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Full Freeview on the Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps51.324,0.520 or 51°19'25"N 0°31'13"Esa_postcodeME5 9RD

 

The symbol shows the location of the Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) transmitter which serves 200,000 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 Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) mast?

Bluebell Hill transmitter - Bluebell Hill transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/11/2024 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 Bluebell Hill 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
C32 (562.0MHz)242mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) South 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
C34 (578.0MHz)242mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Meridian (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 (Meridian south coast), 71 That’s 60s,

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C45+ (666.2MHz)242mDTG-20,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD South 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
C40 (626.0MHz)242mDTG-820,000W
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
C43+ (650.2MHz)245mDTG-820,000W
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
C46 (674.0MHz)245mDTG-820,000W
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)

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

regional news image
BBC South East Today 0.8m homes 3.2%
from Tunbridge Wells TN1 1QQ, 28km southwest (218°)
to BBC South East region - 45 masts.
regional news image
ITV Meridian News 0.7m homes 2.7%
from Maidstone ME14 5NZ, 5km south-southeast (155°)
to ITV Meridian (East) region - 36 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 50% evening news is shared with all of Meridian plus Oxford

How will the Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1984-971997-981998-20122012-1319 Jul 2018
EEEW TW T
C21_local
C28_local
C32com7
C34com8
C39+ArqA
C40BBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1waves+BBCBSDN
C43ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesD3+4ArqA
C45SDNBBCB
C46BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCAArqB
C54tv_offArqB
C55tv_offcom7tv_off
C56tv_offCOM8tv_off
C65C4wavesC4wavesC4waves

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 13 Jun 12 and 27 Jun 12.

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

Analogue 1-4 30kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB, BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-1.8dB) 20kW
com8(-7.8dB) 5kW
com7(-8.1dB) 4.7kW
Mux 1*, Mux B*, Mux C*, Mux D*(-10dB) 3kW
Mux 2*, Mux A*(-11.8dB) 2kW

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Bluebell Hill transmitter area

Sep 1955-Jul 1968Associated-Rediffusion†
Sep 1955-Jul 1968Associated TeleVision◊
Jul 1968-Dec 1981Thames†
Jul 1968-Dec 1981London Weekend Television♦
Jan 1982-Dec 1992Television South (TVS)
Jan 1993-Feb 2004Meridian
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. Bluebell Hill 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
Wednesday, 25 November 2015
D
David Lodge
7:36 PM
Burnham-on-crouch

I live in Essex at Bradwell-on-Sea cm0 7pt and tuned to the Sudbury station.
We are always getting trouble with breaking up,would we better off at Bluebell Hill.
Thank you Dave L.

link to this comment
David Lodge's 1 post GB flag
David's: ...
Thursday, 26 November 2015
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:42 AM

David Lodge: I very much doubt if it would offer any improvement as far as reliability of reception is involved, as practically every other station shown as being possible to receive (inc Bluebell Hill) in DUK's trade reception predictor, indicates reception as being a mixture of variable to poor in your area, this being somewhat backed up with the forecast of the signal dB levels expected from the various stations in question, as indicated on digital UK's (ex Wolfbanes) technical reception predictor.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Monday, 4 April 2016
S
Sue
7:09 PM

My mother has lost all BBC channels - bbc1 - 2 etc she seems to lose it every day at some point in the day and when she goes to watch it at about 7pm - its gone again

She has tried to auto retune the thign and no luck bbc is not there at all and it says no signal

is there a problem or a way we can sort this out please

link to this comment
Sue's 4 posts GB flag
S
Sue
7:09 PM
Chatham

forgot to say she is at me5 8ps

link to this comment
Sue's 4 posts GB flag
Sue's: ...
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:45 PM

Sue: As no faults are listed against the Bluebell Hill transmitter nor is any engineering work taking place at same, it would be prudent to check with other residents (neighbours) in the row to ascertain if they are also experiencing similar problems with the reception of BBC channels, especially if as appearances would suggest, your mother is connected into a communal aerial system.




link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:55 PM

Sue : Also meant to say, that its most inadvisable to carry out a retune simply because channels are lost, as the problem is invariably down the factors external to the TV or box, all that's achieved by retuning same whilst the signal is down is to delete everything already stored in the tuner, frequent retunes then being required to recover same once that the signal has been restored to normal.



link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Tuesday, 5 April 2016
K
Ken C
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

4:21 PM

Sue,
Check to see which way the aerial on your mum's roof is pointing. It should be roughly at right angles to the ridge, pointing towards the sun, for Bluebell Hill, but if it's pointing along the ridge, then she's pointing at Crystal Palace and that won't give the best signal. A friend of mine in Sittingbourne had the same problem, lost all the BBC programs. We got round that by using the HD versions instead. ie 101 instead of 1, 102 instead of 2 and so on, so if your mum has an HD set, not HD Ready, that will be a way around the problem.

link to this comment
Ken C's 24 posts GB flag
S
Sue
5:19 PM

Hi, my Mum said she checked and her aerial has not moved.
Unfortunately she had tried to retune many times before she told me about this problem - She is not on a communal system.
On Saturday when I go there I am going to take my daughters freeview box and see if that gets BBC there as it works fine here.....
My Mum phoned some freeview number (0345 505050 i think it was if i recall) and the woman then told my Mum to retune - So yet again she went through the retune thing. Which achieved nothing.

I am going to check all cables and whatnot when I get there at the weekend.

Thanks very much - i do hope I can sort it out for her :-)

link to this comment
Sue's 4 posts GB flag
S
Sue
5:40 PM

PS - I will update on Saturday when I get back :-)

link to this comment
Sue's 14 posts GB flag
Wednesday, 6 April 2016
K
Ken C
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

3:42 PM

Sue,

The reason for establishing which way the aerial is pointing is NOT to find out if the aerial has moved but to find out where the received signal is coming from. If it is coming from London (Crystal Palace) then because of the distance it is more susceptible to atmospheric changes, which might well account for losing the signal at some point every day. This will also apply to signals coming from Essex. Another way to check where the signal is coming from is to sect Channel 719 on the TV. This is local radio and if you get BBC Radio Kent, your aerial is pointing to Bluebell Hill, but if you get BBC Radio London or BBC Essex, your aerial is pointing to Crystal Palace or somewhere in Essex. As Radio seems less fussy about signal strength and quality you should be able to get local radio on 719 even if you can't get a BBC television station.

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Ken C's 24 posts GB flag
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