@GabeU
I'll call Hughes again (sat on hold until I gave up just now; prolly on holiday staffing), but thought I'd see if anybody had real world experience with devices.
Yeah, I found heaters on the web when I looked into it in the winter, but that's not a good time to look into it! Even on that south side of the roof, snow is there all winter, often a foot or more. No place for an old fart to be climbing around. So I'll have to look again to refresh the brain on it now in Spring.
You'd agree, it seems, that getting a 3rd party product bears some risk unless it was approved by Hughes. Warpage, or whatever. In any case, I hope somebody here has experience with a heater.
Buffalo, you say? Where the lake rises up and falls on you in the winter, as with Watertown. I was in Rochester for 8 years. But now I'm on the east side of the Adirondacks, where we seem to get less snow every year. Still, we get a few wicked storms each winter, and it's the sloppy, sleety, icy stuff that mucks up the dish. Snow sticks to the ick and piles up. Dry snow, no problem of course. It seems that a thin skin of ice or sticky snow degrades performance, but lets it live.
Use warm water on ice? Yow, that's it! All I need is to hook up my hose to the bottom of the hot water heater, which is nearby through the crawl space door, and blast away! Assuming I have exterior grade duct tape on hand when the hot water bursts my cheap hose.
I have an open yard about 40 ft deep to the south, then acres of big pines that aren't done growing yet. That's why I had them put the antenna so high. It's a steep roof, too. But the contract says they will install up to 20 ft. One of the two installer guys said, "I don't care. I wouldn't go up there." The other guy laughed and scrambled around up there like a bird.
Then I learned that this new high-speed Hughes rig has a higher angle than my old Dish Network dish, which is still up there, right below the Hughes ... thank god because it gave me something to hold onto while trying to navigate that half-full half-gallon jug at the end of the stick. Even considered strapping myself to the Dish dish. LOL.
Then I wised up and bought that Prestone De-Icer that shoots like 15 feet. Do NOT get that stuff in your eyes! It worked great, shooting between the gusts best I could, with my other arm across my face. Used a whole can of it, though, since a third of it blew away. Now I'll probably find out it corrodes shingles and damages the finish on the dish. But it was sweet watching that stuff slide down the dish. Small minds thing.
Having no other use for a ladder that long, it's too expensive to get one just for that purpose. But I'd have endless fun with a drone and blow torch (attached with duct tape and bailing wire, of course)!
Well, at least I'm having fun telling the story, with the humor happily at my expense. Thanks for your participation!
