When did Ireland first receive the British stations?

Turquoise1

Does anyone know what year Ireland was able to get the British channels such as BBC, UTV etc on cable?

watty

From start of Cable. Cable existed to provide BBC & ITV.
Off air reception of BBC was from 1950s, about 10 years or more before RTE started.

See http://myhome.iolfree.ie/~icdg/cable_about.htm
It has been in Ireland since the late sixties when RTE Relays began to cable the city of Dublin.

Originally each area was a different cable company.

At one stage there may have been 18 cable companies. All existed mainly to provide BBC & ITV.

Sam Russell

If you look at old photos of Dublin in the 1960 - 1962 era, the sky line is a forest of aerials on guy-wires, all pointing towards Wales, and Divis. It was an aircraft navigational hazard. In order to sort this, cable companies started up, including one called RTE Relays. No royalties were paid to the programme originators until the eighties I think. These companies gradually amalgamated into Cablelink.

Mike 1972

Ive heard mention of enthusiasts as far west as Athlone picking up Holme Moss (West Yorkshire) in the early 1950's

Presumably this was tropospheric and/or hilltop reception but then again on Band 1 with the VHF bands in Ireland practically empty anything is possible ?

RE: Aircraft hazards (Ive always been a bit sceptical on this one barring possibly locations very close to the airport) once cable TV was introduced was there actually any way to compel householders to remove their existing aerials ?

Unless the cable network offered significantly improved reception I cant imagine too many people would have been willing to get rid of an aerial they had (in most cases) paid big money for in order to pay out more money to subscribe to something they were already getting for free ?

SuperInfinity

I would imagine people near the border were able to receive UTV from the very start of its broadcasting, otherwise some people of NI would be cut off. They would also have received BBC as soon as it was broadcast there.

Mike 1972

Yes UTV received telephone calls from Dublin on its opening night however not all of NI received UTV from its inception (Black Mountain was the first TX Strabane, Ballycastle and various smaller relays came later)

BBC from Divis (and later from L/Derry and Brougher) was also widely received in the Republic from its official opening (1955 IIRC) prior to that there was a temporary relay (set up in 1953) on Cave Hill (AFaIK just a low power relay of BBC Scotland) not sure if this made it South of the border.

watty

Mike 1972 wrote: »

prior to that there was a temporary relay (set up in 1953) on Cave Hill (AFaIK just a low power relay of BBC Scotland) not sure if this made it South of the border.

Not sure if it was cave hill. It was initially for the June Coronation.

Ireland's first Deflector system


All 405 line of course, even though 625 TV was 5+ years old in Europe in 1953.

The French switched from their pre war 440 line to 819 lines, Mono HDTV!

Mike 1972

watty wrote: »

The French switched from their pre war 440 line

Pre War the French were using 455 lines until some visitors dropped in and persuaded them to adopt their 441 line standard. Inexplicably they continued on 441 lines after the visitors departed. With duplication on 819 following subsequently.

Incidently it was the Prewar Paris station which used 455/441 but there were a couple of other Ferench stations too. One of them used 405 IIRC. None of these other stations survived the unpleasentness

Freddie59

Turquoise1 wrote: »

Does anyone know what year Ireland was able to get the British channels such as BBC, UTV etc on cable?

Here in Waterford we received the first cable channels in late 1974.

Turquoise1

Thanks for the response everyone, very interesting..will check out the link provided Watty.

popebenny16

in the 1980's rte relays and then cablelink sort of abandoned ballymun and we all put up our own ariels, usually out the back windows. i remember cablelink trying to stop this by saying they were interfering with the Aircraft ATC in dublin airport.

was this true, surely as recievers only this was bull

Mike 1972

popebenny16 wrote: »

i remember cablelink trying to stop this by saying they were interfering with the Aircraft ATC in dublin airport.

was this true, surely as recievers only this was bull

Not unless you were using some particularly cheap and nasty "booster" amplifiers and even then its a bit of a streach TBH.

Cable TV companies are not in the business of regulating the frequency spectrum (indeed given how notoriously leaky the Dublin cable network is it would be akin to letting the fox guard the chicken house) and have a vested interest in spreading this kind of misinformation.

Antenna

There could have been some truth to it - perhaps one case of it genuinely happening. The story can then grow legs as it were.

I have seen oscillating domestic masthead amplifiers (due to bad installation or weather damage) causing TV interference to other people a surprising distance away!
TV3 at home at one time used become unwatchable anytime it rained due to a carrier drifting through its channel, all due to an oscillating masthead amplifier at a house over 100 metres away!

Mike 1972

Antenna wrote: »

There could have been some truth to it - perhaps one case of it genuinely happening. The story can then grow legs as it were.

Bit like the claims of widespread interference levied by RTE against pirate broadcasters around the same time.

Oddly it was the stations with the best equipment (and therefore the biggest commercial threat to RTE) which seemed to cause most of this supposed interference.

popebenny16 wrote: »

in the 1980's rte relays and then cablelink sort of abandoned ballymun ......i remember cablelink trying to stop this

If they had "abandoned" the area why would they care what you did

popebenny16

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Bit like the claims of widespread interference levied by RTE against pirate broadcasters around the same time.

Oddly it was the stations with the best equipment (and therefore the biggest commercial threat to RTE) which seemed to cause most of this supposed interference.



If they had "abandoned" the area why would they care what you did

i did say "sort of", at the time it was when rte relays became cablelink and it was assumed that rte relays wanted as many subscribers as possible at the time, but also didnt really want to do any repairs. most of the repairs to vandalised cables were done by locals fed up waiting for technicians who never arrived.

also, yeah, funny how it was nova and sunshine wot got raided

Antenna

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Cable TV companies are not in the business of regulating the frequency spectrum

It didn't stop Cablelink in Waterford from jamming the transmissions from then unlicenced TV 'deflectors' in east Co. Waterford for a period of time sometime around the mid-1990s.
Maybe they saw it as 'retaliation' to the anti-mmds campaigns?
Freddie59 might explain more?
I remember it was reported in the media at the time that people from deflector groups entered the property the jammer transmitter was located on and disabled it!

Mike 1972

popebenny16 wrote: »

rte relays wanted as many subscribers as possible at the time, but also didnt really want to do any repairs. most of the repairs to vandalised cables were done by locals fed up waiting for technicians who never arrived.

It could only happen in Ireland.........

Antenna wrote: »

jamming the transmissions from then unlicenced TV 'deflectors' in east Co. Waterford for a period of time sometime around the mid-1990s.

Which is actually even more illegal than the transmissions they were jamming (RTE take note too) Ref: Third Schedule of Broadcasting Authority Act 1960

12B. (1) Any person who uses any apparatus for the purpose of interfering with any wireless telegraphy shall be guilty of an offence.

(2) Subsection (1) of this section shall apply whether or not the apparatus in question is wireless telegraphy apparatus or apparatus to which section 12A of this Act applies and whether or not any notice under subsection (7) or subsection (9) of that section has been given with respect to the apparatus.

"any" = regardless of the legality (or otherwise) of the wireless telegraphy in question

Tut Tut !

When walking to Connolly Station on Monday morning I found this array on top of a house in Amiens Street - an example of what was used to get the 405 services from NI. Looks like the Band I aerial has slipped down the mast, it should have been horizontally polarised I believe.

Sam Russell

Karsini wrote: »

When walking to Connolly Station on Monday morning I found this array on top of a house in Amiens Street - an example of what was used to get the 405 services from NI. Looks like the Band I aerial has slipped down the mast, it should have been horizontally polarised I believe.

I remember them going up 40 ft above the roof tops. And every house had one, no sharing the signal. I have seen photos of the quays from 1960 with them on rooftops. Obviously, later they were more common.

My Dad,along with dozens of neighbours watched the queens coronation on the bbc near Arklow in 1953.

Digifriendly

Deleted User wrote: »

My Dad,along with dozens of neighbours watched the queens coronation on the bbc near Arklow in 1953.

Out of interest do you know where the signal came from - England/Wales/N.Ireland?

Mike 1972

In Arklow Id hazard a guess that it was from somewhere in N Wales but maybe BB knows for sure ?

Antenna

Mike 1972 wrote: »

In Arklow Id hazard a guess that it was from somewhere in N Wales

According to this:

http://www.bvws.org.uk/405alive/info/tx_list.html

(lists TX opening dates)
there were no TV transmitters in North Wales in 1953. It must have been from somewhere else.

The only transmitter anywhere in Wales at that point in time was the high-power Wenvoe Band I transmitter near Cardiff. It is listed under 'WEST' (BBC West England region) on that list.

coylemj

My mother watched Grace Kelly's wedding to Prince Ranier of Monaco in 1956 on a home made TV picking up BBC (presumably from NI) in Athlone.

Mike 1972

To muddy the waters even further

Antenna wrote: »

The only transmitter anywhere in Wales at that point in time was the high-power Wenvoe Band I transmitter near Cardiff.

IIRC Wenvoe is actually in England ??

rlogue

Probably Holme Moss, although Wenvoe is in Wales. The main BBC West transmitter these days is Mendip, near Bristol.

Mike 1972

rlogue wrote: »

although Wenvoe is in Wales

Doh youre right

Was confusing it with the Washford MW radio TX

Going senile in my old age dontcha know !

Mike 1972

Mike 1972 wrote: »

Ive heard mention of enthusiasts as far west as Athlone picking up Holme Moss (West Yorkshire) in the early 1950's

Mention of Holme Moss reception in Dublin here Official service area of said transmitter (located a few miles North of a line between Manchester and Sheffield) here

BTW the original BBC NI transmitter was in Glencairn (not Cave Hill) but was only a temporary arrangment until Divis came on air. Glencairn is used nowadays by NVTV (local community station) although not sure if its the exact same site.

Antenna

A piece written by a priest - Fr Brendan Hoban- for RTE TV's 50th anniversay in the Western People newspaper

http://www.westernpeople.ie/news/ojkfeyidid/

where he recalls his first memory of TV of seeing BBC TV (before RTE TV existed) in a window (I presume a radio/electrical shop) in Ballina, Co. Mayo , - albeit with a weak and fading in-and-out reception:

The first television I ever saw was on Byron’s window in Ballina, when I was about four or five and we pressed our noses to the pane trying to decipher what was happening behind the snowstorm on the screen as the signal, presumably from Belfast, flickered and died and rose again

This reception would also of course have been the long defunct 405-line system transmitted in Band I (VHF Low)

watty

About 42MHz.
But we don't know when?
When did Strabane start? More likely for Mayo.

lawhec

watty wrote: »

About 42MHz.
But we don't know when?
When did Strabane start? More likely for Mayo.

Strabane only carried UTV so not them.