken
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SNR 2 dB lower than yesterday, 4.5 dB. Now 2.5 dB.
SNR down 2-3 dB here as well (-3 to -4 dB). RSSI is the same (-77 to -78 dB).
Just to be clear - - you don’t need an in-line amplifier if you are connected at the output of the Othernet LNB. An amplifier is only required if you are trying to send the signal down a long length of cable to your Dreamcatcher. Ken
I expect that the satellites are somewhat linear in their response? More power in means more power out? It’s certainly that way with the Amsat fleet.
Yes, that’s correct.
The power fine tuning (3/5/2020) did result in a about a 2.5 db reduction in the SNR on both my receivers. But still getting 100% packet decodes so from a latitude of 45N I could live with even another 3db power reduction if needed by SES. I am using small dishes reflectors for both receivers.