Motors TV has today (Thursday 25th February) been removed from the Sky platform.
The reason, as of writing, is unknown but the channel disappeared from its channel 447 slot on the EPG at some point late this morning. Their Twitter has not yet commented on the situation, but Sky’s Help Team on the social networking website said that Motors TV are “no longer broadcasting on Sky”.
The removal from Sky follows the removal of the channel from Freeview via an aerial and YouView earlier this year, having been added in late 2014. Obviously it is concerning that the channel has been removed from two platforms in the space of two months. The main casualty of this, if contracts do not change, would be the World Endurance Championship who currently have some races broadcast exclusively live on the channel.
If we hear anything more about this, I will update this post…
Update on February 26th – Thanks to those of you on Twitter and elsewhere who have linked to this piece on the Endurance Info website. The article, written on February 15th, contains quotes from Jean-Luc Roy who is the president of Motors TV. Reading the article, it appears Roy is deeply unhappy with Motors TV’s treatment on French platforms on beyond. The crux of the argument is that Motors TV has found itself sliding down the EPG, meaning they get a smaller audience.
My suspicion, although as far as I can see Roy does not confirm this, is that Motors TV has to pay a flat rate fee to the likes of Sky, irrespective of whether it is channel 413 or 447 on their EPG. For Sky, it would have been “we want X” to extend the carriage agreement, Motors TV would have said no and walked away. And, at the end of the day, no one is really going to defect from Sky to Virgin Media to watch Motors TV, maybe a handful, if that. Similar situations have happened before, and successfully resolved. Back in 2007, Sky’s basic channels were taken off Virgin for nearly two years because of a carriage dispute, at the time it was a high-profile dispute between the two parties.
With the above in mind, Motors TV could return to Sky. Don’t know when, but never say never. We just don’t know. But this is a desperately sad situation that is driven by finances. Is Motors TV closer to the brink than any of us realise?
Update on February 27th – Per Daily Sports Car, a source close to the situation is hopeful that the channel will be reinstated in the next week, which is good news for everyone concerned.
Update on March 4th – Motors TV has returned to the Sky platform in the same EPG slot as previously. On their Twitter page, they did not explain the reason for the disappearance.
Motorsport Broadcasting 
this is depressing, I’m one of those people who cat get it on free view. i wish they’d fix that.
My impression has been that their depth of live coverage had reduced significantly over the last year or two, suggesting financial problems. It doesn’t look good.
Motors TV have voiced their ‘dissatisfaction’ of the platforms here, http://www.endurance-info.com/fr/distribution-de-motors-tv-lexplication-de-jean-luc-roy/
It seems that they are making a protest but it’s difficult to see how they think they will gain from this.
When Motors TV went from a streaming Freeview channel to a ‘proper’ channel I assumed it was down to costs.
They’d be paying for bandwidth and if the viewers increased sufficiently the cost of that could out weigh the fees involved in having a over-the-air channel. That was my take on why it changed a year or so ago.
The drop back to streaming only was, I thought, a sign of a drop in viewers so the OTA option became too costly.
It is a shame they’ve felt the need to take the action, regardless of the reason, as they will lose a lot of viewers.
Rich. I believe iptv costs less for the bandwidth than it does to buy a multiplex space.
motors tv was only on freeview via the HD multiplex for a limited number of months. it was always going to come off com5
The bandwidth costs may start off lower but if there are sufficiently large numbers of viewers the costs, including additional infrastructure required, will increase. There’ll be a cross-over at which the multiplex space is cheaper. The move to OTA looked like a sign that point had been reached. The change back to streaming only doesn’t bode well.
If the report that Andy above links to is about issues with platforms like Sky and VM and their costs then I’d assume Freeview would be seperate from that. Is this all a protest?
Gutted this weekend is the opening round of the Mx 1/2 world motocross championship anyone know if any other channel are showing it?
Of course Sky charge a flat fee for the EPG, no matter which number. But, it was Motors who decided themselves to “do a deal with the devil, i.e. BT” and drop themselves down the list – and by doing so, alienated themselves to Sky.
Your article from 2013, correctly states that the reason Motors TV slid down the Sky EPG was because they sold their higher EPG slot to BT Sport, in the same way MUTV sold 406 (and thus, 407) to Sky.
Another dick move from Sky. Oh well.
In the meantime though they are still broadcasting, just not on the EPG… I must be one of their only viewers right now.
To manually tune: http://www.lyngsat.com/tvchannels/fr/Motors-TV-UK.html
You’ll need to bring up the channel via the “Other Channels” menu in Sky guide after adding this. To get to Other Channels quickly on the Sky remote (with a Sky+HD box) push Services, 6, 5, Select.
GUTTED!!.I had Sky installed on Saturday 27th…..Only to find Motors TV had been removed on the 25th.I feel cheated.I am NOT A HAPPY BUNNY!!
I do hope it is re-instated,If not,when my Sky contract term is up,Sky will have one customer less.
Back now on sky 447
All this is confusing as I have just got YouView (late Feb 2016) and for a week or so was able to access Motors TV on Channel 240. Now all I get is a testcard! Does anyone know reasons /problems and is it likely to return?
Just went to watch Motors TV on Sky ( 6th July 2016 @ 03:40hrs) and it’s no longer listed, anyone have any idea’s on what is happening please…