New aerial

flavia

I live in the Enniskillen area and I need to get a new aerial for RTE as the reception is deteriorated recently. Does anyone know what type and where is the best place to get it and do I need a separate one for TG4 etc as the reception on it is also gone very poor. All 4 Irish currently feed off the one aerial and the reception used to be much better. Some people are blaming Sean Quinns wind generators.

Mayo Exile

Will take a guess at this as posters like "Northern Correspondent" and "Ulsterman 1690" will know more. Are your RTE 1 and 2 on the VHF tuning section of your TV and TV3 and TG4 on UHF? If they are you may be getting your TV from the Truskmore Transmitter in Sligo. RTE 1 and 2 are on VHF Band III, channels I and G respectively while TV3 and TG4 are on UHF group C/D on channels 60 and 63. All horizontal polarisation. If these are the correct frequencies you will probably need two aerials for adequate reception. Check other peoples houses for aerial setups. Are they using 1 or 2 aerials?

If RTE1/2/TV3/TG4 are all on UHF I wouldn't be sure of the source of your reception. N.C. and U. 1690 to the rescue here??

Ulsterman 1690

Depending on where in Enniskillen you are the Irish channels are available from

Truskmore (Sligo) TWO aerials (and a VHF capable TV) required For RTE1/2 you need a VHF aerial for TV3/TG4 you need a UHF horizontal (Group C/D Green)

Cairn Hill (Longford) all four channels available on a single UHF horizontal (Group B Yellow) aerial

Claremont (Dundalk) all four channels available on a single UHF vertical (Group C/D Green) aerial

Truskmore is the nearest transmitter to Enniskillen but because of the need for two aerials (not to mention diplexers/combiners and a TV with a VHF tuner) a lot of people will try and get Cairnhill or maybe Claremont instead.

Some people are blaming Sean Quinns wind generators.

Is there ghosting (secondary images) in the picture which fade in/out as the blades on the windmills turn ? If so its could be the windmills. An aerial with a high "front to back ratio" might help reduce the interference (depending on the direction of the windmills in relation to your house)

flavia

Thank you both for the information, and apologies for not replying sooner. The 4 Irish stations are coming in on UHF. There is one aerial on the roof, although there is another in the loft which is for BBC etc. There is some sort of booster with an LED on it but the signal is pretty bad. The cable run is very long to the TV, so maybe that is a factor, but I think if the aerial was replaced it would probably be OK as the reception was quite good a few years ago. There is no "ghosting". Any ideas are welcome, we are on the very top of a hill so I thought it would be possible to get quite a good picture.

flavia

Thank you both for the information, and apologies for not replying sooner. The 4 Irish stations are coming in on UHF. There is one aerial on the roof, although there is another in the loft which is for BBC etc. There is some sort of booster with an LED on it but the signal is pretty bad. The cable run is very long to the TV, so maybe that is a factor, but I think if the aerial was replaced it would probably be OK as the reception was quite good a few years ago. There is no "ghosting". Any ideas are welcome, we are on the very top of a hill so I thought it would be possible to get quite a good picture

Mayo Exile

Originally posted by Flavia: The 4 Irish stations are coming in on UHF. There is one aerial on the roof

Which way is the aerial pointing? If its roughly south, you would be getting signals from Cairn Hill in Longford on channels 40/43/46/50. This is group B as Ulsterman 1690 says above. If its roughly east its Clermont Carn in Louth. Channels used are 52/56/66/68, group C/D.

lawhec

If the four RoI stations are on UHF, its almost certainly from Carin Hill in Longford. Clermont Carn reception in Enniskillen is shielded by the hills in South Fermanagh.

Reception of RTÉ services in Enniskillen, in my estimation, are split around 50/50 between Carin Hill and Truskmore, with Carin Hill used for more recent installs for cost reasons.

Best thing to do would be a Carin Hill/Brougher Mountain combo with both aerials on the outside if possible, the top aerial pointing southwards to Longford for RTÉ, the lower one northwards towards between Tempo & Trillick for Brougher Mountain.

A high-gain (but not a massive) Group B aerial for Carin Hill along with a good masthead amplifier should do the trick for RTÉ. A decent ordinary 14-18 element Group A should be OK for Brougher Mountain.

If ghosting is a problem, try and find out where the culprit comes from. Different aerials can have different properties, some are very good at rejecting signals from the back and sides, others are better if the interference is slightly off-beam.

Experimenting with Carin Hill for reception purpouses, TG4 always seems to be the one compared to the other three that fares the weakest for fring areas.

Deterioration in reception might not just be down to windmills, its possible that water could have entered the downlead somehow and this will weaken reception. Its possible that being high up could have seen wind damage to your installiation that isn't apparent from the ground.