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Full Freeview on the Mendip (Somerset, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps51.237,-2.626 or 51°14'12"N 2°37'33"Wsa_postcodeBA5 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 11/11/2024 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 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.

MuxH/VFrequencyHeightModeWatts
PSB1
BBCA
 H max
C32 (562.0MHz)591mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
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)591mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
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)591mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
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

COM4
SDN
 H max
C48 (690.0MHz)591mDTG-8100,000W
Channel icons
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)591mDTG-8100,000W
Channel icons
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)591mDTG-8100,000W
Channel icons
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)591mDTG-1210,000W
Channel icons
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?

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

CheddarTransposer15 km E Weston-super-Mare1674 homes
LuccombeActive deflector6 km w Minehead38 homes

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

1984-971997-981998-20102010-132013-182013-1727 Feb 2018
C/D EEEC/D EC/D E TW TW T
C30_local
C32BBCA
C33com7com7
C34D3+4
C35com8com8
C36ArqB
C37C5wavesC5waves
C48SDNSDNSDNSDN
C49tv_off BBCABBCA
C51tv_offLBSLBS
C52tv_offArqBArqBArqB
C54tv_offC4wavesC4wavesC4wavesD3+4D3+4D3+4
C55tv_offcom7tv_off
C56tv_offArqAArqAArqACOM8tv_off
C58tv_offBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBCBBBCBBBCB
C61ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesBBCA
C64BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2waves

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

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

Jan 1958-Jul 1968Television Wales and the West
Jul 1968-Feb 2004Harlech 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. 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.

Comments
Monday, 9 September 2019
C
Chris.SE
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

1:36 AM

AntD:

That is deplorable. This is not the first time that I've heard of cases of people with issues since the Mendip retune not getting the aerial help they should have. I suggest you ring them 0808-100-0288 request/demand if necessary to speak to a manager and ask what they are going to do after failing to comply with their obligations and at the very least get a written admission and apology.

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Chris.SE's 4,359 posts GB flag
Saturday, 14 September 2019
C
Chris.SE
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

5:40 AM

Richard: & All:

Some info I had previously missed which may explain why a number of people are having periodic reception problems of the Local Bristol mux (LBS/LOC1), that is at the last retune when it was moved from UHF51 to 30 the Power (ERP) was reduced from 10kW to 5kW. This certainly won't have helped anyone still using a group C/D aerial (even an enhanced one) which would already be struggling to get any signal on UHF30.

All:

Also note that at the last retune event when COM7 moved to UHF55, the Power (ERP) was reduced from 72kW to 61kW. COM8 & the other main multiplexes were unaffected by power changes.
As many have already noted & commented, the channel and power information on this page may be/is not up-to-date.

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Chris.SE's 4,359 posts GB flag
Monday, 16 September 2019
P
Phil
5:32 PM
Swindon

I have been having problems with the Mendip transmitter over recent days. I cannot find any aerial or connection problems. I have been fine since the last channel changes in June until just recently.
Incidentally the latest changes are not shown in the 'change over time table' and hard to find online despite them happening. I cannot find any reported problems to explain my problems. My signal levels are about 90% but quality is only high 80s% and I understand one really needs 100% particularly on older equipment. Before I have to get more serious and get the aerial down to check/replace is there anything more general to explain this?

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Phil's 2 posts GB flag
Phil's: mapP's Freeview map terrainP's terrain plot wavesP's frequency data P's Freeview Detailed Coverage
S
StevensOnln1
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

7:17 PM

Phil: 90% signal strength is plenty (maybe even too high for some tuners) and 80% quality is hardly anything to worry about. What sort of problems have you been experiencing? Please provide a full postcode so that we can see where you are in relation to the transmitter and your predicted signal strength etc.

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StevensOnln1's 3,671 posts GB flag
Tuesday, 17 September 2019
C
Chris.SE
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:50 AM

Phil:

There is planned engineering this week at Mendip with "Possible weak signal" which may be the cause of your problems. If you put your postcode into About us | Freeview you can see your predicted reception at your location. As StevensOnln1 says with a full postcode further advice may be provided.

If you use the menus & follow links on the DigitalUK website you can find details and documents relating to the 700Mhz clearance. See also About us | Freeview
Help | Freeview is another place to keep an eye, and loads of other useful information on that site. Unfortunately the operator/owner of this site hasn't updated all the information on various pages here.

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Chris.SE's 4,359 posts GB flag
Wednesday, 18 September 2019
P
Phil
5:27 PM
Swindon

Chris.SE:

Okay, thanks. With all my googling I didn't manage to find the engineering work. What I found was 'no problems'. Nothing shows up here All transmitters with faults and engineering | free and easy or here BBC Transmitter Engineeering information | free and easy for instance. I will explain my setup but really I was looking for just this sort of thing to explain the problems I've suddenly started having over the last few days. I've just been out with the binoculars and the cable and connection to the aerial look as fine as I can tell without getting it down.

I will always be marginal as my postcode is SN6 6EA and I should be using Oxford not Mendip but I want west region. Anyway, I've been doing this since the 80s. I have a 20ft scaffold pole with a Televes DAT45 wideband amplified aerial. My ancient Topfield digibox needs more or less 100% quality. All has remained fine with all the channel changes. Problems over last few days are blocking, freezing, squaking, particularly on weaker channels. My newer TV and Humax box were fine but now the Humax is affected to an extent as well. Hopefully the power will come back up or they will have snookered what I have been doing for over 30 years for this 5G lark. Seems like they are trying to squeeze terrestrial out of existence.

Currently coping by using catchup for unwatchable recordings but not much good for live TV.

Sorry for slow reply. Email me updates doesn't seem to work.

Thanks.

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Phil's 2 posts GB flag
Phil's: mapP's Freeview map terrainP's terrain plot wavesP's frequency data P's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Tuesday, 24 September 2019
A
Alan
9:44 PM
Weston-super-mare

Over the last few weeks we have had high blocking interference on ITV coming from the Mendip transmitter.
My location is BS22 9EF, the signal quality is all over the place, and the bit error is totally erratic. Very poor during early morning, but reduces up early evnning. BBC channels ok. Any idea's

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Alan's 3 posts GB flag
Alan's: mapA's Freeview map terrainA's terrain plot wavesA's frequency data A's Freeview Detailed Coverage
C
Chris.SE
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:12 PM

Alan:

You should get pretty well perfect reception at your location. There's Planned Engineering at Mendip this week with "Possible weak signal" which might affect you, and in recent times there's been some tropospheric propagation which could cause interference from other transmitters using the same UHF channels but that should have subsided by now.

I assume that you have had a Group T/Wideband aerial since the retune event back in the summer. You should check in your TV tuning menus that you are tuned to the correct UHF channel (34) for the D3&4 multiplex from Mendip. You may have inadvertently auto-tuned to transmissions on 24 from the Hutton relay or on 23 from the Stockland Hill transmitter.

To check all the correct UHF channels, put you postcode into About us | Freeview

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Chris.SE's 4,359 posts GB flag
C
Chris.SE
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:20 PM

Phil:

My apologies for not replying to you sooner. Email updates aren't immediate, they are daily, weekly etc depending on what you selected. Tropospheric propagation in recent times causing interference from other transmitters will not have helped you but that should have now subsided. There's still Transmitter Engineering at Mendip this week with "Possible weak signal".

link to this comment
Chris.SE's 4,359 posts GB flag
Saturday, 28 September 2019
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Your comment please
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.

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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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