Full Freeview on the Sutton Coldfield (Birmingham, England) transmitter

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

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52.600,-1.835 or 52°36'1"N 1°50'5"W

B75 5JJ

The symbol shows the location of the Sutton Coldfield (Birmingham, England) transmitter which serves 1,870,000 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 Sutton Coldfield (Birmingham, England) mast?

Sutton Coldfield transmitter - Sutton Coldfield transmitter: Possible effect on TV reception week commencing 25/11/2024 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 Sutton Coldfield 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	C43 (650.0MHz)	433m	DTG-	200,000W
	1 BBC One (SD) West Midlands, 2 BBC Two England, 9 BBC Four, 23 BBC Three, 201 CBBC, 202 CBeebies, 231 BBC News, 232 BBC Parliament, plus 19 others
PSB2 D3+4	H max	C46 (674.0MHz)	433m	DTG-	200,000W
	3 ITV 1 (SD) (Central (West micro region)), 4 Channel 4 (SD) Midlands ads, 5 Channel 5, 6 ITV 2, 10 ITV3, 13 E4, 14 Film4, 15 Channel 4 +1 Midlands ads, 18 More4, 26 ITV4, 28 ITVBe, 30 E4 +1, 35 ITV1 +1 (Central west), 71 That’s 60s,
PSB3 BBCB	H max	C40+ (626.2MHz)	433m	DTG-	200,000W
	46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD West Midlands, 102 BBC Two HD England, 103 ITV 1 HD (ITV Central West), 104 Channel 4 HD Midlands 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	C42 (642.0MHz)	433m	DTG-8	200,000W
	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	C45 (666.0MHz)	433m	DTG-8	200,000W
	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	C39+ (618.2MHz)	433m	DTG-8	200,000W
	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
LB	H -13dB	C48 (690.0MHz)	433m	DTG-12	10,000W
	from 31st October 2014: 7 Big Centre TV,

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 Sutton Coldfield transmitter?

BBC Midlands Today 2.9m homes 10.9%
from Birmingham B1 1RF, 15km south-southwest (200°)
to BBC West Midlands region - 66 masts.

ITV Central News 2.9m homes 10.9%
from Birmingham B1 2JT, 15km south-southwest (201°)
to ITV Central (West) region - 65 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 80% evening news is shared with Central (East)

Are there any self-help relays?

Burton (shobnall)	Transposer	1 km W Burton-on-Trent	60 homes
Coalville	Transposer	18 km NW Leicester	600 homes
Solihull	Transposer	Land Rover building	400 homes

How will the Sutton Coldfield (Birmingham, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

	1950s-80s	1984-97	1997-98	1998-2011	2011-13	7 Mar 2018
	VHF	B E T	B E T	B E T	B E K T	W T
C4	BBCtv_waves
C33						com7
C35						com8
C36						LOCAL2
C39					+ArqB	ArqB
C40		BBC2_waves	BBC2_waves	BBC2_waves	+BBCB	BBCB
C42					SDN	SDN
C43		ITV_waves	ITV_waves	ITV_waves	BBCA	BBCA
C45					ArqA	ArqA
C46		BBC1_waves	BBC1_waves	BBC1_waves	D3+4	D3+4
C48						_local
C50_{tv_off}		C4_waves	C4_waves	C4_waves
C51_{tv_off}						LB
C55_{tv_off}						com7_{tv_off}
C56_{tv_off}						COM8_{tv_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 7 Sep 11 and 21 Sep 11.

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	(-10.5dB) 89.2kW
com8	(-10.7dB) 86kW
LB	(-20dB) 10kW
Mux 1, Mux 2, Mux A, Mux B, Mux C, Mux D	(-21dB) 8kW

Local transmitter maps

Sutton Coldfield Freeview Sutton Coldfield DAB Sutton Coldfield AM/FM Sutton Coldfield TV region BBC West Midlands Central (West micro region)

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Sutton Coldfield transmitter area

Feb 1956-Jul 1968	Associated TeleVision†
Feb 1956-Jul 1968	Associated British Corporation◊
Jul 1968-Dec 1981	Associated TeleVision
Jan 1982-Feb 2004	Central Independent 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. Sutton Coldfield 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_satisfied}Silver

7:13 PM

Sean:
You could be getting Too Much now, especially as you are getting in a number of other transmitters. Try taking your out of circuit and see what you get.

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Chris.SE's 251 posts GB flag

B

Billy

_{sentiment_satisfied}Bronze

7:25 PM

Sean, this helped me, as I have said before, decide, find out which you should be on, it Sutton, note the on this page.

Now, assuming and you might, who knows, have too strong a , you need to do this:

Unplug the connection at the back and then factory reset tv or box, or and, do a complete rescan, should get nothing.

Now plug in the connector again.

Now if it lets you, do it manually, not auto.

Trouble I had with the T215 Top up box, is won't let you do this, comes up with this screen and when you press menu, nothing, have to press ok, then it scans, so I pull it out and wait until gets close to channel 39, lowest one on Sutton and then plug in aerial connector, so it on say 37, as goes quicker with nothing in.

Once it logs 39, pull it back out quick, store those 10 channels and radio and then once scanned the lot, plug it back in yet again and do it manually.

Hopefully, not like mine and your Box/TV can be done manually from the start.

Since doing this, I do not pick up the ones yet again, box seems to retain the ones.

Remember though using a 23 db amp, with hill in the way, 17.4 miles may as well be over 30 to 40 plus miles away and I get sometimes, often 95 SS 100% . That is in the as well.
Using Log Periodic, 22 element, quoted as only 7.5 db gain on box.

So my point is, someone with a aerial living less than 20 miles from Sutton should not longer what so ever, unless a crap old thing, need an any more.

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Billy's 50 posts GB flag

B

Billy

_{sentiment_satisfied}Bronze

4:44 PM

Last night appears my top up box has one it again.
Tuned itself to , lol, thought wow good, not one break up, then checking, yup, have changed again.

Not sure if faulty, but I'm keeping it anyway, but it is strange and likely that could be what is happening to others, hence they put things in, wake up next day and put it on and channels have gone, or changed etc.

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Billy's 50 posts GB flag

C

Chris.SE

_{sentiment_satisfied}Silver

2:27 AM

: Brian, now that's an interesting report - there's no TV at now ......cough cough ;)

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Chris.SE's 251 posts GB flag

dutchman
3:11 PM

Billy: you might want to try turning off automatic if your box has that option?

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dutchman's 7 posts GB flag

C

Chris.SE

_{sentiment_satisfied}Silver

9:20 PM

Ryan:
John Gaunt:
Neither of you have given a postcode, so I can't be of specific.
You both may be getting more than one or too much now power has increased.
So first try a full reset/new with the unplugged to clear all previous settings and (the link " reset procedure" in the yellow box below has some more details), then reconnect the aerial and do a MANUAL install using UHF channels ,,,, and if you have HD .
Then, if you are still suffering breakup etc, if you have any /amplifiers in circuit, remove them and see if things improve.

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Chris.SE's 251 posts GB flag

S

stephen
9:41 PM
Walsall

i live in the walsall area,and my tv go upto 49 and go straight to 70,i cant get any hd channels at all,im using a samsung fullhd 1080 tv so shouldnt get any problems,but there it is,any suggestions welcome

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stephen's 1 post GB flag

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

C

Chris.SE

_{sentiment_satisfied}Silver

12:37 AM

stephen: hi, are you sure your model has an in built HD tuner? Give us the full model number and we can check.
Did you get the HD before ?

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Chris.SE's 251 posts GB flag

K

ken
9:26 AM
Alcester

Any chance of widening the stripes denoting the ariel bands in the above for those of us with poor screens or eyesight. Or putting a little white stripe between the colours so they are separate?

Try looking at it on a notebook screen.

(Good site by the way. lots of useful stuff)

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ken's 4 posts GB flag

ken's: K's Freeview map K's terrain plot K's frequency data K's Freeview Detailed Coverage

J

jack
10:53 AM

I agree with ken
The design of this page is terrible.

Also please put DATES on the info. "Over the next week" could mean anything.

I'm getting a lot of drop outs at the moment and HD is never much good. I dont think the is at all high enough from even with a 21db amp in my line.

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jack's 1 post GB flag

Page 115

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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