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Full Freeview on the Sandy Heath (Central Bedfordshire, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps52.130,-0.242 or 52°7'47"N 0°14'33"Wsa_postcodeSG19 2NH

 

The symbol shows the location of the Sandy Heath (Central Bedfordshire, England) transmitter which serves 920,000 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 Sandy Heath (Central Bedfordshire, England) mast?

Sandy Heath transmitter - Sandy Heath transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/03/2024 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
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Which Freeview channels does the Sandy Heath 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
C27 (522.0MHz)291mDTG-180,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) Cambridge, 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
C24 (498.0MHz)291mDTG-180,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Anglia (West 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 (Anglia east),

PSB3
BBCB
 H max
C21+ (474.2MHz)291mDTG-180,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD Cambridge, 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 -0.2dB
C33 (570.0MHz)291mDTG-8170,000W
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 -0.2dB
C36 (594.0MHz)289mDTG-8170,000W
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 -0.2dB
C48 (690.0MHz)289mDTG-8170,000W
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 Sandy Heath transmitter?

regional news image
BBC Look East (West) 1.0m homes 3.7%
from Cambridge CB4 0WZ, 29km east-northeast (65°)
to BBC Cambridge region - 4 masts.
70% of BBC East (East) and BBC East (West) is shared output
regional news image
ITV Anglia News 1.0m homes 3.7%
from Norwich NR1 3JG, 119km east-northeast (60°)
to ITV Anglia (West) region - 5 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 80% evening news is shared with Anglia (East)

How will the Sandy Heath (Central Bedfordshire, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1965-80s1984-971997-981998-20112011-1312 Feb 2020
VHFA K TK TK TW TW T
C6ITVwaves
C21C4wavesC4wavesC4waves+BBCBBBCB
C24ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesD3+4D3+4
C27BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCABBCA
C31BBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1waves
C32com7
C33SDN
C34com8
C35_local
C36ArqA
C39C5wavesC5waves
C43_local
C48ArqBArqB
C51tv_offSDN
C52tv_offArqA
C55tv_offcom7tv_off
C56tv_offCOM8tv_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 30 Mar 11 and 13 Apr 11.

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

Analogue 1-4 1000kW
BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-7.4dB) 180kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB(-7.7dB) 170kW
com7(-13dB) 49.6kW
com8(-13.1dB) 49.1kW
Mux 1*, Mux 2*, Mux A*, Mux B*, Mux C*, Mux D*(-17dB) 20kW
Analogue 5(-20dB) 10kW

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Sandy Heath transmitter area

Oct 1959-Feb 2004Anglia Television
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.

Comments
Wednesday, 6 August 2014
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

8:57 PM

Jodie: The fact of you having said that others around you are also experiencing problems, plus reports of poor, or no reception from other viewers located around the areas referred to in my previous posting and yet signals from the Sandy transmitter are being received perfectly OK further afield, is a positive indication that reception in the areas of complaint "are" being affected by conditions relating to high pressure, something no one can do anything about except to wait until it clears.

This being one of the pitfalls of terrestrial digital reception, as in analogue days the effects of interference from distant stations generally resulted in a range of visual disturbances, for example, ghostly negative images sweeping across the picture from left to right, wavy lines etc across same, and only in cases of severe interference would the picture become non-viewable, whereas in the case of digital reception interference from distant stations, even if only of a relatively mild / low level nature usually results in picture glitching problems, the quality of the signal frequently being observed to dive down to near zero, any increase in the strength of the interference completely corrupting the digital signal entering the decoder thereby killing reception, this being the type of thing that can give some viewers the impression that the transmitter must be faulty, which in Sandy's case it isn't!

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Saturday, 9 August 2014
D
Daniel
6:49 PM

Hello I'm sick of poor signal . I used to get very good signal but now its down to 40% and the HD channels are 10 or nothing at all . I'm new here but my mate next door has had the same problems . i live in rushden

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Daniel's 1 post GB flag
MikeP
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

8:54 PM

Daniel

Rushden is one of the areas served by Sandy Heath transmitter that has a history pof poor or intermittent reception when the weather is good or warm/hot - as we have mostly experienced in the last few weeks. So I would suspect that your reception problems may well be due to a known weather-related phenomemn about which no one can do anything (unless you believe in a helpful deity that is).

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MikeP's 3,056 posts GB flag
K
KMJ,Derby
sentiment_satisfiedGold

10:14 PM

Daniel: Use of Waltham, or in some places, Sutton Coldfield on a second TV or Freeview box might give a more reliable signal for the PSB channels in some parts of Northamptonshire.

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KMJ,Derby's 1,811 posts GB flag
Wednesday, 13 August 2014
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:32 PM

SANDY HEATH transmitter - DAB: BBC National DAB Radio Weak Signal from 14:02 today. [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

7:31 PM

SANDY HEATH transmitter - DAB: BBC National DAB Radio Weak Signal from 14:02 today to 16:02 today. [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
Thursday, 14 August 2014
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:32 AM

SANDY HEATH transmitter - DAB: BBC National DAB Radio Weak Signal from 14:02 yesterday to 16:02 yesterday. [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
Friday, 15 August 2014
Transmitter engineering
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

4:33 AM

SANDY HEATH transmitter - DAB: BBC National DAB Radio Weak Signal from 14:02 on 13 Aug to 16:02 on 13 Aug. [BBC]

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Transmitter engineering's 149,799 posts xx flag
K
Katie
12:31 PM

My TV signal has gone extremely poor today no HD signal and SD channels are quite poor to what's going on . my freind is having same problem to

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Katie's 1 post GB flag
M
Max
5:09 PM
Wellingborough

HI it seems I not the only one with HD channel problems, poor and missing (com7) BBC4 for example, anybody have any ideas or am I just to hope a large bolt of electricity travels to the transmitter and makes it glow.


Max in Stanwick

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Max's 1 post GB flag
Max's: mapM's Freeview map terrainM's terrain plot wavesM's frequency data M's Freeview Detailed Coverage
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