Freeview Light on the Backwell (North Somerset, England) transmitter
 | Google map |  | Bing map |  | Google Earth |  | 51.441,-2.724 or 51°26'28"N 2°43'25"W |  | BS48 1NY |
The symbol shows the location of the Backwell (North Somerset, England) transmitter which serves 4,600 homes. The bright green areas shown where the signal from this transmitter is strong, dark green areas are poorer signals. Those parts shown in yellow may have interference on the same frequency from other masts.
This transmitter has no current reported problems
The BBC and Digital UK report there are no faults or engineering work on the Backwell (North Somerset, England) transmitter._______
Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)
The Backwell (North Somerset, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: U&Yesterday, 4seven, 5Action, 5STAR, 5USA, Al Jazeera Eng, Al Jazeera English, Blaze, Blaze +1, Challenge, Channel 5 +1, DMAX, E4 Extra, YAAAS!, Film4 +1, Food Network, FRANCE 24 (in English), GREAT! action, GREAT! christmas, GREAT! movies, GREAT! romance mix, HGTV, HobbyMaker, ITV2 +1, ITV3 +1, ITV4 +1, ITVBe +1, Legend, PBS America, Quest +1, Quest Red, Really, Sky Mix, Sky News, Talking Pictures TV, That's 90s, That's TV 2, Together TV, TRUE CRIME, TRUE CRIME XTRA, U&Dave, U&Dave ja vu, U&Drama +1, U&W.
If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.
Which Freeview channels does the Backwell transmitter broadcast?
If you have any kind of Freeview fault, follow this Freeview reset procedure first.Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.
| Mux | H/V | Frequency | Height | Mode | Watts |
| PSB1 BBCA | V max | C25 (506.0MHz) | 125m | DTG- | 19W |
 1 BBC One (SD) West, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 17 others | |||||
| PSB2 D3+4 | V max | C28 (530.0MHz) | 125m | DTG- | 19W |
 3 ITV 1 (SD) (West), 4 Channel 4 (SD) South ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 South ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (West), 71 That’s 60s, | |||||
| PSB3 BBCB | V max | C22 (482.0MHz) | 125m | DTG- | 19W |
 46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD West, 102 BBC Two HD England, 103 ITV 1 HD (ITV Meridian Southampton), 104 Channel 4 HD South ads, 105 Channel 5 HD, 106 BBC Four HD, 107 BBC Three HD, 204 CBBC HD, 205 CBeebies HD, plus 1 others | |||||
Are you trying to watch these 44 Freeview channels?
The Backwell (North Somerset, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: U&Yesterday, 4seven, 5Action, 5STAR, 5USA, Al Jazeera Eng, Al Jazeera English, Blaze, Blaze +1, Challenge, Channel 5 +1, DMAX, E4 Extra, YAAAS!, Film4 +1, Food Network, FRANCE 24 (in English), GREAT! action, GREAT! christmas, GREAT! movies, GREAT! romance mix, HGTV, HobbyMaker, ITV2 +1, ITV3 +1, ITV4 +1, ITVBe +1, Legend, PBS America, Quest +1, Quest Red, Really, Sky Mix, Sky News, Talking Pictures TV, That's 90s, That's TV 2, Together TV, TRUE CRIME, TRUE CRIME XTRA, U&Dave, U&Dave ja vu, U&Drama +1, U&W.
If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.
Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Backwell transmitter?
BBC Points West 0.9m homes 3.4%
from Bristol BS8 2LR, 8km east-northeast (75°)
to BBC West region - 60 masts.
ITV West Country News (East) 0.9m homes 3.4%
from Bristol BS4 3HG, 11km east (90°)
to ITV West region - 61 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 50% evening news is shared with West Country (West)
How will the Backwell (North Somerset, England) transmission frequencies change over time?
| 1984-97 | 1997-98 | 1998-2010 | 2010-13 | 5 Jun 2019 | |||||
| A K T | A K T | A K T | A K T | A K T | |||||
| C22 | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBCB | BBCB | ||||
| C25 | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | BBCA | BBCA | ||||
| C28 | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | D3+4 | D3+4 | ||||
| C32 | C4waves | C4waves | C4waves |
tv_off Being removed from Freeview (for 5G use) after November 2020 / June 2022 - more
Table shows multiplexes names see this article;
green background for transmission frequencies
Notes: + and - denote 166kHz offset; aerial group are shown as A B C/D E K W T
waves denotes analogue; digital switchover was 24 Mar 10 and 7 Apr 10.
How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?
| Analogue 1-4 | 94W | |
| BBCA, D3+4, BBCB | (-6.9dB) 19W |
Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Mendip transmitter area
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Sunday, 21 April 2024
P
Paul Dursley8:29 PM
Steve Donaldson:
Evening.
I have been following the discourse on aerial types, splitters, diplexers and insertion losses etc and I like to think I have genuinely been educated within this subject area so thank you for that.
Where my TV reception is at currently (excellent on Backwell transmitter and good to very good on Wenvoe) I am really happy with it. So I'm getting my West of England content in preference to Wales content and also getting the selection COMs channels from Wenvoe which give me access to some nationality 'flavourless' commercial channels which aren't available from the Backwell transmitter.
In short this is where I want to be.
With reference to potential water ingress with the original aerial fitment there is some decent rain due here tomorrow so there will be an opportunity to see if we suffer any signal degradation through the afternoon/evening. It has been dry for the last few days so we should get a positive indication one way or the other.
My eBay splitter should be turning up by midweek so I can also do a test for insertion loss vs signal strength/quality later in the week.
Assuming no signal degradation due to water ingress I would suggest given that the relative lack of sophistication of my aerial installation seems to support my viewing tastes with the availability of transmitted channels from Backwell and Wenvoe I would argue that less, if not more, is at least enough in this case.
Worst case scenario would be re installation of current aerial or new low tech Yagi type installation.
I've copied this to Chris
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Chris.SE8:46 PM
Paul Dursley:
Hi again. Any immediate degradation after the rain could certainly suggest water ingress, however if engineering work is still listed (we won't know until tomorrow) then maybe judgement over a longer period would be a good idea.
If at the end of the day the existing aerial is in good enough condition for reinstallation, I'd strongly recommend brand new double screened coax for the downlead.
We eagerly await await further updates.
(PS. no need to repeat a seperate post, we both see all the posts).
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Tuesday, 23 April 2024
P
Paul Dursley11:45 AM
Chris.SE:
Morning all.
So some rain yesterday, not copious amounts but enough over a number of hours to possibly initiate some water ingress if there is a serious barrier problem with the cable at the aerial.
Channel reception figures today (all out of 10) below for your information:-
Backwell -
CH22 - quality 9; strength 10
CH25 - quality 10; strength 10
CH28 - quality 10; strength 10
Wenvoe -
CH39 - quality 8.5; strength 6
CH41 - quality 10; strength 7
CH42 - quality 10; strength 5
CH44 - quality 10; strength 5
CH45 - quality 10; strength 5
CH47 - quality 10; strength 6
Reception has been consistently at these levels for a few days now. Not too shabby.
The splitter should be turning up soon so I can pop that inline and see if it makes any obvious difference. Watch this space.
Thanks
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Chris.SE2:41 PM
Paul Dursley:
Thanks for the update. Wenvoe and Mendip still listed, god knows what they are doing!
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Thursday, 25 April 2024
P
Paul Dursley9:17 AM
Chris.SE:
Morning - splitter has turned up just in time for the Wenvoe signal to be dropping off dramatically and the Backwell signal relayed from Mendip to be dipping somewhat.
The Wenvoe signal has dropped dramatically to the point of being almost unwatchable on some of the multiplexes (C39, C42 and C44).
The Backwell signal has dropped anything from 10 to 20 per cent in strength and quality but is still providing decent enough reception.
I haven't played with the splitter yet - think I'll wait until Wenvoe and Mendip have finished whatever it is they are doing and signals have stabilised.
Weather wise some rain earlier in the week as previously reported otherwise dry, bright and sunny at times especially yesterday when the signals started dropping off.
Stay tuned for updates.
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Sunday, 28 April 2024
C
Chris.SE1:11 PM
Paul Dursley:
Hi Paul. I'm guessing you've had some good torrents of rain in the last 24hrs or so, how's the signals doing?
I can't find any issues with Mendip at present, and I was in N.Bristol yesterday and with no issues tuned in a set to |Mendip that used a loft aerial. So Backwell shouldn't be having problems with Mendip.
There's no reported faults in the last 5 days for Backwell, Mendip or Wenvoe.
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Tuesday, 30 April 2024
P
Paul Dursley11:01 AM
Chris.SE:
Morning - yes plenty of rain recently enough to fill a 400 litre water butt overnight.
Backwell reception is steady and decent quality though not as good as the best reported reception recently.
Wenvoe reception is still well down on the best reported numbers; C42 is currently unusable.
My wall plate installation isn't the best so I have an Antiference item on order which I'll fit when I receive it. I'll let you know if that has any beneficial effect.
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Thursday, 2 May 2024
P
Paul Dursley8:46 AM
Chris.SE:
Bit of a let down with Antiference wall plate - fitted it to find out no signal at the TV.
After some head scratching and continuity testing I find that the wall plate is open circuit between the coaxial wire binding post and the IEC connector output pin!
Refitted the old unit and TV now receiving signal.
Reception is definitely weather affected at the moment so not much point experimenting right now. Let's see how it improves (if it approves) over the next few days....
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Sunday, 5 May 2024
P
Paul Dursley1:49 PM
Chris.SE:
Afternoon - so we've had 48 hours of dry (mostly) weather with light winds to boot.
I have located and fitted a screened wall plate and can report as follows.
Backwell signals all have improved reception strength and quality - C22 had dropped off significantly to 5 out of 10 for both strength and quality; now showing solid 6-7 for both parameters.
Wenvoe signal reception is better but still confusing - still much lower strength and quality on certain channels but good to very good on others (considering its side lobe reception only) - results below (quality / strength all out of 10)
C39 - 3 and 4.5
C41 - 1.5 and 5
C42 - 0 and 1
C44 - 4 and 3
C45 - 10 and 4.5
C47 - 6 and 5
All the Wenvoe channels except C45 had been stronger a couple of weeks ago. Really don't know what's happened to C42 (which carries some of my favourite commercial channels) which seems to have just about disappeared completely. Even the Backwell channels had been better.
The only significant change I have made is the fitting of a screened wall plate.
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C
Chris.SE3:06 PM
Paul Dursley:
Hi Paul. Obviously frustrating.
Unless you have trees directly on the line-of-sight to both transmitters, then I suspect that water getting into the aerial connections and/or coax is still a strong possibility.
Whether you can safely get a ladder out (or have a friend that could) and have a closer look, it has to be a strong possibility with an installation this old. It only needs small cracks in various places, either on the aerial connector box and/or the coax for problems to show up, and of course it'll take a while for it to dry out after as well.
The problem with this sort of thing is you can't predict the exact effects. Sometimes you just get (maybe start off) with some attenuation, but then as the characteristic impedance changes depending where/how far along the coax the water may be, you can then get standing waves in the cable, these being frequency dependant. So at whatever that frequency may be, it can cancel out any signal or at best cause severe attenuation. And because it's frequency dependant, it won't necessarily affect all frequencies at all/or to the same extent.
The other thing that can affect off-beam signals to a degree, is propagation conditions.
I have an aerial pointing at Mendip (horizontal obviously) that can get some Wenvoe signals off sidelobes. I usually find C42 & C45 stronger and higher quality than C41 & C44 (none ever 100%) but the former adequate quality to decode, but today they are the other way about!! Rarely get any C47 & C39. But I can also get CCI from Oxford PSBs affecting Wenvoe PSBs and sometimes Hannington PSBs affecting Wenvoe COMs! A lot of this is obviously aerial performance and location dependant.
I keep meaning to experiment with another aerial to see what I can get!
Before 700MHz clearance, I recall a situation with a loft aerial, but the coax went out under a tile and down the roof and wall and in with no wall-plate, just looped up from floor level to the set. During some very wet weather, things started with a bit of attenuation of the highest frequency C64, later then some other lower frequencies were severely affected. Nothing obvious looking at the coax plug UNTIL the cable had been left unplugged lying on the floor and then a teaspoonful + of water came out of the plug!
Getting up to the roof, several cracks in the coax sheath were found and it was generally quite brittle.
In all these situations it's very much a case of "suck it and see" to use an expression (not literally!!).
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