Oulton (Suffolk, England) DAB transmitter
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Are there any planned engineering works or unexpected transmitter faults on the Oulton (Suffolk, England) mast?
No problems on any service. 
UK Free TV shows the coverage area for a radio transmitter as a coloured overlay (orange for FM, other colours for DAB) on the grey map. We have computed the coverage by combining the terrain with the official radiation pattern. A single click will select the transmitter to view the coverage for a single site, and a double click goes to a page showing full details. Click on the buttons in the right-hand corner of the map to choose from different frequencies (or multiplexes for DAB).
Local transmitter maps
Oulton DABWednesday, 29 June 2016
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Geoff11:35 AM
NO DAB reception in Oulton Village, suffolk this a.m. 29/6/16
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Richard Cooper12:00 PM
Norwich
Geoff: Good morning, Geoff. I've just checked fault reports on the Oulton transmitter and the summary is stating, "The BBC and Digital UK report there are no faults or engineering work on the Oulton (Suffolk, England) transmitter", however I have just been on to the BBC website and found this, which was published this morning at 09:12 a.m., "Date: 29.06.2016 Last updated: 29.06.2016 at 09.12 "BBC Radio Norfolk on DAB: Multiple transmitters across Norfolk, carry BBC Radio Norfolk are currently off air". No reason is given for this, but at least it shows that the BBC are aware of the problem and are probably working on it right now. BBC Radio Norfolk on 95.1 MHz FM and 855 kiloHertz AM, medium wave are unaffected and are transmitting normally, so i suggest you revert back to 'steam radio', or alternatively listen online, via this link:-
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radi…olk,
then click '
Listen Live".
Summarising, 95.1FM, 855 AM or listen online - all working in Norwich at 12 midday, Richard, Norwich.
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Garry4:18 PM
Geoff: I am in south Lowestoft and not reciving any of the commercial channels on dab, the bbc ones seem fine
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Richard Cooper4:28 PM
Norwich
Garry: Hi Garry. This is Richard in Norwich. The commercial DAB stations have been off air from the Oulton and Stoke Holy Cross (Poringland) (near Norwich) transmitters since early this morning. Stoke Holy Cross came back on in the last few minutes, so I can get Absoute, Smooth, etc, again. Assuming the fault has more or less been corrected, I'd expect the Oulton, North West Lowestoft transmitter to have the commercial DAB channels back on again very soon indeed, so keep trying, or switch to A.M., Freeview tv radio channels or listen online until DAB is back. Hope this helps, Richard, Norwich, aka 'Yoda'.
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Garry10:51 PM
Richard Cooper: thanks for your reply, still not on in Lowestoft , hope they sort it by tomorrow as I enjoy listening to lbc while working , missed it today . Long live fm I suppose !
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Thursday, 30 June 2016
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Richard Cooper7:22 AM
Norwich
Garry: Hi, Garry. The BBC, the main transmission company, the commercial multiplex operators and the local multiplex operators are all working together to improve DAB coverage in preparation for the Government decision for digital radio switchover when the national stations on FM will be switched off, so they won't live much longer I'm afraid! The Government decision will be made when 50% of radio listening is digital (nearly that now) and coverage is the same as FM, especially in vehicles. The latest phase of transmission improvements will be finished by the end of October and so a Government switchover decision is likely in early 2017 perhaps, with actual switchover occurring a year or two later? Yesterday's problems were the result of a failure in the optical fibre link owned by Virgin Media, this link supposedly carrying the broadcasters' programme feeds to the transmitters! Richard, Norwich.
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MikeP
2:36 PM
2:36 PM
Richard Cooper:
The problem with DAB is that we should be using either DAB2 or DAB+, as 'standard' DAB breaks up badly in many cars as it is not resilient to variable path delays - as happens with moving cars! That is one reason why many stick top FM reception. Another is that many DAB broadcasts are in mono or pseudo 'stereo' which is not good enough for many music lovers. Further, the tonal quality of DAB is considered by many to be not as good as that of FM stereo. It seems to be related to the difference between digitised sound and analogue sound, many not liking the digitised version. It is mainly the music performances that people notice the differences, particularly those involving pipe/wind organs which have overtones that are not reproduced in the digitised version of the performance.
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Richard Cooper9:45 PM
Norwich
MikeP: Thanks for today's lesson, Mike. I'm looking forward to tomorrow's lesson, Richard.
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Harry11:23 PM
Oldham
MikeP: Wouldn't agree about DAB breaking up in cars; I regularly drive very long distances in many different vehicles and never ever noticed severe break ups for the majority of the motorway network at least.
Problem as you say is in cars ... although then again for me DAB is far superior for my favourite radio station TalkSport on 1053/89 medium wave ... sounds incredible on DAB compared to AM.But I'm a traditionalist and I don't bother with DAB despite it's quality over the ever fading Medium Wave, I just like the old fashioned crackly analogue signals on 1089AM from Moorside Edge for some reason!
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Friday, 1 July 2016
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Richard Cooper9:42 AM
Norwich
Harry: Hi, Harry. Being something of a radio 'geek' ('anorak'), myself, I actually collect radios! I'm one of a small minority in the UK who listens to BBC Radio 4 on Long Wave. I use FM or DAB when I want to listen to a station that's not on A.M., but around here we can get 'Smooth Radio' on 'AM' from Brundall, just outside Norwich and Absolute or 'talkSPORT' from Postwick, also just outside Norwich. I'm not particular interested in high audio quality; I've always liked the 'mellow' sound that emanates from the speaker of an A.M. radio. The only issue I sometimes have indoors is electrical interference, but, apart from that I receive strong A.M. signals, being sufficiently lucky as not to experience 'crackles', perhaps because I've taken a number of measures to optimise the A.M. signals entering the flat! Richard, Norwich.
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