Full Freeview on the Bluebell Hill (Medway, England) transmitter
 | Google Streetview |  | Google map |  | Bing map |  | Google Earth |  | 51.324,0.520 or 51°19'25"N 0°31'13"E |  | ME5 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 28/10/2024 Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels 
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Digital television services are broadcast on a multiplexes (or Mux) where many stations occupy a single broadcast frequency, as shown below.
64QAM 8K 3/4 27.1Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)
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.
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?
BBC South East Today 0.8m homes 3.2%
from Tunbridge Wells TN1 1QQ, 28km southwest (218°)
to BBC South East region - 45 masts.
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?
| 1984-97 | 1997-98 | 1998-2012 | 2012-13 | 19 Jul 2018 | |||||
| E | E | E | W T | W T | |||||
| C21 | _local | ||||||||
| C28 | _local | ||||||||
| C32 | com7 | ||||||||
| C34 | com8 | ||||||||
| C39 | +ArqA | ||||||||
| C40 | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | +BBCB | SDN | ||||
| C43 | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | D3+4 | ArqA | ||||
| C45 | SDN | BBCB | |||||||
| C46 | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBCA | ArqB | ||||
| C54tv_off | ArqB | ||||||||
| C55tv_off | com7tv_off | ||||||||
| C56tv_off | COM8tv_off | ||||||||
| C65 | C4waves | C4waves | C4waves |
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 |
Local transmitter maps
Bluebell Hill Freeview Bluebell Hill DAB Bluebell Hill TV region BBC South East Meridian (East micro region)Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Bluebell Hill transmitter area
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Saturday, 5 February 2022
J
James halsey3:12 PM
Chris.SE:
The TV advises
Transmitter ONID
South east 0x233a
TSID 0x104c
Network Id 0x3052
Information from ch32 mux
I hope that may help?
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C
Chris.SE3:13 PM
James halsey:
Well bearing in mind that COM7 operates as a Single Frequency Network (SFN) and your location and aerial direction, that signal could be coming from Bluebell Hill or Crystal Palace or a combination of both.
None of which unfortunately changes the problem of interference to The Bluebell Hill Local mux on C21 from PSB1 on the Faversham Relay at Ospringe.
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C
Chris.SE3:31 PM
James halsey:
Sorry, didn't see your last before my last! Just happened to see your previous post and replied to that straight away. Because COM7 is an SFN, the transmitter information will be different and not identify a specific transmitter.
Unfortunately because there is no published list of Network IDs (that we've found) which identify transmitters, because Sittingbourne Stockers Hill also operates as an SFN, I doubt that the Network ID will identify that or Bluebell Hill.
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Monday, 25 April 2022
J
Julian M7:09 AM
For information TalkTV is broadcating on the Bluebell Hill ch40 mux.
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C
Chris.SE2:14 PM
Julian M:
It's on the SDN multiplex at all transmitters that broadcast the COM muxes
For Bluebell Hill the correct UHF channels are C32, C34, C45, C40, C43, C46, C55, C21 for the multiplexes in the order BBCA/PSB1, D3&4/PSB2, BBCB HD/PSB3, SDN/COM4, ArqA/COM5, ArqB/COM6, COM7 & the Local multiplex.
See Channel listings for Industry Professionals | Freeview for which channels are carried on which multiplexes.
Don't forget COM7 closes at the end of June 2022 under the current licence. No announcements have been made about what will happen to channels on COM7.
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Friday, 29 April 2022
M
mike mo8:44 PM
West Malling
I keepgetting interference ,pixellation sometimes disappearance, from the bluebell transmitter for about the last week or so. ME19 5QP with signals of around 66% quality 100% and also on channel 55 sig 46 48% quality 100%
Anything I can do?
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mike's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
C
Chris.SE10:18 PM
mike mo:
The Bluebell transmitter has been listed for Planned Engineering in recent weeks with the Possible effect on TV reception ""Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels" so this is likely what you are seeing. So if your reception is normally excellent, there is nothing for you to do, certainly don't retune as you may lose correct tuning.
Having said there is nothing to do, If your reception otherwise isn't normally perfect, I'm a little surprised that you are seeing a problem as you are predicted to get excellent reception of all multiplexes and you're only 7km from the transmitter. What sort of aerial are you using? It should be pointing at compass bearing 66 degrees (almost ENE) with its rods horizontal.
If you do have problems at other times it might be worth giving your aerial and downlead a checkout.
Also note, posts sometimes take an inordinate amount of time to appear on this site, so it's best to wait several minutes to check if you post appears even if you got a fatal error message!
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Saturday, 30 April 2022
M
mike mo8:10 AM
Yeah, fatal error misled me to think the post does not go through. The aerial is in the loft and was pointing slightly down about 5 degrees from the horizontal. I've got it now horizontal and it has improved the strength on ch55 by about 8-10%, which gives me the results I just posted yesterday.
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Friday, 13 May 2022
P
Philip A Hadler4:15 PM
Dear Sirs
I live in whitstable Kent. CT54HX. We cannot tx the Dover tx. So face the antenna to London/Blubell.
However, the auto tune always tunes low, ch 23 and up. So most the London tx.
My tv is a Sony 50x85j.
Any ideas how I can force it to use. Bluebell tx. The set up asks for Kent only.
Thank you.
Phil Hadler
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S
StevensOnln14:25 PM
Philip A Hadler: Crystal Palace is predicted to be much stronger at your location than Bluebell Hill and both transmitters are in almost the exact same direction so it makes sense that your TV is preferring to tune to London region rather than Meridian. You could try manual tuning on UHF channels 32, 34 and 45 but you may find that the signal isn't strong enough to work reliably.
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