Wrexham-Rhos transmitting station

Wrexham-Rhos

Mast height	45 metres (148 ft)
Coordinates
Grid reference	SJ3000153762
Built	1977
Relay of	Moel-y-Parc
BBC region	BBC Wales
ITV region	ITV Wales

The Wrexham-Rhos transmitting station is a digital television relay of Moel-y-Parc, and forms part of the Wales television region. Despite its name, the station is situated in Moss Village and serves the town of Wrexham, the northern area of Wrexham County Borough and south-western Flintshire. It is a free-standing lattice tower structure serving around 85,000 homes which are unable to receive broadcasts from Moel-y-Parc due to Hope Mountain.

This area is traditionally served by English transmitters at Winter Hill and The Wrekin, which have historically provided English-language channels Channel 4 and Channel 5, plus the digital terrestrial services ONdigital/ITV Digital (from 1998 to 2002) and Freeview from 2002 onwards. Wrexham-Rhos was constructed to coincide with the 1977 National Eisteddfod in Wrexham, initially providing S4C and BBC One Wales, later joined by HTV Wales and BBC Two Wales in 1997.

Services available

Analogue television

1977 - 1 November 1982

Frequency	UHF	kW	Service
615.25 MHz	39	0.2	BBC1 Wales

1 November 1982 - 1997

Frequency	UHF	kW	Service
615.25 MHz	39	0.2	BBC1 Wales
839.25 MHz	67	0.4	S4C

1997 - November 1998

Frequency	UHF	kW	Service
527.25 MHz	28	0.2	BBC Two Wales
559.25 MHz	32	0.2	HTV Wales
615.25 MHz	39	0.2	BBC One Wales
839.25 MHz	67	0.4	S4C

November 1998 - 28 October 2009

Prior to analogue switch-off, Wrexham-Rhos broadcast four of the five national terrestrial stations. Channels 1 to 3 were broadcast at 200 W ERP, while S4C was broadcast at 400 W. In 1998, due to the upcoming launch of ONdigital from neighbouring transmission site, Winter Hill, S4C from the relay was required to change frequency (from UHF Channel 67). A message was displayed telling viewers to re-tune their televisions of the channel were carried for a couple of months. When the original frequency was switched off, the power on the newer version was increased.

Frequency	UHF	kW	Service
503.25 MHz	25	0.4	S4C
527.25 MHz	28	0.2	BBC Two Wales
559.25 MHz	32	0.2	ITV1 Wales (HTV Wales until 2002)
615.25 MHz	39	0.2	BBC One Wales

Analogue and digital television

28 October 2009 - 25 November 2009

Frequency	UHF	kW	Service	System
503.25 MHz	25	0.4	S4C	PAL System I
527.25 MHz	28	0.08	BBC A	DVB-T
559.25 MHz	32	0.2	ITV1 Wales	PAL System I
615.25 MHz	39	0.2	BBC One Wales	PAL System I

Digital television

25 November 2009 - present

At present, the station broadcasts three of the six national digital terrestrial television multiplexes on the "Freeview Lite" service. The station switched over to digital transmissions from analogue throughout November 2009, and remaining analogue services ceased at midnight on 25 November 2009. BBC A and Digital 3&4 broadcast using MPEG2 compression on DVB-T standards, whilst the HD multiplex, BBC B, uses DVB-T2.

Frequency	UHF	kW	Operator
482.000 MHz	22	0.08	Digital 3&4
506.000 MHz	25	0.08	BBC B
530.000 MHz	28	0.08	BBC A

Analogue radio (FM VHF)

Frequency	kW	Service
88.0 MHz	0.7	Heart North Wales
95.4 MHz	0.7	BBC Radio Wales
103.4 MHz	1.4	Capital North West and Wales

Digital radio (DAB)

Frequency	Block	kW	Operator
215.072 MHz	10D	—	MuxCo North East Wales & West Cheshire†

† Awarded but not yet on air

See also

• Winter Hill transmitting station
• The Wrekin transmitting station

External links

• mb21 - The Transmission Gallery - photographs
• ukfree.tv Shutdown plans for Wrexham-Rhos