Full Freeview on the Sandy Heath (Central Bedfordshire, England) transmitter
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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 30/09/2024 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 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.
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?
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
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?
| 1965-80s | 1984-97 | 1997-98 | 1998-2011 | 2011-13 | 12 Feb 2020 | ||||
| VHF | A K T | K T | K T | W T | W T | ||||
| C6 | ITVwaves | ||||||||
| C21 | C4waves | C4waves | C4waves | +BBCB | BBCB | ||||
| C24 | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | ITVwaves | D3+4 | D3+4 | ||||
| C27 | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBC2waves | BBCA | BBCA | ||||
| C31 | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | BBC1waves | ||||||
| C32 | com7 | ||||||||
| C33 | SDN | ||||||||
| C34 | com8 | ||||||||
| C35 | _local | ||||||||
| C36 | ArqA | ||||||||
| C39 | C5waves | C5waves | |||||||
| C43 | _local | ||||||||
| C48 | ArqB | ArqB | |||||||
| C51tv_off | SDN | ||||||||
| C52tv_off | ArqA | ||||||||
| 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 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
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Sunday, 2 June 2024
P
paulJ2:46 PM
Ely
Maybe Mark will give more precision on his channels/muxes impacted,
but COM 5 (eg food network) , for the duration of yesterday/ 1st was unwatchable, in Ely compared to all the other muxes, even though they all showed similar strength and quality though (on both panasonic tv & humax box)
Today COM5 is fine, as remain others
It is as though, for maintenance, they had cut back the bitrate to introduce both pixellation and audio distortion.
COM5 has been bad for most evening this past week >10pm , but this is the first time I see this throughout the day.
[
aerial (in loft) currently has a look angle of about 200 degrees, and calculation yesterday suggested 220 would be more accurate, but I don't see that such an error could be responsible for just com5 ., yagi type aerial maybe 15 elements
]
Regards, Paul (posted mutltiple times before)
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paulJ's: mapP's Freeview map terrainP's terrain plot wavesP's frequency data P's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Monday, 3 June 2024
C
Chris.SE1:16 AM
paulJ:
Hi again. 222 degrees is supposedly the precise angle for your postcode. It depends a bit on what may be on your line-of sight or within the beamwidth of the aerial (especially locally), as to whether 200 degrees rather than 220 makes much difference. It can make a difference to each multiplex, and there won't necessarily be an optimal position for all multiplexes, sometimes you have to have a compromise, especially with an aerial in a loft as very local parts of the structure or it contents can make a difference. Experiment.!
Did you ever get the free filter from Restore TV?
As for you COM5 issues, reasons could be various. They maybe doing things with the encoding, it could have been weather briefly but then I would have expected other COM5 channels to be affected. if it were weather. Went to have a look at whether I could glean any information on bitrates affecting Food Network. Nothing conclusive I'm afraid and nothing specific for the 1st June for Sandy Heath anyway.
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P
paulJ10:24 AM
Ely
Chris.
I now rang restoretv and they are sending some 4G/5g filters - I'll report back
They gave me number for freeview information service too 03456 505050
which I may try to see if they can provide details on what maintenance sandy heath does regularly which might impact COM5/c36 more than others.
Yagi aerial, 10yr old, for which I can't see any specific manufacturer identity , may have been optimal for previous channel range up to c69,
perhaps a ubiquitous log36 aerial would give massive improvement ?
Thanks, Paul
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paulJ's: mapP's Freeview map terrainP's terrain plot wavesP's frequency data P's Freeview Detailed Coverage
C
Chris.SE11:14 PM
paulJ:
I wouldn't waste your money on calling the "Freeview Information service". They don't have a clue about anything technical. They are monkeys reading from computer scripts!
I have been highly critical of them in the past and no doubt will continue to be so when they are unable to get detailed technical information.
This Planned engineering works | Freeview is what they will look at.
If you used to get COMs 7&8 when they were operational then you may have a wideband.
These days, since 700MHz Clearance, the optimal aerial is a Group K (it cuts off anything above C48 - potential mobile cell interference). A log periodic will give you the flattest response BUT considering your distance from the transmitter and being in a loft, I would try this one -
https://www.blake-uk.com/56-element-log-periodic-group-k-aerial-new-double-element-design.html
and you'll need an F-connector for the aerial end.
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Sunday, 11 August 2024
J
John4:01 PM
I have a 4 ch DVB-T modulator to insert channels into my rf distribution at home.
What is the highest channel number available, that isn't affected by the 5G transmissions, please?
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S
Steve Donaldson4:07 PM
John: The band of channels now in use and available for TV, without interference from 4G or 5G mobile base stations, is 21 to 48. 49 and upwards were previously used for TV, and have now been given over to the mobile operators.
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Monday, 30 September 2024
D
DARREN AMOS8:43 PM
Do you know why we don't receive Anglia ITV1 SD anymore via Freeview, but can receive its Plus 1 version an hour later?
We have had to switch to ITV1 HD but this is Meridian, not Anglia, even though we live in Northamptonshire. Do you know why that is the case?
We are tuned to Sandy Heath transmitter and have a strong signal.
Note I have seen many posts with the same issue, so it isn't our equipment.
We have reset & retuned but still no change
This suddenly happened whilst we were watching the channel around 1:00 am on the 27th August.
It did come back for an hour or so a few days later then disappeared again
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S
Steve Donaldson9:02 PM
DARREN AMOS:
This is the first I've heard about this. I found this thread on a forum about Humax devices (not affiliated with Humax):
https://myhumax.org/forum/topic/itv-sd-has-disappeared/page/4
Is yours a Humax?
That said, if it's a Humax box then what about the TV?
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Tuesday, 1 October 2024
C
Chris.SE12:13 AM
DARREN AMOS:
Just FYI, the reason you see Meridian on HD is because ITV currently only distribute 4 major regions in HD. Down in the SW they get Central!
We are still waiting for ITV to roll out the individual regions in HD as the BBC did last year!
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Wednesday, 2 October 2024
A
Anne Moorley8:48 AM
Cannot receive any freeview channels apart from BBC ones today from 6.30 am ( not sure if happed before this time as TV not on
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