All posts by Chris.SE
Below are all of Chris.SE's postings, with the most recent are at the bottom of the page.
Steven:
I can't find any reports of Planned Engineering or Faults for Emley Moor at present.
If you've been having this issue since the retune event on the 23rd October, then it's possible that you don't have a Group T / Wideband aerial and have the original Group B which may not satisfactorily receive further multiplexes after further retune events in Q1 & Q2 next year. Providing you don't have Satellite or Cable TV you can get free help by contacting the Freeview Advice line on 0808-100-0288 where they should be offering to send an engineer to replace your aerial with a Group T / Wideband which is what you'll need to have satisfactory reception of all multiplexes after retunes next year.
If you already have a Group T/ Wideband aerial then see the following -
Problematic connections, water ingress etc. can seem to affect reception of just an individual or several multiplexes.
So I'd suggest you check all you coax plugs, connections, flyleads etc, unplug connectors check for corrosion or other problems and reconnect them. See what signal strengths and quality you are getting for the multiplexes shown in your TV's tuning section, this might indicate potential issues with your aerial or downlead. Also check that your downlead looks undamaged and that your aerial seems intact and pointing in the correct direction.
| link to this comment |
Malcolm Lowe:
Are you picking your signals up from Rowridge? Aerial pointing 100 degrees (10deg.S of E). Predicted reception at your location for COMs4-6 is very variable. Do you have an HD set/tuner and receiving BBC HD channels as well as those on COMs 7&8?
The UHF channels from Rowridge are 24, 27, 25, 22, 28 for the SD channels - PSB1&2, SDN, ArqA, ArqB.
UHF HD channels are 21, 55, 56 for BBCB, COM7, COM8.
Try a manual tune on the UHF channels for those missing SD ones.
The local Poole Relay transmitter only transmits the 3 PSB muxes.
| link to this comment |
Chris Carter:
The BBC site Problems with Freeview reception? | Help receiving TV and radio now shows "Off the air due to a fault - From 8:52am on 2nd Nov 2019 to 2:54pm on 4th Nov 2019" and that there are currently no faults.
I note that according to the Freeview Coverage Checker the Plympton Transmitter (also VP) is within 3degrees of the direction of the Plymouth VP transmitter at your location. Do you get signals for the SDN, ArqA & ArqB multiplexes from Plympton on UHF channels 41, 44, & 47?
I also note that it predicts that you'd get good coverage of all 6 multiplexes from Caradon Hill 308degrees HP.
| link to this comment |
John:
The question you need to ask yourself is which region is my preferred region? You are in Yorkshire after all, do you not want local Yorkshire news?
Not sure why you think that Emley Moor COM8 moved from 56 to 37 as it's still on 56. UHF37 is as you've seen where Bilsdale COM8 currently is. You must have inadvertently (auto) mistuned!
Eventually the temporary muxes COMs 7&8 (where they are still transmitted) with be on UHF 55 & 56 as SFNs.
But also I'm not sure where you get the idea that Bilsdale should be the transmitter you should be using. According to the Freeview Coverage Checker the "Most Likely Transmitter" is Emley Moor, it's only 19km away and the main 6 muxes transmit with 174kW each COMs 7&8 are a touch over 50kW.
Whereas Bilsdale is 77km away, the PSBs transmit with 100kW and COMs 4-6 are 50kW and COMs 7&8 are currently a fraction over 18kW.
What's more, there is a retune event at Bilsdale on the 13th November where the PSBs are moving around those lower channels. COMs 7&8 are moving to UHF 55 & 56 as SFNs and although their power will increase to ~27kW, you are predicted to lose coverage of COM8 from Bilsdale and COM7 will become "poor" reception! But what is worse, is because of some retune events elsewhere in Q1 next year, you are predicted to lose coverage of COMs 4-6 from Bilsdale! There is also a retune event at Emley Moor in Q1, but it's only COM7 predicted reception being slightly worse when it moves to UHF55.
Not sure why you have a self imposed handicap with your loft aerial for Emley Moor (as opposed to Bilsdale), do you have Solar Panels, water tanks, walls or other objects in the way in the Emley Moor direction? I find it strange that you say some of your signal strengths are about 45dBuV from Emley Moor and 56dBuV from Bilsdale considering distance and transmitter power, also for PSB1 84dBuV from Bilsdale and 69dBuV from Emley Moor, you also mention varying quality. Are you absolutely sure that something isn't getting overloaded with all the amplification? That could explain apparently lower signals and varying quality from Emley Moor. IMHO I think some careful checks are needed ;)
Well I've spelt it out for you, I can't give you a direct link to your predicted reception since the changes/amalgamation made to the DigitalUK and Freeview sites last week (a right mess IMHO), but you can check all the details for your self as follows -
Go to Freeview | All your favourite TV shows, all in one place and all for free scroll down the page to the box "Check Freeview at my home" and enter your postcode and house number/name. Scroll down the new page where available channels are shown in "tiles". Below the initial block there is a "down arrow" if not all are displayed. If you are only interested in a particular group of channels click on that button on the top row.
If you scroll down just after half way down the page, there is a button "Detailed view". If you click on that it will show the predicted reception of transmitters and multiplexes that may be receivable at your location on another new page. Transmitter distances and aerial directions etc are given at the top of that page.
If you hover over any given channel number a pop-up box will show you the transmission details, power etc.
HTH.
| link to this comment |
Not sure what happens on this site from time to time, but one can't get back to previous pages as the links seem to get corrupted eg. at present Page 209 has the link Emley Moor (Kirklees, England) Full Freeview transmitter | free and easy and it just stays on Page 210. The corruption seems to be the _(U) after Emley_Moor.
The workaround seems to be Right Click the page number and select Copy Link Location. Paste that into the address bar and delete the _(U) from the address before pressing Return/Go.
| link to this comment |
John:
First, I meant to say in my previous post that the channel listings here on this site are incorrect, the owner here has not managed to correctly keep up with the changes, there's over 1100+ transmitters in the UK. The Freeview site is normally the accurate place to refer.
2nd, there's probably a bit of confusion which maybe I should have clarified in my previous post about EM. The was a multiplex on UHF56 which moved to UHF39 according to DigitalUK's documentation, BUT this is a Local multiplex identified as L-LDS (LOC1) not COM8. At the same time COM8 which was on UHF34 moved up to UHF56. Try a manual tune on it with your EM aerial. COM8 carries programmes such as BBC4 HD, QVC HD etc.
For a full list of which channels are on which Multiplex see Channel listings | Freeview
I'm afraid as I'm not there I can't confirm, I can only go by DigitalUK/Freeview documentation - there's two places that is stated - 700MHz_Clearance_Q4_2019_Yorkshire_v2.pdf and the current Detailed Coverage Checker lists as I detailed how you can see them in my previous post. Unfortunately the link to that pdf document on the amalgamated website is broken and it's not possible to download copies of that atm. Freeview have been made aware, but how long it will take them to fix it is anyone's guess as some other issues I pointed out to them months ago (in writing) are still the same!! So try that manual scan of EM UHF56.
Autotuning is a well known problem where more than one transmitter and/or region can be received. Manual tuning is the only real option these days. Again the Coverage Checker will tell you which UHF channels to use.
Your point about topography is well known and taken, another reason why when looking at the Coverage Checker putting in your house number/name (don't post it here) can make a difference to the prediction. I can only do a general check on the postcode which terrain plotting on here gives (a mean?) 248m (at 10m chimney height), Emley Moor is 575m, Bilsdale is 674m and with those numbers there's supposedly clear line of sight. I wouldn't have expected that if you are slightly below the sight-line it would have had significant impact on the quality. On which multiplexes are you see the quality variations?
Interference, too weak, or too strong a signal especially when lots of amplification is involved, or a poor connection is a more usual cause. I would do a test from one aerial direct to one set to see if the quality variations continue.
It's also worth saying that the Coverage Checker is only a prediction and there have been cases where it's just not right for some obscure reason. However with the COMs 7&8 multiplexes as SFNs there is inevitably some reduction in coverage because of the way SFNs work, so I would not ignore the fact that COMs 7&8 from Bilsdale are predicted to be unreliable at your location one all the retunes occur.
Finally - I think ;) 5G, - Group K aerials will be the norm in due course, but where the temporary multiplexes COMs 7&8 continue to transmit, a Group T /Wideband is needed (Group K is no good for them, especially as they are often lower power). At present, no final date has been announced but it's currently expected that they will all close by sometime in 2022, at present they are allocated in a gap between the Downstream and Upstream 5G allocations. If you are interested, look at all the documentation associated with the 700MHz clearance program.
| link to this comment |
StevensOnln1:
I think what Roy is referring to is the speculation here Rebuilding Freeview High Definition from 2019 onwards | free and easy that once the HD muxes COMs 7&8 close then COMs 4-6 will go HD. It is of course pure speculation that they will all go HD, one may do so initially, but it will be purely a commercial decision (we think at present) by Arqiva and the broadcasters. So the answer to Roy's question is we don't know, nothing has been announced and nothing is expected to be announced soon!
| link to this comment |
Roy:
As mentioned by StevensOnln1, UHF55&56 are in the gap between Uplink & Downlink allocations for 5G. It is the rest of the 700MHz band that will be cleared by June 2020. I'm afraid there are many listings on various pages on this site that are wrong and information that has not been fully updated by the site owner to reflect the current situation, there are over 1100+ transmitters in the UK. Some main transmitters have already lost COMs 7&8 as has been mentioned in part due to technical aspects of SFNs, but mainly due to the fact that existing equipment (mainly pre-DSO AFAIK) has to be repurposed for the new SFN allocations and it's not always technically possible and/or cost effective for Arqiva to do this.
The current allocation (gap) is planned for 5G SDL for which there is yet no proposals by the mobile operators AFAIK.
As you know there are no other HD muxes other than BBCB on which there is no more room. So until there is some future proposal by Arqiva, or intervention by HMG/OFCOM (or new agreements resulting from CEPT proposals) it's all speculation.
| link to this comment |
John:
There is a nice graphic at the top of this page Will I need a filter when the 5G mobile broadband services start in 2020? | free and easy which shows 5G and DTV allocation.
There is one bit of information later on that page which I think could be misinterpreted, and that is where it implies the BBCB mux will be on UHF47 or 48. Quote "Be using the BBCB multiplex for Freeview HD (as they will use C47/C48)". That is not the case for most of the transmitters, the mux is on other UHF channels.
| link to this comment |
Monday 4 November 2019 2:57AM
Andy Dodds:
There has been Planned Engineering work at Sandy Heath over the last week with "Possible weak signal" which might be the cause of your problems. Cannot confirm if any work continues this week until later today (see Planned engineering works | Freeview ).
Have you actually checked your cables etc.? Problematic connections, water ingress etc. can seem to affect reception of just an INDIVIDUAL, OR several or all multiplexes.
Check all you coax plugs, connections, flyleads etc, unplug connectors check for corrosion or other problems and reconnect them. Flyleads can often be a problem. See what signal strengths and quality you are getting for the multiplexes shown in your TV's tuning section, this might indicate potential issues with your aerial or downlead. Also check that your downlead looks undamaged and that your aerial seems intact and pointing in the correct direction.