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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
Wednesday, 28 September 2011
Briantist
sentiment_very_satisfiedOwner

2:01 PM

Mike Dimmick/Chris.SE: Apologies, I had not updated the database to the new Mendip allocations. They are now showing.

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Briantist's 38,915 posts GB flag
J
Jack Sukerman
2:20 PM
Bath

I can't get anything on C67, although at this point the only channel I'm missing is Dave. But, before Sept 28 I couldn't get Film 4 etc which was on C67. All other channels are now 10/10 strength and 10/10 quality but we get nada from C67. I've tried unplugging everything except the TV but no change. I'm in BA1 2QU.

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Jack Sukerman's 3 posts GB flag
Jack's: mapJ's Freeview map terrainJ's terrain plot wavesJ's frequency data J's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
Jack Sukerman
2:22 PM

Sorry by missing I mean I wish I still had it, I'm missing the whole multiplex in terms of reception.

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Jack Sukerman's 3 posts GB flag
A
Alex B
3:22 PM
Bristol

Thanks for the updates, Briantist and Mike Dimmick.

Digital UK's trade view postcode checker for the Mendip transmitter appears to have a mistake in that it claims that the SDN/Mux A/COM4 multiplex is now 64QAM, 2/3, 2k as of 28 Sep 2011. I'm pretty sure that it's actually 8k.

I tried to verify this with Digital UK, but I was told that "they're not technical" and didn't understand what I meant by 2k or 8k transmission modes. Hmm...

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Alex B's 3 posts EU flag
Alex's: mapA's Freeview map terrainA's terrain plot wavesA's frequency data A's Freeview Detailed Coverage
A
Alex B
3:30 PM
Bristol

Jack Sukerman, have you tried a factory reset before doing a retune? I've found before that when channels are changing multiplex, and multiplexes are changing/swapping frequencies, it's very easy for TVs and set-top boxes to get utterly confused.

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Alex B's 3 posts EU flag
Alex's: mapA's Freeview map terrainA's terrain plot wavesA's frequency data A's Freeview Detailed Coverage
M
Mal
4:46 PM

Linux scan PSB1 currently giving the following frequencies.

PSB1 794Mhz
PSB2 738Mhz
COM4 690Mhz
COM5 754Mhz
COM6 722Mhz

No but no COM5 or PSB3 ?

Up until now I could only get PSB1,PSB2 & PSB3

COM4 and COM6 appear to be the same signal strength as PSB1 and PSB2.

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Mal's 6 posts GB flag
M
Mike Dimmick
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

4:59 PM

Mal: Is that an *actual* channel scan or is it being downloaded from some website? The necessary information is all carried in the Network Information Table on all multiplexes, in the terrestrial_delivery_system_descriptor. However, a lot of PC software doesn't actually read the descriptors and instead downloads the information from a website.

The exception is that PSB3's descriptor is a t2_delivery_system_descriptor instead - because it is carried on DVB-T2, not DVB-T. This confuses several boxes.

COM5 is actually on C67, 842 MHz, but it was advertised that it would be on C56, 754 MHz.

To convert from a channel number to a frequency: Subtract 21, multiply by 8, add 474.

If the transmitted descriptors are wrong, you could try telling the BBC - go to BBC - Help receiving TV and radio , enter your postcode in the upper right under 'Diagnose your problem' and follow through the wizard. The people really responsible are DMOL DMOL | Home Page but they don't have any customer services facilities.

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Mike Dimmick's 2,486 posts GB flag
M
Mike Dimmick
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

5:06 PM

Jack Sukerman: I'd look for any other equipment, such as a Sky box, that has an RF output on C66, C67 or C68. You will need to retune that to a different channel - perhaps down at C21. If you're not using the feature to distribute the box's output to other TVs, turn it off entirely if possible. Or, simply don't pass the aerial signal through the box.

If you don't have anything like that, check that the cables are waterproofed and that the cable run is as short as possible - losses along cables are greater at higher frequencies. Water in cables increases the losses further and again higher frequencies are affected more than lower ones. If cables can rub against bricks or tiles, the insulation may be letting water in directly; if not, check that all connection points outside (including the aerial) are sealed, and any covers are on the bottom side so that any water that does get in can drain out.

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Mike Dimmick's 2,486 posts GB flag
M
Mal
5:08 PM

Yes it is the transmitted descriptors.

COM5 must be very low power.
PSB3 T2 is still missing or gone low power.

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Mal's 6 posts GB flag
M
Mike Dimmick
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

5:12 PM

Alex B: Bit of disagreement on Mux A/SDN's current mode. DUK's installer newsletter says it should have changed to 8K mode, the postcode checker still shows it in 2K mode.

The installer newsletter shows FULL power - 100kW - for SDN, and Ofcom show no restriction after today.

Ofcom's licensing information shows ArqA at 26 kW and ArqB at 25.7 kW until 28 March 2012, which DUK's installer newsletter say is to avoid interfering with Salisbury.

(References to these documents are in my earlier post.).

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Mike Dimmick's 2,486 posts GB flag
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