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Full Freeview on the Sudbury (Suffolk, England) transmitter

first published this on - UK Free TV
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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
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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
Saturday, 31 August 2013
N
nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

9:03 AM

Dave, please could you explain this.
On analogue, when the foreign channels messed up signals from Sudbury, we had a wobbly picture with foreign picture underneath.
On digital, I lose muxes on c56, 58, 60, but there is no foreign picture to replace them. From this I get the impression that there is no foreigner there, even if I turn the aerial to Holland. So why I am I losing the signal?
Also, when Holland comes in, it comes in with the aerial in any direction. Is this because the signal is bouncing down from above, so that how the aerial is positioned is irrelevant?

link to this comment
nick's 425 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

11:54 AM

nick: The only way that you "might" just be able to view the foreign channel responsible (if!) for your problem is should any of Sudbury's C56-58 or 60 muxes fail, because just in the same way as the muxes from across the water can wipe out your reception from Sudbury, on the other hand Sudbury will be wiping them out.

As unlike in the case of analogue reception and where two signals can be received at the same time without completely wiping each other out, digital reception cannot tolerate its data being corrupted in any way or the receiver will be unable to decode it, and of course this corruption can be starting to occur at well under the level that's is required to resolve a picture anyway.

With regards to the query in the latter part of your posting, basically yes! although its also possible that the signal is beaming in a low level by skipping across the water and is being reflected on some distant "inland" object and back onto your aerial or even a combination of both, but though you are effectively in the realms of the unknown unless in possession of a hand held test aerial (Log) coupled into professional test equipment.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
N
nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

8:00 PM

Thanks JB.
Is it necessary to do a scan when the foreigners come in and perhaps see something? Otherwise I am left with the impression that there is nothing there and lost as to why Sudbury has vanished.

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nick's 425 posts GB flag
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

8:55 PM

nick: No, because if you are viewing a programme and it slowly starts to break up and with the reason for suspected as being caused by a rising level of co-channel interference from a foreign station then rescanning would not make any difference, and simply because that the end situation would still be exactly the same.

That being, of the receiver picking up signals from two digital transmitters on the same channel but with the data stream from both corrupting each others in varying degrees dependant on the signal strength ratio between them, partial but intermittent reception only starting to re-appear when the signal from one transmitter has reached a sufficiently high enough level to virtually overpower the other and with "no signal" or just a blank being seen on the receiver whilst it hasn't, albeit of course that the actual signals are still there.


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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
K
KMJ,Derby
sentiment_satisfiedGold

10:26 PM

nick: The Sudbury COM muxes share frequencies with Waltham (C56 & C58) and Belmont (C60). Similarly Dover shares frequencies with Tacolneston (C50, C55, C59) and Sandy Heath (C48 & C51). It is very likely that these transmitters are responsible on many occasions for the interuptions to your normal reception.

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KMJ,Derby's 1,811 posts GB flag
Sunday, 1 September 2013
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

12:07 AM

nick: With reference to the suggestion made by KMJ,Derby, if when your reception of Sudbury's C56 or C58 is affected in any way then try a "manual" signal check on C49 Waltham's BBC1, or alternatively C57 which is Waltham's COM6 and see if anything is being indicated, because if atmospheric conditions are enabling Waltham's muxes to interfere with your reception from Sudbury then the chances are that its BBC1 and also its COM6 will also be receivable.

If though its Sudbury's C60 that's affected, then should Belmont's C60 be responsible then try a manual tune signal check on Belmont's COM5 on C53 and see if anything is being indicated signal wise.

By the way, the check I refer to is achieved by going into the tuning menu / manual tune and entering the channel number but NOT being followed by pressing search or scan, as on most devices the strength / quality of the mux channel entered will be seen shortly after the channel number has been entered, if search or scan is accidentally pressed the test will be null and void as you will have activated the signal level cut off threshold into the equation.

Those tests are not necessarily 100% accurate, however in most cases they will apply by giving an indication of whether or not the problem is being caused by another UK station rather than a foreign one.

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
N
nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

11:08 PM

Thanks KMJ and JB
I suspect the culprit is Holland, but no search when I lose signal from these three Sudbury muxes will help me find out?
C41 and 44 are the same power but don't vanish. Why?

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nick's 425 posts GB flag
Monday, 2 September 2013
J
jb38
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

8:09 AM

nick: Its not so much the case that carrying out the procedure as described in my reply will positively pinpoint Holland as being responsible for your difficulties, but more the case checking and possibly eliminating other sources such as mentioned by KMJ.Derby, and although not a 100% accurate test it does at least give you an idea as to whether or not there is even the slightest trace of a signal from either of the stations mentioned, because if there is then both of will come into the equation whereas if not this its inclined to eliminate them as playing any role thereby casting suspicion on Holland as being entirely responsible.

I would like to emphasise that I am not doubting what you have said, but just giving you another way of verifying (or otherwise) what you suspect.

As far as C41 and C44 are concerned, the only reason for this is simply because that the offending source does not transmit on those channels, and of course neither does Waltham or Belmont!

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jb38's 7,179 posts GB flag
N
nick
sentiment_satisfiedGold

5:34 PM

Thanks JB.
I have mentioned this before, I know.
All my small portables buzz on sound with a freeview box connected via scart, more so on bright pictures, but annoying all the time. Where I have a freeview box, eg Icecypt, which will also work via the aerial connection, there is no problem, although the Icecrypt makes a buzz via scart.
Where the other freeview boxes can only be connected via scart, is there anything possible to stop the buzz?

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nick's 425 posts GB flag
M
MikeB
sentiment_very_satisfiedPlatinum

9:37 PM

nick: It sounds like your scart is poorly shielded, and probably very close to other cables. Move them away from each other for a start, possibly change them for better leads (ATV do seemingly very nice ones for only £3.50 Online Satellite/TV/FM/DAB Cable, Leads and Connectors sales. and of course check that you cannot ultimately use HDMI instead (they can also have interference, but probably less than scart).

There are one or two other possibilities, and they are discussed here Suggestions For Fixing Scart Interference On TV? - TV and Home Entertainment Technology - Digital Spy Forums

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MikeB's 2,579 posts GB flag
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