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Full Freeview on the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps52.005,0.786 or 52°0'17"N 0°47'8"Esa_postcodeCO10 5NG

 

The symbol shows the location of the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmitter which serves 440,000 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 Sudbury (Suffolk, England) mast?

Sudbury transmitter - Sudbury transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 04/11/2024 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 Sudbury 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
C44 (658.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) East, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 16 others

PSB2
D3+4
 H max
C41 (634.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Anglia (East micro region)), 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 (Anglia east), 71 That’s 60s,

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C47 (682.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD East, 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

COM4
SDN
 H max
C29 (538.0MHz)186mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
20 U&Drama, 21 5USA, 29 ITV2 +1, 32 5STAR, 33 5Action, 38 Channel 5 +1, 41 Legend, 42 GREAT! action, 57 U&Dave ja vu, 58 ITV3 +1, 59 ITV4 +1, 64 Blaze, 67 TRUE CRIME, 68 TRUE CRIME XTRA, 81 Blaze +1, 83 Together TV, 91 WildEarth, 93 ITVBe +1, 209 Ketchup TV, 210 Ketchup Too, 211 YAAAS!, 251 Al Jazeera English, 255 FRANCE 24 (in English), 265 Rok Sky +1, plus 29 others

COM5
ArqA
 H max
C31- (553.8MHz)228mDTG-8100,000W
Channel icons
11 Sky Mix, 17 Really, 19 U&Dave, 31 E4 Extra, 36 Sky Arts, 40 Quest Red, 43 Food Network, 47 Film4 +1, 48 Challenge, 49 4seven, 60 U&Drama +1, 65 That's TV 2, 70 Quest +1, 74 &UYesterday +1, 76 That's TV 2 MCR, 233 Sky News, plus 13 others

COM6
ArqB
 H max
C37 (602.0MHz)228mDTG-8100,000W
Channel icons
12 Quest, 25 U&W, 27 U&Yesterday, 34 GREAT! movies, 39 DMAX, 44 HGTV, 52 GREAT! christmas, 56 That's TV (UK), 63 GREAT! romance mix, 73 HobbyMaker, 75 That's 90s, 82 Talking Pictures TV, 84 PBS America, 235 Al Jazeera Eng, plus 18 others

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

The Sudbury (Suffolk, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: .

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 Sudbury transmitter?

regional news image
BBC Look East (East) 0.8m homes 3.2%
from Norwich NR2 1BH, 77km north-northeast (24°)
to BBC East region - 27 masts.
70% of BBC East (East) and BBC East (West) is shared output
regional news image
ITV Anglia News 0.8m homes 3.2%
from NORWICH NR1 3JG, 78km north-northeast (24°)
to ITV Anglia (East) region - 26 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 80% evening news is shared with Anglia (West)

Are there any self-help relays?

Felixstowe WestTransposer1000 homes +1000 or more homes due to expansion of affected area?
WithamTransposer14 km NE Chelmsford.118 homes

How will the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1984-971997-981998-20112011-131 Aug 2018
B E TB E TB E TE TK T
C29SDN
C31ArqA
C35C5wavesC5waves
C37ArqB
C41ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesD3+4D3+4
C44BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCABBCA
C47C4wavesC4wavesC4wavesBBCBBBCB
C51tv_offBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1waves
C56tv_offArqB
C58tv_offSDN
C60tv_off-ArqA

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 6 Jul 11 and 20 Jul 11.

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

Analogue 1-4 250kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB, BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-4dB) 100kW
Analogue 5(-7dB) 50kW
Mux 2*(-14.9dB) 8.1kW
Mux B*(-15.2dB) 7.5kW
Mux 1*(-15.5dB) 7kW
Mux A*(-17dB) 5kW
Mux C*(-22.2dB) 1.5kW
Mux D*(-23.6dB) 1.1kW

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

Oct 1959-Feb 2004Anglia Television
Feb 2004-Dec 2014ITV plc
Feb 1983-Dec 1992TV-am•
Jan 1993-Sep 2010GMTV•
Sep 2010-Dec 2014ITV Daybreak•
• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Sudbury 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
Monday, 17 September 2012
H
Heinz
1:57 PM

Nick, Sudbury is not intended to cover Aldeburgh - that's why Aldeburgh has its own (Freeview Lite) transmitter on the outskirts of the town.

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Heinz's 9 posts GB flag
Wednesday, 19 September 2012
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:12 AM
Aldeburgh

Thank you, Heinz, but that does not explain a 90%+ signal quality on all muxes apart from the one using ch 60, which can sometimes be zero.

link to this comment
Nick's 431 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Thursday, 20 September 2012
Tim CO14
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

6:11 AM
Walton On The Naze

Nick: Try using another tuner/digibox. If you then get Ch60 with a different tuner, that would suggest a fault with your current one.

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Tim CO14's 34 posts GB flag
Tim's: mapT's Freeview map terrainT's terrain plot wavesT's frequency data T's Freeview Detailed Coverage
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

11:02 AM
Aldeburgh

I have, Tim, all the same. With the same aerial turned, I can get Clacton, Dover and Tacolneston. I am sure the transmitter is not all it should be.

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Nick's 431 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Wednesday, 10 October 2012
R
Rob Shepter
12:49 PM

Since Sudbury turned off analogue completely, and turned up the digital transmit powers, I cannot get any of the stations on c58 or c60. All the others c41/c44/c47/c56 are excellent, with usually 100% signal quality and 75% or better signal strength.
I have a new (this year) 25dB MHA with a 48-element aerial and satellite grade cabling (new this year) throughout.
I have tried three different receivers of two different brands (Philips, Echostar) with the same result.
Any ideas anyone?

link to this comment
Rob Shepter's 2 posts GB flag
H
Heinz
3:26 PM

You don't say where you are Rob but those symptoms are eerily similar to a receiver being swamped with too much signal (although why that should only happen on those 3 upper channels is beyond my simple mind).

link to this comment
Heinz's 9 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

8:47 PM

Rob Shepter: Should you be the person residing in the CO1 area and originally using a Philips DTR210 then, and as mentioned by Heinz, you "might" be receiving an excessively high signal level by being located about 10 miles or so from Sudbury, especially with the type of aerial set up you are using, which I must say does seem rather excessive at this sort of distance from a 100Kw transmitter.

The other point is, that although the terrain predictor does not indicate any obstructions in the signal path between the transmitter and you, this type of indicator cannot really be classed as being highly accurate by only showing ground levels and nothing else, so in real life is there any obstructions that you might be aware of?

Regarding the 75% strength indication that you have mentioned, what happens to this level if you switch off the mast head amplifier "whilst observing" this indication? although ideally I would have been more interested in what the indication would be if the amplifier had been by-passed, but if of a mast head type then that's obviously not possible.

And with reference to the mast head amplifier, if when its switched off you can still see a signal level being indicated, which with a strong signal you should do albeit that the picture may have vanished, then go into the tuning menu / manual tune and enter Ch58 or Ch60 and check if any level is being shown, no need to scan.



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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Tuesday, 16 October 2012
T
Tony
8:25 PM
Saffron Walden

I live on the border of the Sandy/ Sudbury transmitters location CB10 2HB with the ariel pointing to Sudbury. I am now getting pixelation and signal loss apart from Ch58 on a new Panasonic TX-L42ET5B (which shows 100% signal strength but 10% signal quality on the problem channels), no channels apart from Ch58 on a Tvonics LT3 and no problems on the old Philips set top box or the Sony Bravia KDL-32S5500. Problems are intermittent mostly early evening and started happening about 2 weeks ago, everything AOK up to then. Any ideas?

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Tony's 8 posts GB flag
Tony's: mapT's Freeview map terrainT's terrain plot wavesT's frequency data T's Freeview Detailed Coverage
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:30 PM
Aldeburgh

Whatever anyone says, I believe the Sudbury transmitter has problems with the channels outside the old analogue channels, whatever the aerial and particularly if you are not on the doorstep of the transmitter. The mux using channel 60 is dreadful. Whilst the one on channel 58 can give near 100% sig strength and quality, I look at what happens on ch 60. The quality flashes within milliseconds between 90% and zero. They need to look at it.

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Nick's 431 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Wednesday, 17 October 2012
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:14 AM

Nick: The most likely reason for the quality flash you refer to is that some moving object has reflected the signal, and with this most likely being a high (or in certain cases not so!) flying aircraft.

As a matter of fact this effect can be seen on most TV's / boxes that offer a quality as well as strength indication, because if a mux channel number of a known distant station is entered into the search box on a sets manual tune facility (only entering and "not" scanning) and with the strength / quality bars being viewed over a few minutes, the effect that you observed can frequently be seen to occur and for the reason explained.

You may (or may not) already know this, but entering a mux channel number into a manual tune facility box but NOT scanning causes the tuner to act like a form of signal meter and is likewise free of threshold level restrictions whereby it will show signal levels far too low to produce a picture, this being why should a subsequent scan be carried out some people might be a bit mystified as to why nothing was picked up even although they had observed signal levels being shown, the reason for being that as soon as "search" or "scan" is activated the threshold level restrictions part of the circuitry jump in.

As far as Ch60 is concerned, I have a element of sympathy with you concerning this type of problem, albeit that you are outside of the coverage area, as ever since Sandy Heath switched over I, and many others have had the same type of problem on ArqA Ch52 (and only that channel) whereby its constantly under the reception threshold level on all of my equipment, and with me having a strong suspicion that there might possibly be a slight angular misalignment on the the panel aerial thats used to serve the NW sector of the mast such as I am located in, as mobile tests I have carried out have proven that the problem seems to affect a span area of about 65 degrees or so in roughly the W / NW area from the mast.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
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