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

first published this on - UK Free TV
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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 22/04/2024 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
_______

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),

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 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 max
C43+ (650.2MHz)245mDTG-820,000W
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 max
C46 (674.0MHz)245mDTG-820,000W
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

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
Thursday, 7 April 2016
S
Sue
7:22 PM

BBC is back again apparently......

719 says.... Black screen - No signal

but BBC1 is back - BBC2 is no signal
BBC4 is no signal

Tried BBC1 again - Gone again

Grrrr
There has to be something up as BBC is up and down like.... (Well I shall say like some socks......) lol

link to this comment
Sue's 14 posts GB flag
MikeP
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

10:16 PM
Trowbridge

Sue:

It would be useful to know what the signal strengths are on the BBC channels giving problems. Can you check on you mother's TV what the channel frequencies are and give the strengths of those, not the signal quality though.

Check at the top of this page what the frequencies should be. If they are showing as different on the TV then you may need to do a manual tune on those that are incorrect.

Let us know what the results are please?


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MikeP's 3,056 posts GB flag
MikeP's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Friday, 8 April 2016
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:16 AM

Sue : In addition to the advice given by MikeP, it would also suggest that carry out your intention of (5th @ 5.15pm) trying your daughters Freeview box on your mothers aerial system, because apart from the possibility (albeit slight) of your mothers TV being defective, some Freeview devices are more sensitive than others, the effect of being that viewing might be possible from a low level signal on one device whereas not on another, this being why its always better to try reception tests using more than one receiver, as your mother's problem might simply be down to the signal received from Bluebell Hills BBC Mux (C46) hovering at a level just high enough and no more to resolve a picture, but which is dropping off slightly towards night time.

If though the BBC channels are not received on either device, go into the TV or boxes "manual" tuning menu followed by entering C46 (Bluebells BBC) but pausing at this point, i.e: do "not" press search or scan, because if any signal is being received (no matter how low) the level of will be seen on the strength / quality bars.









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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:28 AM

Sue : Meant also to add, disregard that said re 719 which is BBC Radio Kent (local), the test channel I should have referred to is the BBC World Service on 710.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
K
Ken C
sentiment_satisfiedBronze

11:47 AM

jb38,

You said about Sue's mum getting BBC Solent on 719. That is almost impossible from the Bluebell Hill transmitter. Channel 719 is the channel for BBC local radio and which one you get depend or where you are (receiving your signal from), thus to get get BBC Solent you would need to be somewhere in the Southampton area. Where Sue's mum lives she should be able to get either BBC Radio Kent, BBC London or BBC Essex, but it would depend which way her aerial was pointing and ideally it should be pointing to Bluebell Hill as it's almost in her back garden, metaphorically.

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Ken C's 24 posts GB flag
S
Sue
4:47 PM

BBC1 says signal strength 50% says UHF 46 if that means anything?
It has been coming and going today - Mostly going all morning it was gone
I will take my freeview box there when I go and see if it helps

Mums is a wharfedale if that makes any difference?

Whilst I was typing this BBC channels left again...

I really think they are up to something - LOL. Mum only uses this in the evenings

link to this comment
Sue's 14 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:01 PM

Ken C: Yes, you are perfectly correct, the BBC Solent error being down to me having mistakenly viewed the Meridian channel list for another transmitter, but which I had corrected in a follow up posting made early (very) this morning @12.28am.


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

9:56 PM

Sue : UHF46 means that you are receiving BBC1 etc from the correct transmitter. However 50% strength cannot be classed as particularly good on a box of the type mentioned as it isn't that much above the reception threshold drop out level, if though the quality of the signal was also indicated along with the strength? maybe you could give an update on what it was, although I do appreciate that some of these boxes only indicate a combined level.

By the way, it would also be of assistance if you could indicate the brand / model number of your own Freeview box, as many of these boxes sold under a range of different brand names are actually made by the same manufacturer.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
MikeP
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

10:22 PM
Trowbridge

Sue:

As jb38 suggests, 50% strength is not really enough for reliable reception on most TV sets. The ideal is more like 60-70% strength with a quality of at least 80% for best reception.

That suggests there may be an aerial problem at your mother's house. I agree with jb38 that checking by using another TV set (yours perhaps) might help identify whether there really is an aerial fault, but that does depend on the make and model of your own set.


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MikeP's 3,056 posts GB flag
MikeP's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Saturday, 9 April 2016
S
Sue
10:04 AM

Mum thinks that it is not her aerial as it has been fine and then all of a sudden this happens for no reason then comes back.....

I will take my freeview box there and see if that makes any difference

Will let you know....... Thanks alot

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Sue's 14 posts GB flag
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