Why am i getting free ntl?

4-age

OK to explain we have ntl downstairs standard cable not digital. upstairs my brother has a coat hanger as an aerial and he is getting all of the cable channels? please help me solve this mystery.

marcbrophy

That's a new one to me
Where in da country are you?? Someone could be broadcasting the channels over the air as a deflector group often does sometimes!
Think it's illegal if it's not for testing reasons!!

4-age

IM in dublin 5 I thougt it was bizzare my self. and when my little brother told me i didnt belive him.

Mountjoy Mugger

4-age wrote: »

OK to explain we have ntl downstairs standard cable not digital. upstairs my brother has a coat hanger as an aerial and he is getting all of the cable channels? please help me solve this mystery.

By "all of the cable channels" do you mean all the analoge channels?

4-age

yea i mean the analogue channels

subway

similar thing was happening in a house i used to rent.
we put it down to proximity to the junction box that ntl installed / unshielded cables

Alun

Yes, probably just leakage from badly shielded cables or junction boxes.

Solair

You used to be able to pick up BBC Radio 4 etc on FM leaking from the Cork cable network in various parts of the city. They've obviously tidied up the cable network a bit since then as I haven't heard it in a long time.

Your TV is possibly close to a bad / leaky junction (as the previous poster said)

It doesn't say much for the quality of the wiring in your area though!!:eek:

Basically, the cable network is acting like a "leaky feeder". They use deliberatly broken coax cables in tunnels to carry radio signals for FM and even mobile telephone signals.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leaky_feeder

zilog_jones

I've seen vague remenants of cable channels from using an indoor aerial, and sometimes an almost watchable picture (esp. back when they were using Band I) or no picture and good sound but never anything more substantial.

watty

Yes it can happen. A section of damaged cable or mis-terminated cable can act as an aerial. It's technically not free TV.

Seen it often in Limerick.

Antenna

Solair wrote: »

You used to be able to pick up BBC Radio 4 etc on FM leaking from the Cork cable network in various parts of the city.]

they have discontinued that on Cork cable (FM radio), probably in conjunction with the phase out of analogue TV service

Zapho

Leaky cable could definately be the problem. We used to hi-jack our neighbours cable back in the day by poking a small hole in the cable wire and pointing a high gain antenna at the hole. Worked like a charm.....