menuMENU    UK Free TV logo Freeview

 

 

Click to see updates

Full Freeview on the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
sa_streetviewGoogle Streetviewsa_gmapsGoogle mapsa_bingBing mapsa_gearthGoogle Earthsa_gps52.005,0.786 or 52°0'17"N 0°47'8"Esa_postcodeCO10 5NG

 

The symbol shows the location of the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmitter which serves 440,000 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 Sudbury (Suffolk, England) mast?

Sudbury transmitter - Sudbury 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
_______

Which Freeview channels does the Sudbury 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
C44 (658.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
1 BBC One (SD) East, 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
C41 (634.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
3 ITV 1 (SD) (Anglia (East 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
C47 (682.0MHz)229mDTG-100,000W
Channel icons
46 5SELECT, 101 BBC One HD East, 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
C29 (538.0MHz)186mDTG-100,000W
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 max
C31- (553.8MHz)228mDTG-8100,000W
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 max
C37 (602.0MHz)228mDTG-8100,000W
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)

The Sudbury (Suffolk, England) mast is a public service broadcasting (PSB) transmitter, it does not provide these commercial (COM) channels: .

If you want to watch these channels, your aerial must point to one of the 80 Full service Freeview transmitters. For more information see the will there ever be more services on the Freeview Light transmitters? page.

Which BBC and ITV regional news can I watch from the Sudbury transmitter?

regional news image
BBC Look East (East) 0.8m homes 3.2%
from Norwich NR2 1BH, 77km north-northeast (24°)
to BBC East region - 27 masts.
70% of BBC East (East) and BBC East (West) is shared output
regional news image
ITV Anglia News 0.8m homes 3.2%
from NORWICH NR1 3JG, 78km north-northeast (24°)
to ITV Anglia (East) region - 26 masts.
All of lunch, weekend and 80% evening news is shared with Anglia (West)

Are there any self-help relays?

Felixstowe WestTransposer1000 homes +1000 or more homes due to expansion of affected area?
WithamTransposer14 km NE Chelmsford.118 homes

How will the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmission frequencies change over time?

1984-971997-981998-20112011-131 Aug 2018
B E TB E TB E TE TK T
C29SDN
C31ArqA
C35C5wavesC5waves
C37ArqB
C41ITVwavesITVwavesITVwavesD3+4D3+4
C44BBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBC2wavesBBCABBCA
C47C4wavesC4wavesC4wavesBBCBBBCB
C51tv_offBBC1wavesBBC1wavesBBC1waves
C56tv_offArqB
C58tv_offSDN
C60tv_off-ArqA

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 6 Jul 11 and 20 Jul 11.

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

Analogue 1-4 250kW
SDN, ARQA, ARQB, BBCA, D3+4, BBCB(-4dB) 100kW
Analogue 5(-7dB) 50kW
Mux 2*(-14.9dB) 8.1kW
Mux B*(-15.2dB) 7.5kW
Mux 1*(-15.5dB) 7kW
Mux A*(-17dB) 5kW
Mux C*(-22.2dB) 1.5kW
Mux D*(-23.6dB) 1.1kW

Which companies have run the Channel 3 services in the Sudbury 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. Sudbury 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, 12 November 2012
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:25 PM

Nick: I believe that I had mentioned some time back that the reason for this type of indication on mux Ch60 is because you are not actually receiving a "direct" signal from it, this most likely for reasons previously explained, and when you see the signal flashing between 0 - 90, the 90 is when the signal is being reflected towards you from some object, maybe even a high flying plane whilst changing course whereby its wings act like huge reflectors.

This type of thing was frequently witnessed on analogue reception and took the form of signal strength flutter being seen on the picture, the duration of usually lasting about a minute or so every time.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:44 PM

Nick: Just noticed your other postings. As far as those responsible for testing things are concerned, this is something that will not be revealed by any of the indicators on a transmitter as radiation angles does not affect the loading, and even if it was on a subsequent field check then it would be a major problem to rectify once things are powered up.

I have to suffer exactly the same problem on Ch52 from Sandy, me having verified this by carrying out the procedure as mentioned in my somewhat lengthy posting, and although I have numerous facilities at my disposal there is absolutely nothing I can do about the situation.

Regarding you having reported that the engineering work is finished and yet the problem is still the same, yes! that's got to be expected as its not a transmitter problem.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Tuesday, 13 November 2012
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:42 AM
Aldeburgh

Thanks JB, but I thought we had more or less decided it WAS a transmitter problem.
I know aircraft cause signals to flutter, noticeable on fm, but my 0-90% is only for fractions of a second, only on C60, and happens at Aldeburgh and Hollesley, sufficiently far apart not to be suffering from the same object in the way. What did you think of my notion that the tx aerial might be facing a bit downhill, and therefore struggling to go far?

link to this comment
Nick's 425 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
R
Robert
3:06 PM

Does anyone know if the effect of 4G transmissions will be a problem to us receiving signals from Sudbury?

link to this comment
Robert's 1 post GB flag
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:20 PM
Aldeburgh

If it means they lose C60, hope so.

link to this comment
Nick's 425 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:50 PM

Nick: You are placing too much emphasise on the way your aerial is facing, because when a signal is not being received on, or near to, line of sight then the reflective bursts of signal can be from any angle. (within reason!)

Most people who cares to experiment can see this sort of thing happening on most channels if they choose to enter a mux channel number from a station thats well out with their area into their receiving devices manual tuning menu, this in most devices allowing the tuner to act like a form of non db indicating signal meter, then if they observe the strength / quality indications for about 10 minutes or so they will no doubt see exactly what you do on mux Ch60 and caused by the same reasons.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Thursday, 15 November 2012
N
Nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

8:15 PM
Aldeburgh

Thank you, JB. At the risk of trying your patience further though, I am baffled why this only happens on c60, in two locations, when 58 is so strong.
I have a very good aerial, high mast, high location, and even used to get the former mux on c63 sometimes, which was only at 3kw.

link to this comment
Nick's 425 posts GB flag
Nick's: mapN's Freeview map terrainN's terrain plot wavesN's frequency data N's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Friday, 16 November 2012
T
Tony
8:35 PM
Saffron Walden

All very peculiar. Still having problems with all channels apart from C58, which should be worse coverage as it, is a lower level transmitter than the rest. The remaining channels are completely unwatchable at 6pm but by 8-9pm things improve with only occasional/ partial pixelation. Havent checked the situation in the day yet.

link to this comment
Tony's 8 posts GB flag
Tony's: mapT's Freeview map terrainT's terrain plot wavesT's frequency data T's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Saturday, 17 November 2012
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:17 PM

Tony: Although you may have already done this, but on a previous posting I see that you mention your aerial is pointing towards Sudbury, this making me wonder if have you have double checked to ensure that all of these channels that you report as being unviewable at times are actually being received from Sudbury and not Sandy? as Sandy is only about 4 degrees out from being a perfect rear pick up on your aerial, and according to the reception predictor Sandy is not that terribly different from Sudbury for reception, neither seen as being exactly sparkling at your location.

Sudbury : (@ 97degrees / 21 miles) 44 - 41 - 47(HD) - 58 - 60 - 56.

Sandy : (@ 281 degrees / 25 miles) 27 - 24 - 21(HD) - 51 - 52 - 48.

link to this comment
jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
Sunday, 18 November 2012
T
Tony
9:47 AM
Saffron Walden

JB38: Thanks for the suggestion. Indeed I am able to pick up Sandy and sometimes the reception is better than Sudbury, when the aerial was originally installed (about 10 years ago) we had the choice of either transmitter as the reception was near identical. I am going to swing the aerial to Sandy today to see if I get any great improvement. If this fails I will try a new aerial (ATVs XB22WB) possibly on a longer pole. The main issue is the fact that we did have perfect reception until the recent round of engineering works.

link to this comment
Tony's 8 posts GB flag
Tony's: mapT's Freeview map terrainT's terrain plot wavesT's frequency data T's Freeview Detailed Coverage
Select more comments

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.

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.

UK Free TV is here to help people. If you are rude or disrespectful all of your posts will be deleted and you will be banned.








Privacy policy: UK Free Privacy policy.