Full Freeview on the Crystal Palace (Greater London, England) transmitter
 | Google Streetview |  | Google map |  | Bing map |  | Google Earth |  | 51.424,-0.076 or 51°25'26"N 0°4'32"W |  | SE19 1UE |
The symbol shows the location of the Crystal Palace (Greater London, England) transmitter which serves 4,490,000 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 Crystal Palace (Greater London, England) mast?
Crystal Palace transmitter - Crystal Palace transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 22/04/2024 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
DTG-12 QSPK 8K 3/4 8.0Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)
Which Freeview channels does the Crystal Palace 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
DTG-12 QSPK 8K 3/4 8.0Mb/s DVB-T MPEG2
H/V: aerial position (horizontal or vertical)
Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Crystal Palace transmitter?
BBC London 4.9m homes 18.4%
from London W1A 1AA, 12km north-northwest (335°)
to BBC London region - 55 masts.
ITV London News 4.9m homes 18.4%
from London WC1X 8XZ, 11km north-northwest (345°)
to ITV London region - 55 masts.
Are there any self-help relays?
| Charlton Athletic | Transposer | Redeveloped north stand Charlton Athletic Football Club | 130 homes |
| Deptford | Transposer | south-east London | 100 homes |
| Greenford | Transposer | 12 km N Heathrow Airport | 203 homes |
| Hendon | Transposer | Graham Park estate | 50 homes |
| White City | Transposer | 9 km W central London | 80 homes |
How will the Crystal Palace (Greater London, England) transmission frequencies change over time?
| 1950s-80s | 1984-97 | 1997-98 | 1998-2012 | 2012-13 | 21 Mar 2018 | ||||
| VHF | A K T | A K T | A K T | A K T | W T | ||||
| C1 | BBCtvwaves | ||||||||
| C22 | ArqA | ArqA | |||||||
| C23 | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | BBCA | BBCA | ||||
| C25 | SDN | SDN | |||||||
| C26 | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | D3+4 | D3+4 | ||||
| C28 | -ArqB | ArqB | |||||||
| C29 | LW | ||||||||
| C30 | C4waves | C4waves | C4waves | -BBCB | BBCB | ||||
| C33 | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | com7 | |||||
| C35 | com8 | ||||||||
| C55tv_off | com7tv_off | ||||||||
| C56tv_off | COM8tv_off |
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 4 Apr 12 and 18 Apr 12.
How do the old analogue and currrent digital signal levels compare?
| Analogue 1-4 | 1000kW | |
| SDN, ARQA, ARQB, BBCA, D3+4, BBCB | (-7dB) 200kW | |
| com7 | (-13.7dB) 43.1kW | |
| com8 | (-14dB) 39.8kW | |
| Mux 1*, Mux 2*, Mux A*, Mux B*, Mux C*, Mux D*, LW | (-17dB) 20kW |
Local transmitter maps
Crystal Palace Freeview Crystal Palace DAB Crystal Palace AM/FM Crystal Palace TV region BBC London LondonWhich companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Crystal Palace transmitter area
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Tuesday, 17 July 2012
M
Mark Fletcher7:11 PM
Halifax
Keith.One indicator is the text immediately above yours from Transmitter Engineering on Monday 16 July 2012,11.10am.
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Mark's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Wednesday, 18 July 2012
D
Dee1:41 PM
All of the radio channels have disappeared from my Freeview. Have tried retune, but still none listed. Any advice appreciated.
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D
Dee1:44 PM
Sorry...meant to add I am in Harrow, North West London.
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S
Sean11:12 PM
London
Hi. In Highbury N5, we're losing the C28 channels at night. I rescanned in the hope of improving the signal and ended up losing the channels entirely. Signal levels are around 60-70%, but quality reads as nil. I will have to rescan another night and hope they come back.
I wonder how long this nonsense will go on for. I thought April was as bad as it could get. I'm sick of losing film recordings, et al, to unreliable signals.
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Sean's: mapS's Freeview map terrainS's terrain plot wavesS's frequency data S's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Saturday, 21 July 2012
M
Michael9:30 PM
London
We are having problems with Freeview. The postcode (starting N14) should be picking up Crystal Palace signals. Our digital TVs do this, though the older one sometimes shows pixellation on all but main BBC and ITV muxes.
Our main TV is analogue so has to be fed by either out Toshiba RDXV59DTJB2 HDD recorder or our (very) old Sagem Freeview box. Both were working fine until about two weeks ago. Then the picture on the three non-BBC/ITV muxes started to pixellate, and often became unviewable. I know that the digital TV picture was fine. I also know that if the digital TV gets its picture fed by the Freeview box (I haven't shifted the recorder) it shows the same problems. So it is not the TV. Nor is it the cables, as I have swapped them round several times.
Judging from the signal strength and quality indicators on the HDD recorder, the strength is OK but the quality jumps about. Aerial engineers have also confirmed that the strength (through a roof aerial) is fine. I've considered the weather and wet leaves as possible problems - but the digital TV copes fine. Can't be the Shard, surely!
Is it plausible that the recorder and Freeview boxes are unable to cope with quality variations that are no problem to the TV?
We then started having occasional problems on the BBC and ITV muxes. To my astonishment I found that on the HDD recorder, channels were sometimes displayed as coming from Bluebell Hill or Heathfield, which of course use different UHF channels. I was vaguely aware that other sources were being scanned during an automatic retune, but they had never "got in the way" before.
I got rid of these by retuning with the aerial disconnected and then manually tuning in just the five Crystal Palace UHF channels.
Then this morning, BBC1 was shown as Crystal Palace and BBC2 and other BBC mux channels from elsewhere! Same MUX, different source! How is this mixture possible?
As I had not tuned in any other sources, it seemed that the HDD recorder was retuning itself automatically. Sure enough, in the manual, a reference to a "Service Update" function which searches for newly available channels at 8.00 (am, I presume). No indication of how to switch the function off!
That would explain how the unwanted sources got back, but not why the recorder should choose a more distant (and definitely inferior) source - unless the Crystal Palace source had been particularly poor at 8am (and then only for parts of a mux?).
The Sagem Freeview box is less useful for diagnosis as it shows less info about channels. Also, no manual retune capability.
As fas as I am aware only the BBC and ITV muxes have ever been picked up from anywere other than Crystal Palace, so the pixellation problems on those arise from the Palace signal itself, or at least from the processing of that signal.
So ... does any of this make sense? Has the Crystal Palace signal generally been weakened over the last two weeks, in particular at 8am when the Toshiba scans for signs of life? And, while we should not have to worry about it, how do I stop the HDD recorder retuning itself?
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Michael's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Sunday, 22 July 2012
J
jb383:12 PM
Nottingham
Michael: Your last paragraph sums the situation up perfectly, insomuch that since shortly after the start of the month work has been going on at the transmitter resulting in weak signals accompanied by all the problems that's associated with them.
And with reference to your HDD recorder, if as is very likely to have happened an automatic service update occurred (or you maybe carried out an auto-tune) at the time when the TX power was reduced then this is the most likely reason why the recorder stored the other transmitter in the prime EPG position, and on the subject of the automatic service updating on the Toshiba, unfortunately this is another example of Toshiba's occasional lack of forward thinking as it cannot be disabled, although should I get a chance to have a look in the service manual I will check if anything is mentioned about it there, although somehow I doubt that it will.
Regarding pixilation being seen on one of your TV's whereas not on the others is concerned, "if" you are feeding exactly the same level of signal to all your devices such as via a powered splitter, then the device that the pixilation is seen on simply does not have a tuner of the same sensitivity as your other equipment.
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jb38's: mapJ's Freeview map terrainJ's terrain plot wavesJ's frequency data J's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Monday, 23 July 2012
M
Michael12:36 AM
London
Michael: Thanks for your comments, JB. The signal should be much the same to all devices, as it comes from a powered splitter, but there could be differences in the cable quality.
I had seen references to issues at Crystal Palace as far as the BBC mux was concerned, but the last few days it has been "no problems reported". But it retuned itself this morning! Also, I haven't yet found any similar info source on the other four muxes. I think there must have been issues on the whole set.
The simple way to stop the HDD recorder retuning is presumably to unplug it overnight until it is wanted the next day!
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Michael's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
jb385:28 PM
Michael: Yes, splitters of the powered variety is the only way to guarantee that signals of the same level are being fed into each of the receiving devices being used, that is as well as safeguarding against the potential problems that can sometimes occur with the commonly used practice of daisy chaining RF leads, something which I never do! as its a practice dating back to early analogue days when the signals involved weren't quite so critical as their modern day digital counterparts.
However as far as cable quality is concerned, although on an odd occasion this might well come into the equation, but in the general run of things if pixilation is observed on only one *device* then in the majority of cases its due to variations in sensitivity between the tuners fitted into the different brands of equipment, no two being of the same in sensitivity unless they are in "exactly" the same model number of equipment, even at that though variations can still occur due to production line upgrades being made, this being why on some devices a serial number is necessary when ordering spares.
(*Needless to say the device suffering from pixilation problems should be tried out on another one of the splitters outputs.)
On the subject of leaving the HDD unplugged during night time, it should be appreciated that there are no hard and fast rules as to when a box will attempt a service update, as although some might carry this out about 3.00am or so others can do it at any time day or night, and should a pre-programmed update scan be missed then some boxes will try to compensate by scanning at any time after the device has been switched back on.
A final point, as these transmitter engineering notices are always published behind the event, then I would suggest that should any odd problem be observed to have cropped up at any point in time its by far the best policy to refrain from being tempted to alter (or try) anything, as the cause of the difficulty is likely to be (for one reason or another) out with your control.
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Tuesday, 24 July 2012
M
Michael1:23 AM
London
Michael: Thanks. The powered splitter should send a good signal to each room, but we had been using daisy chaining of RF leads without problems, and the problems over the last fortnight were not altered by taking one or other of the recorder and the digibox out of the chain. I also tried the digibox in a different room, feeding the signal via Scart to a digital TV - no difference.
The Toshiba box claims to update st 8am, but it could be lying, and I would not be surprised if it tried to make up for a missed scan.
I agree about not fiddling when things aren't going wrong, but after more than a week and with a disgruntled family I could not leave it for ever! At leaat I've learnt a good deal more.
No problems today, so I'm hoping any messing about has stopped. Perhaps it was work being done before the Olympics.
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Michael's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Wednesday, 25 July 2012
D
David Taffel1:26 PM
Stanmore
Since yesterday we are having problems with Freeview. You report no problems at Crystal Palace so what is going on?
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David's: mapD's Freeview map terrainD's terrain plot wavesD's frequency data D's Freeview Detailed Coverage
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