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TV Breakdown Appreciation Thread

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NJ
Neil Jones Founding member
If we're doing Lottery cock ups, this is pretty spectacular. Only saved by the fact it's Millennium night and the chances of anybody watching being sober enough to care are slim

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSXlMkpwP48


Fairly unique too by virtue of the fact Dale Winton just totally ignores anything Alan Dedicoat suggests to keep things moving, though I wonder if somebody issuing the same request in his earpiece would have had the same outcome.
XI
Xilla
This isn't a breakdown per se, but it does involve stuff being put to air that we shouldn't have heard!

On 2nd December 1982, Channel 4 closed down for the night. Nothing unusual in that, but keep watching the video. We hear the phone ringing after it's gone off air, and what were presentation "looking into"?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ON7DT7nusHo


Definitely has an air of "bloke who's lost his car key and is frantically looking for it under everything" that one!

Came across a VHS with a poor quality Pages from Ceefax recording recently from 1999. Its from BBC2 Scotland and is the compilation that begins with the track "Sightseeing". The track plays fine, all the way through, then starts to play again, only for it to get stuck and loop the same half-a-second over and over again! Sadly the recording ends before we hear what happens next.

I actually recall it happening again on another occasion, with the same track. Ended up getting switched with a disc featuring a female Gaelic singer
Last edited by Xilla on 24 November 2018 2:52am
SP
Steve in Pudsey
If we're doing Lottery cock ups, this is pretty spectacular. Only saved by the fact it's Millennium night and the chances of anybody watching being sober enough to care are slim

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wSXlMkpwP48


Fairly unique too by virtue of the fact Dale Winton just totally ignores anything Alan Dedicoat suggests to keep things moving, though I wonder if somebody issuing the same request in his earpiece would have had the same outcome.


I wouldn't be surprised if Dale was hearing Alan through the same earpiece as the gallery talkback and didn't hear him over the chaos while the gallery were trying to rescue things.
WH
Whataday Founding member
With all respect to Deadly, I'm sure Dale was instructed by the gallery to fill with Barbara and took his lead from them rather than the voiceover artist. Either that or he was waiting for coherent instructions from the director. Don't forget there are important rules regarding the lottery draw so everything needs to be done by the book.

The greatest curiosity to me about that blooper is that those doors don't look as if they can't open any wider as the set is in the way. Perhaps they didn't rehearse with a full set?
CR
Critique
I hardly imagine that Deadly was just making it up as he went along though! And what Deadly says about being able to go up to the machine and do the draw from where it was stuck turns out to be exactly correct too.

11 days later

FO
FanOfTV99
Just watch I'm A Celeb and it looked like ITV lost pictures to the show for a few seconds. Did anyone else have this?
:-(
A former member
Oops all round this afternoon at around 5.35pm on BBC ONE Northern Ireland...


TC
TonyCurrie
Xilla posted:


Came across a VHS with a poor quality Pages from Ceefax recording recently from 1999. Its from BBC2 Scotland and is the compilation that begins with the track "Sightseeing". The track plays fine, all the way through, then starts to play again, only for it to get stuck and loop the same half-a-second over and over again! Sadly the recording ends before we hear what happens next.

I actually recall it happening again on another occasion, with the same track. Ended up getting switched with a disc featuring a female Gaelic singer


When we were still in Queen Margaret Drive, the CEEFAX music was played from a minidisc. Sony MD players have three modes - stop at end of every track, play track as a loop, or play the whole disc without pausing. Selecting the right mode involved finding the remote, going into one menu and then scrolling up and down to find a second menu and then finding the appropriate setting, using the right arrow key on the remote to scroll through the options and then selecting the right one. All in a dark and unlit corner of the control room. Sometimes colleagues were unaware of how to change the settings! Not long after these incidents I replaced the CEEFAX disc with one that had everything segued together on a single track and the problem went away!
RO
robertclark125
Tony, if you can come and help me fix my class 08 shunter on my model railway layout, that's struggling with a lack of power at times, you're more than welcome.. If you can solve technical issues at QMD with minidiscs, I reckon you can sort a shunter!
TC
TonyCurrie
Clean the wheels with alcohol and make sure that they're not simply dirty (not forgetting the track itself which can become oxidised after a while) - that's the usual cause of poor power transfer.
RO
robertclark125
Clean the wheels with alcohol and make sure that they're not simply dirty (not forgetting the track itself which can become oxidised after a while) - that's the usual cause of poor power transfer.


Thanks for that Tony. Incidentally, if you, or anyone else is interested, this is the most recent update from my layout, filmed last month. The layout is set in a fictional town in Lanarkshire in 1989, and yes, the trains run to time!

36 days later

CH
channel4squares1
One of my favourites is this one from Game Show Network from the states. No idea what show was proceeding this slide but it's very clever use of a game show technique.

I just wish Challenge TV did something very similar, but all there is, is a slide like this.
*
I remember seeing a breakdown during Deal or No Deal on 2 separate occasions, in 2012 the start of an episode started in sound only, then I've heard the tape slowed down before breaking into a breakdown slide appeared, back to black, slide appeared again. then replaced it with the first episode of Classic Millionaire. I can't remember what happened in 2013 but it was once again replaced with Classic Millionaire. Both occasions used the generic Sky TV music.
LTSC1980, Si-Co and BBI45 gave kudos

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