Channel 5 Analogue now on test in the South East

News for anyone in the East Surrey/North Sussex area: the Channel 5 terrestrial analogue service is now on test from the Reigate transmitter on UHF channel 42, and is currently showing a 'coming soon' screen. Unfortunately reception is pretty poor, even though I live only 2 miles from the transmitter, and this is the best I can manage with my capture card!

http://www.nascr.net/~rgwill/Ch5test.jpg

Channel 5 analogue is apparently also coming this autumn to the Brighton, Hastings and Tunbridge Wells transmitters (all relay stations). Incidentally Reigate has already been transmitting Channel 5 on digital terrestrial for the past 4 years.

Is this anything to do with the BBC upgrading tranmitters for DTT. Still no sign in Derbyshire

Well I live in Redhill, and strangely I've been recieving channel 5 in only one room of my house for a couple of years at least (ok, there's a bit of snow but it's quite a decent colour picture, and perfect sound!)! I suppose it's because we're on top of a hill, but I'm not sure which transmitter we're picking up.

Now I can pick up that test screen on a different frequency, but not in colour.

Probably from the Croydon tx on Channel 37.

Yep, that's the one then.

Err.. I'm sure it can't be Croydon, Croydon's had Five since it launched!

Why would it be showing a test screen? Interesting though if you're getting that on Channel 37 - I definitely think it isn't Croydon.

I think he means he's been able to pick up Croydon for the last couple of years, and is now able to pick up the test screen from Reigate.

Interestingly, the Channel 5 test is coming from channel 42, which actually falls outside of the standard analogue aerial grouping for this area (Group C/D which covers channels 48-68 ) - this may possibly be why benjy is only receiving it in black-and-white. So if anyone is going to want to get a vaguely decent signal, they'll be needing a wideband aerial - and the only people who already have one of those are those like me, with digital terrestrial (since most of the digital multiplexes are at the other end of the UHF band to the analogue channels) - and they'll already have Channel 5!!

I don't know about Brighton, Hastings and Tunbridge Wells, but at Reigate methinks they are wasting their time.

Well I thought I'd have a quick scan around on my TV to see what our aerial could pick up (Group A)... I couldn't get the Channel 5 test from Reigate, but, what amazed me was I got BBC1, Meridian and Channel 4 with only minimal interference from.... Bluebell Hill! (Group E!) And when I looked at my grid reference on Wolfbane's site, it didn't even list Bluebell Hill as a transmitter I'd be able to receive!

And still getting perfect signal from there now... so it can't be anything to do with atmospherics or strong overnight signals....

Not bad for a 30kW signal from 47 miles away!

Well five started broadcasting on thursday in the South East. Actually the picture quality is better than the other channels for me - in perfect colour!

Interestingly when I flick between the ch 37 five from Croydon and the new ch 42 one from Reigate there's a 2 second time delay - is Reigate re-transmitting the Croydon version?

Also since it started broadcasting, five (from Reigate, channel 42) has been occasionally cutting out to a black screen for a couple of seconds and then returning - does anyone know why this might be?

Interesting, that.... maybe I'll get a rooftop Extragain installed and see if I can get Emley Moor!!

Slightly off topic, but there is an Asda in Warrington, which is closer to Merseyside than Manchester which had a TV which picked up Emely Moor with only a minimal amount of galloping dandruff.

Shame it never works, but the best we could get once was a half decent version of S4C from Moel Y Parc, but this was before we got Digital and before we had to get a new aerial installed (It got damaged due to bad weather, leaving Analogue TV useless) so I assume the people pointed it in the direction of Winter Hill.

The five transmitters are fed from a couple of satellites (Orion). However a few months after launch there was a large thunderstorm in London, this wiped out the downlink to the Croydon transmitter for a while..... hugely embarrasing for Channel 5 - Croydon being it's biggest transmitter and only being 15-20 miles away from it's playout centre.

So they installed a permanant line between the playout centre and the Croydon transmitter, hence the delay between Reigate - fed via satellite and Croydon - fed via wire.



Presumably it isn't officially on air, just on test?