Castlebar transmitter

The Castlebar transmitter is a relay station used to broadcast television and radio to a large part of County Mayo, Ireland, located at Croaghmoyle. The site is part of the RTÉ Network Limited transmission network.

The transmitter currently provides FM radio on VHF and a number of television stations on UHF. TV3 doesn't broadcast on its allocated frequency from this transmitter (or indeed any relay transmitters).

Tawnycullawee deflector site

A separate, close by site at Tawnycullawee is a television deflector station operated by Dropvale Limited, which carries channels from Northern Ireland as well as TV3. The Tawnycullawee site is located at a lower altitude (within the same range of hills) and transmits on lower power than Croaghmoyle as it is intended to serve the town of Castlebar and its immediate enviorns only.

In the past Eurosport (Channel 39 615.25 MHz) and Sky News (Channel 42 639.25 MHz) were available from this location however they have since been closed down.

History

The transmitter which opened in the early 1970's was originally a VHF television transmitter carrying RTÉ One (Channel D 175.25 MHz) and later RTÉ Two (Channel F 191.25 MHz); these ceased transmission on VHF in 1999, after UHF transmissions from RTE1 and 2 began from the transmitter in 1998.

The first UHF transmissions were from TG4 in 1996 with RTE1 and 2 migrating to UHF in the years following.

FM radio transmissions began in 1992 In 2005 there was a major change to the frequencies used by the radio services in order to accommodate a new FM transmitter at Cairnhill (Co Longford).

UHF service (originally BBC1 BBC2 and UTV) began from Tawnycullawee in 1985. originally this was an unlicenced transmitter but after a long campaign a licence was finally issued in 1999

Following the issuing of the licence UTV moved frequencies (from UHF channel 50 to 42) in 2000 and now occupies a channel previously used for Sky News which no is no longer carried

Channels listed by frequency

* Analogue Radio (FM VHF) "All services use vertical polorisation"
** 89.3 MHz("previously 89.8") - RTÉ Radio 1 Croaghmoyle
** 91.5 MHz ("previously 92.0") - RTÉ 2fm Croaghmoyle
** 93.7 MHz ("previously 94.2") - Raidió na Gaeltachta Croaghmoyle
** 98.9 MHz ("previously 99.4") - RTÉ Lyric FM Croaghmoyle
** 101.1 MHz ("previously 101.6") - Today FM Croaghmoyle
** 102.9 MHz - Community Radio Castlebar Tawnycullawee
* Analogue Television (PAL-I UHF) "All services use Horizontal polorisation"
** UHF 23 (487.25 MHz) - TG4 Croaghmoyle (RTÉ site)
** UHF 26 (511.25 MHz) - TV3 "(Not yet broadcasting)"
** UHF 29 (535.25 MHz) - RTÉ One Croaghmoyle (RTÉ site) "previously VHF Ch D Vertical"
** UHF 33 (567.25 MHz) - RTÉ Two Croaghmoyle (RTÉ site) "previously VHF Ch F Vertical"
** UHF 39 (615.25 MHz) - TV3 "(previously Eurosport)" Tawnycullawee
** UHF 42 (639.25 MHz) - UTV "(previously Sky News) Tawnycullawee"
** UHF 47 (679.25 MHz) - BBC One Tawnycullawee (deflector site)
** UHF 50 (703.25 MHz) - (no longer in use -formerly UTV)
** UHF 53 (727.25 MHz) - BBC Two Tawnycullawee (deflector site)
** UHF 56 (751.25 MHz) - Channel 4 Tawnycullawee (deflector site)

External links

* [http://www.castlebar.ie/photos/mike/TV-deflector/glry/ mast pictures Croaghmoyle Tawnycullawee and Westport]
* [http://www.w9wi.com/articles/system.htm#systemb.htm www.w9wi.com Irish VHF Channel Identification]