FM 'glitches'

[LeMartinPecheur]

For several days now my morning R3 listening via FM has been disturbed by frequent bumps/glitches as if tiny fractions of a second are being chopped from the signal every few minutes. I'm pretty sure this isn't a studio CD-player problem because a) there's no apology from the presenter, and b) there is no 'spit and crackle' in the gap, as is usual with a dirty CD or (?)a faulty player. It's not a fault in my system as it happens on several FM radios in different rooms with different aerial feeds.

I'd guess it may be a problem just in the SW as nobody seems to care enough to fix it Has anyone else experienced it?

[Frances_iom]

... Has anyone else experienced it?

yes in IoM - via I think a local repeater station - I suspect some dropout in a link either to the main feed to the Island or more likely to a repeater which as the loss in this case is just that of signal from its feeding transmitter and could be caused by possibly birds close to receiver or other glitches in reception tho it doesn't have the characteristics of multipath cancellation caused by aircraft - are you receiving from a main transmitter or via a local repeater ?

[Andrew Slater]

I experienced similar problems with the Holme Moss transmitter early last year. After contacting the authorities, the problem was eventually rectified. It helped that somebody on the far side of the transmitter from me also reported the problem, which convinced them it wasn't a localised problem. There's a post somewhere on this board giving the details. It's here, and I see that I PM'd the details. The first step to try is this - enter postcode and select 'FM' under 'choose platform' to see if there are any known problems with your local transmitter. Links are available on the website for reporting problems as well.

[Frances_iom]

were you informed of the cause + remedy ?

[Andrew Slater]

were you informed of the cause + remedy ?

Unfortunately not: nobody took the trouble to tell me, and the somewhat tortuous communication method put me off trying to find out, I'm afraid.

[LeMartinPecheur]

Thanks everyone. My transmitter is North Hessary Tor and the only reported problem online is recent weak signal on R2, now rectified. Oh dear, I missed that!

Typically, I haven't heard any problems on R3 today and so won't need to enter AS's reporting purgatory Today anyway

My OP wasn't quite accurate in referring to a 'gap': there's no silence, just the feeling that some fraction of a beat has just been chopped out. Not a 'might be, might not be' feeling, a certain feeling if you follow me.

[Anastasius]

....just the feeling that some fraction of a beat has just been chopped out...

Are you sure you weren't listening to some of this 'modern' stuff ? To my taste most 'modern' stuff is missing something. Like melody, for example !!

[Frances_iom]

please can we keep techie threads on topic

... just the feeling that some fraction of a beat has just been chopped out.

this sounds rather like a digital transmission problem - a packet possibly with uncorrectable errors has been replaced by the preceding packet so as to keep the transmitted bit rate correct