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Full Freeview on the Craigkelly (Fife, Scotland) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
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The symbol shows the location of the Craigkelly (Fife, Scotland) transmitter which serves 430,000 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.

Are there any planned engineering works or unexpected transmitter faults on the Craigkelly (Fife, Scotland) mast?

Craigkelly transmitter - Craigkelly transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/03/2024 Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels Digital tick


Choose from three options: ■ List by multiplex ■ List by channel number ■ List by channel name
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Which Freeview channels does the Craigkelly 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.

MuxH/VFrequencyHeightModeWatts
PSB1
BBCA
 H max
C27 (522.0MHz)311mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) Scotland, 2 BBC Two Scotland, 7 BBC Alba HD, 23 BBC Three, 24 BBC Four (Scotland SD), 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 13 others

PSB2
D3+4
 H max
C24 (498.0MHz)311mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
3 STV (SD) (STV Central (Edinburgh micro region)), 4 Channel 4 (SD) Scotland ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 Scotland ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (STV Edinburgh), 35 STV+1 (STV Edinburgh),

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C21+ (474.2MHz)311mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD Scotland, 102 BBC Two HD Scotland, 103 ITV 1 HD (STV West), 103 STV HD (STV West), 104 Channel 4 HD Scotland ads, 105 Channel 5 HD, 106 BBC Four HD, 108 BBC Scotland HD, 204 CBBC HD, 205 CBeebies HD, plus 1 others

COM4
SDN
 H -3dB
C29 (538.0MHz)311mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
20 Drama, 21 5USA, 29 ITV2 +1, 32 5STAR, 33 5Action, 38 Channel 5 +1, 41 Legend, 42 GREAT! action, 57 Dave ja vu, 58 ITVBe +1, 59 ITV3 +1, 64 Blaze, 67 TRUE CRIME, 68 TRUE CRIME XTRA, 78 TCC, 81 Blaze +1, 83 Together TV, 89 ITV4 +1, 91 WildEarth, 209 Ketchup TV, 210 Ketchup Too, 211 YAAAS!, 267 Al Jazeera English, plus 30 others

COM5
ArqA
 H -3dB
C31 (554.0MHz)311mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
11 Sky Mix, 17 Really, 19 Dave, 31 E4 Extra, 36 Sky Arts, 40 Quest Red, 43 Food Network, 47 Film4 +1, 48 Challenge, 49 4seven, 60 Drama +1, 65 That's TV 2, 70 Quest +1, 74 Yesterday +1, 75 That's 90s, 233 Sky News, plus 11 others

COM6
ArqB
 H -3dB
C37+ (602.2MHz)311mDTG-810,000W
Channel icons
12 Quest, 25 W, 27 Yesterday, 34 GREAT! movies, 39 DMAX, 44 HGTV, 52 GREAT! romance, 56 That's TV (UK), 61 GREAT! movies extra, 63 GREAT! romance mix, 71 That’s 60s, 73 HobbyMaker, 82 Talking Pictures TV, 84 PBS America, 235 Al Jazeera Eng, plus 18 others

LEH
 H -6dB
C32 (562.0MHz)311mDTG-125,000W
Channel icons
from 30th June 2014: 8 STV Edinburgh,

DTG-8 64QAM 8K 3/4 27.1Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
DTG-12 QSPK 8K 3/4 8.0Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)

Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Craigkelly transmitter?

regional news image
BBC Reporting Scotland 2.4m homes 9.2%
from Glasgow G51 1DA, 70km west-southwest (252°)
to BBC Scotland region - 230 masts.
regional news image
STV News 0.5m homes 1.7%
from Edinburgh EH3 9QG, 14km south (174°)
to STV Central (Edinburgh) region - 8 masts.

Are there any self-help relays?

DullaturTransposer20 km NE Glasgow40 homes
EdinburghTransposerSighthill area167 homes

How will the Craigkelly (Fife, Scotland) transmission frequencies change over time?

1984-971997-981998-20112011-133 Oct 2018
A K TK TK TK TW T
C21C4wavesC4wavesC4waves+BBCBBBCB
C24ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesD3+4D3+4
C27BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCABBCA
C29SDN
C30LEH
C31BBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1wavesArqA
C32_local
C33com7
C34com8
C37ArqB
C39+ArqB
C42SDN
C45ArqA
C48C5wavesC5waves
C55tv_offcom7tv_off
C56tv_offCOM8tv_off

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 1 Jun 11 and 15 Jun 11.

How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?

Analogue 1-4 100kW
BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-7dB) 20kW
com7, com8(-9.7dB) 10.8kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB(-10dB) 10kW
LEH(-13dB) 5kW
Analogue 5, Mux 1*, Mux 2*, Mux A*, Mux B*(-14dB) 4kW
Mux C*, Mux D*(-17dB) 2kW

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Craigkelly transmitter area

Aug 1957-Jun 1997Scottish Television
Jun 1997-Dec 2014STV plc
Feb 1983-Dec 1992TV-am•
Jan 1993-Sep 2010GMTV•
Sep 2010-Dec 2014ITV Daybreak•
• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Craigkelly was not an original Channel 3 VHF 405-line mast: the historical information shown is the details of the company responsible for the transmitter when it began transmitting Channel 3.

Comments
Thursday, 16 June 2011
G
Graham Ellery
8:21 AM
Anstruther

Picked this up on the net. I had perfect freeview preswitch but 1st June and now 15th June a number of channels dropped of. This may be reason looks like Craigkelly users getting a duff deal.

"The transmitter was originally an A group but has become a K group (or wideband) with the advent of Channel Five and Digital. Craigkelly is one of the few main transmitters which will not be returning to its original group at DSO. In fact after the switchover even less of its Digital output will be receivable on an A group aerial than is the case now, see Ofcom transmitter details".


link to this comment
Graham Ellery's 9 posts GB flag
Graham's: mapG's Freeview map terrainG's terrain plot wavesG's frequency data G's Freeview Detailed Coverage
G
Graham Ellery
8:24 AM
Anstruther

Ordered my new aerial then spotted this.

Looks like the transmitter operators/some multiplex operators are downgrading power and hence service. Only guessing but could it be to use more of the transmitter and bandwidth for lucrative phone , £D telly and pay for view channels???. Otherwise why would they not boost the power to levels where everyone gets their multiplexes.

"Restrictions on SDN, Arqiva A and Arqiva B multiplexes
There are no restrictions on the "commercial multiplexes" on the Craigkelly transmitter - however they will broadcast at 10kW, half of the power of the public service multiplexes and may be unavailable to those on the fringes of the reception area".

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Graham Ellery's 9 posts GB flag
Graham's: mapG's Freeview map terrainG's terrain plot wavesG's frequency data G's Freeview Detailed Coverage
E
Edin
9:38 AM

Duddingston in Edinburgh situation as follows

All freeview channels from Blackhill are
available from that transmitter in its
current state.From Craigkelly I can only
get PSB1 BBCA C27 (522.0MHz),
and PSB2 D3+4 C24 (498.0MHz),

not available are

PSB3 BBCB C21+ (474.2MHz)
COM4 SDN C42 (642.0MHz)
COM6 ArqB C45 (666.0MHz)

looks like the transmitter is just not
putting out enough power on all its
Mux so all of them can be received in EH14
what a shame.I would suggest waiting for
Blackhill to complete its switchover.

My unit is AVerTV Volar Black HD A850
if it was not compatible with any HD
channels it would still pick them up but
would show a black screen with no picture.
when tuned to that HD channel




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Edin's 5 posts GB flag
K
KMJ,Derby
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:43 AM

Graham Ellery: The problem is Craigkelly overlaps coverage with Durris to the North and Darvel to the West. All three transmitters have the PSB muxes in group A as were the original analogue services. Darvel and Durris now use C22, C25 & C28 for PSB muxes and C23, C26 & C29 for the COM muxes. The Black Hill and Craigkelly service areas sit between the areas served by the Darvel and Durris transmitters. If Craigkelly had used the same group A frequencies for the COM muxes there would have been problems for fringe area viewers in the overlap areas for all three transmitters. Durris incidentally could not continue to use the temporary frequencies that the COM muxes had "borrowed" as these will be used at high power from Black Hill from DSO stage 2. With regard to the power of the COM muxes, it is the case that these are transmitted at half the power of the PSB muxes at most sites. Only the biggest main stations (Black Hill in Scotland) and some former relay sites use the same power for all muxes.

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KMJ,Derby's 1,811 posts GB flag
S
Speug
9:59 AM
Edinburgh

In EH4 area and receiving strong signals from my loft aerial from Craigkelly on channels 21(HD),24 27, 39,42 & 45 and appear not to be missing any channels on my Sony HD tuner TV and 1 other TV.

However in the notes from 15 June 2011 you say that NEW7 starts on C52 and NEW8 starts on C30.

What are these channels and when will they be active ?

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Speug's 1 post GB flag
Speug's: mapS's Freeview map terrainS's terrain plot wavesS's frequency data S's Freeview Detailed Coverage
E
Edin
9:59 AM

sorry my area is eh16 not 14

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Edin's 5 posts GB flag
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

10:37 AM

CRAIGKELLY transmitter - Freeview BBC Digital TV Off Air; DSO related from 00:20 yesterday to 02:59 yesterday Analogue BBC ONE Weak Signal from 10:37 on 14 Jun to 10:50 on 14 Jun BBC ONE Weak Signal from 08:55 on 14 Jun to 09:53 on 14 Jun BBC ONE Weak Signal from 21:47 on 13 Jun to 23:12 on 13 Jun [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

10:37 AM

CRAIGKELLY transmitter - Freeview BBC Digital TV Off Air; DSO related from 00:20 yesterday to 02:59 yesterday Analogue BBC ONE Weak Signal from 10:37 on 14 Jun to 10:50 on 14 Jun BBC ONE Weak Signal from 08:55 on 14 Jun to 09:53 on 14 Jun BBC ONE Weak Signal from 21:47 on 13 Jun to 23:12 on 13 Jun [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
K
KMJ,Derby
sentiment_satisfiedGold

11:28 AM

Graeme: Craigkelly is completely independent of Black Hill and is transmitting the full service since DSO step2 completed. Did you do a factory reset to clear the channel list before scanning for channels? Try a manual tune for each of the frequencies for the COM muxes, your receiver might be overlooking them due to the signal strength being less than that on the PSB muxes.

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KMJ,Derby's 1,811 posts GB flag
K
KevF
1:45 PM

EH33, Roof aerial

After rescanning 15th June, I found I had lost ARQA and ARQB channels. This was on the freeview tuner in tv. I also have BT Vision, and that picked up all channels ok. Strange, as being a twin tuner, I believe that this should be worse, not better than the single tuner. TV is a Philips, 6 years old. Previously I had to use an amp to boost the signal. Pleased to say that this is now off (can't get BBC with it on), and no picture breakup whatsoever, which was a major issue before DSO. Happy days.

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KevF's 16 posts GB flag
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