Full Freeview on the Mendip (Somerset, England) transmitter

Brian Butterworth first published this on 1st May 2004 at 08:20 - UK Free TV

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51.237,-2.626 or 51°14'12"N 2°37'33"W

BA5 3LB

The symbol shows the location of the Mendip (Somerset, England) transmitter which serves 720,000 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 Mendip (Somerset, England) mast?

Mendip transmitter - Mendip transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 04/11/2024 Pixelation or flickering on some or all channels

Choose from three options: ■ List by multiplex ■ List by channel number ■ List by channel name

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Which Freeview channels does the Mendip 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.

Mux	H/V	Frequency	Height	Mode	Watts
PSB1 BBCA	H max	C32 (562.0MHz)	591m	DTG-	100,000W
	1 BBC One (SD) West, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 17 others
PSB2 D3+4	H max	C34 (578.0MHz)	591m	DTG-	100,000W
	3 ITV 1 (SD) (West), 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 (West), 71 That’s 60s,
PSB3 BBCB	H max	C35 (586.0MHz)	591m	DTG-	100,000W
	46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD West, 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 66 TBN UK,
COM4 SDN	H max	C48 (690.0MHz)	591m	DTG-8	100,000W
	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	C33 (570.0MHz)	591m	DTG-8	100,000W
	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	C36 (594.0MHz)	591m	DTG-8	100,000W
	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
LBS	H -10dB	C30 (546.0MHz)	591m	DTG-12	10,000W
	from 22nd September 2014: 7 Made in Bristol,

DTG-8 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 Mendip transmitter?

BBC Points West 0.9m homes 3.4%
from Bristol BS8 2LR, 25km north (3°)
to BBC West region - 60 masts.

ITV West Country News (East) 0.9m homes 3.4%
from Bristol BS4 3HG, 23km north (11°)
to ITV West region - 61 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 50% evening news is shared with West Country (West)

Are there any self-help relays?

Cheddar	Transposer	15 km E Weston-super-Mare	1674 homes
Luccombe	Active deflector	6 km w Minehead	38 homes

How will the Mendip (Somerset, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

	1984-97	1997-98	1998-2010	2010-13	2013-18	2013-17	27 Feb 2018
	C/D E	E	E	C/D E	C/D E T	W T	W T
C30							_local
C32							BBCA
C33						com7	com7
C34							D3+4
C35						com8	com8
C36							ArqB
C37		C5_waves	C5_waves
C48				SDN	SDN	SDN	SDN
C49_{tv_off}					BBCA	BBCA
C51_{tv_off}						LBS	LBS
C52_{tv_off}				ArqB	ArqB	ArqB
C54_{tv_off}	C4_waves	C4_waves	C4_waves	D3+4	D3+4	D3+4
C55_{tv_off}							com7_{tv_off}
C56_{tv_off}				ArqA	ArqA	ArqA	COM8_{tv_off}
C58_{tv_off}	BBC1_waves	BBC1_waves	BBC1_waves	BBCB	BBCB	BBCB
C61	ITV_waves	ITV_waves	ITV_waves	BBCA
C64	BBC2_waves	BBC2_waves	BBC2_waves

_{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 24 Mar 10 and 7 Apr 10.

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

Analogue 1-4	500kW
Analogue 5	(-6dB) 126kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB, BBCA, D3+4, BBCB	(-7dB) 100kW
com7	(-8.4dB) 72.4kW
com8	(-8.6dB) 69.1kW
Mux 1, Mux 2, Mux A, Mux B, Mux C, Mux D, LBS	(-17dB) 10kW

Local transmitter maps

Mendip Freeview Mendip DAB Mendip AM/FM Mendip TV region BBC West West

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Mendip transmitter area

Jan 1958-Jul 1968	Television Wales and the West
Jul 1968-Feb 2004	Harlech Television
Feb 2004-Dec 2014	ITV plc

Feb 1983-Dec 1992	TV-am•
Jan 1993-Sep 2010	GMTV•
Sep 2010-Dec 2014	ITV Daybreak•

• Breakfast ◊ Weekends ♦ Friday night and weekends † Weekdays only. Mendip 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.

Is the transmitter output the same in all directions?

C

Chris.SE

_{sentiment_very_satisfied}Platinum

1:51 AM

phil: You are not correct in what you state. StevensOnln1 has explained it correctly. Sometimes for obscure reasons tuners can miss a on an auto . If you've experienced those sort of issues (and you have an adequate - which might mean a new to achieve that!) then it often pays to do a factory reset/a complete scan with the aerial unplugged to clear all the stored information from the set and then start again.

Barrie Wreford: The power for COMs 7&8 has not changed since the UHF channel move. It is slightly lower than the other main muxes, but this should not affect your - especially if you can see the transmitter! This is also confirmed by the DigitalUK Coverage Checker Coverage Checker - Detailed View for your location. As others have mentioned previously, sometimes poorer reception on one mux can be due to a possible bad connection somewhere in your system. It would be worth checking through that all the connections, coax & aerial plugs/sockets etc are clean and free from corrosion or damage. I presume you have checked that the aerial hasn't moved in any recent high winds and is pointing correctly. If it's been installed for some considerable time, it could be worth checking the connections at the aerial itself if all else has failed to resolve the problem.

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Chris.SE's 4,346 posts GB flag

R

RichardH
2:10 PM

Chris.SE is correct in what he says about checking connections. I lost channel 36 (Com 7) on my lounge television, 33 and 35 (Arq. A and Com 8) worked okay, although the level wasn't fantastic. All other used channels.had reasonable' signal levels.

Problem was caused by a poor connection at the box, after a bit of wiggling channel 36 returned and the signal level on other channels also increased. So the moral of the story is check connections, even if other channels are working fine.

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RichardH's 7 posts GB flag

T

Terry
6:14 PM
Highbridge

David : I have retuned my humax 2000t to postcode TA9 4HE numbers 49,54,48,33,52. And HD 58,36,35. As given by humax but I still cannot receive itv on had, any ideas please?
E

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Terry's 2 posts GB flag

Terry's: T's Freeview map T's terrain plot T's frequency data T's Freeview Detailed Coverage

S

StevensOnln1

_{sentiment_very_satisfied}Platinum

7:28 PM

Terry: ITV is on UHF 54 from . ITV West is only available in SD on (the HD version is currently only available on ) so you will get a different if you watch ITV HD on Freeview.

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StevensOnln1's 3,669 posts GB flag

C

Chris.SE

_{sentiment_very_satisfied}Platinum

12:55 AM

Terry: David is very unlikely to respond to your query as his post is very very old, and his problem appears to be due to having an old band C/D .
In your case it's as StevensOnln1 explains, you will get ITV Central instead. This is because of the way ITV distributes the HD to transmitters - it's separate from the SD channel distribution.

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Chris.SE's 4,346 posts GB flag

W

wes.w
3:03 PM

If you've lost ITV3 in the last month it has moved. Its now on PSB2 (/738.0MHz) same as ITV, ITV2 and ITV4.

I was very pleased to see that the software on my TV (Bush Play HD 32" Argos special, bought just before Xmas) now has two options if you go for a full retune - the usual "replace all " and a new "update all channels" which keeps the channels in the order I want, rather than the muddled order they used to come in.

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wes.w's 1 post GB flag

S

SJ Dunnett
7:39 PM
Wellington

TA21 8BH
Hello, I wish to get a For top of stairs ,next to bathroom, and receive TV , so need distance as crow flys and good brand for weak area.

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SJ Dunnett's 1 post GB flag

SJ's: S's Freeview map S's terrain plot S's frequency data S's Freeview Detailed Coverage

G

Gary Colby
9:23 PM

Just to update.

Got an guy from Aerial Express to come round and replace my aerial. Don't know the make or model, but the problem has gone, and I'm getting a strength of 10 where as before it was just one.

So sorted.

Thanks for the guys.

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Gary Colby's 5 posts GB flag

S

StevensOnln1

_{sentiment_very_satisfied}Platinum

11:04 PM

SJ Dunnett: There is no such thing as a . An aerial is a piece of metal which receives radio waves and does not know or care whether they are or digital. The for your postcode shows that you should get a good from the , although you are 52km away so you would be better off having an aerial fitted on the (of maybe in the ) rather than trying to use an indoor aerial.

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StevensOnln1's 3,669 posts GB flag

J

Jackie Webb
9:12 PM

Since the change over I have problems with a bad for sky news?

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Jackie Webb's 3 posts GB flag

Page 162

Please post a question, answer or commentIf you have Freeview reception problems before posting a question your must first do this Freeview reset procedure then see: Freeview reception has changed, Single frequency interference, and Freeview intermittent interference.

If you have no satellite signal, see Sky Digibox says 'No Signal' or 'Technical fault'

If you have other problems, please provide a full (not partial) postcode (or preferably enter it in box at the top right) and indicate where if aerial is on the roof, in the loft or elsewhere.

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