Radio Reception

[The Beerhunter]

I'm considering fitting the modwise aerial and amplifer kit. Does anyone have any experience of the upgrade? Does it give any significant improvement? Only I'm missing the Archers on my way back from work each evening - not!

[rbryant]

Yep, get one, it made a big difference for me. I used to have Radio 4 fading in and out on my journey to work, now its steady and it so good that I have forgotten all about it. Mind you, I changed the radio at the same time, but they are all roughly the same for reception aren't they?

[The Beerhunter]

Thanks Rbryant. Have to take R4 intravenously... I have a (original?) Pioneer radio cassete and a 6 way CD changer. What did you change yours to?

[The Beerhunter]

La la la, sorry your breakin' (cracking?) up. lol.

[beano500]

Gosh, Carruthers! Why would anyone want to fit a Radiogram to their Charabanc?

[The Beerhunter]

well you know it's that dammned exhaust note. Gets a bit wearing after a while you know.....

[The Beerhunter]

Joking!!!

[K4TRV]

Thoroughly recommend Mr Beer's Ae amplifier (in fact all his gismos!!). It was easy to fit, well getting the co-ax to the radio is the hardest, but then what do you expect - no pain- no gain!!

I upgraded to an MP3 capable radio, so don't need a changer in the boot/behind passenger seat for those 120 favourite tracks - beside, it's only in slow moving traffic do I bother with radio/music - roof down and radio off !!

Trev McM

[.Mark]

What? They have radio's?
Nope don't believe you!

[RichB]

Out of interest, I have Dave's aerial amplifier and for FM it made a great difference butg on AM i.e. Radio 5 909 I get absolutly nothing! Anyone got any ideas? Rich...

[Podie]

Both the S and the Chim seem to have fairly good radio reception… in each case I've fitted a fairly expensive Pioneer...

[K4TRV]

RichB said:

Out of interest, I have Dave's aerial amplifier and for FM it made a great difference butg on AM i.e. Radio 5 909 I get absolutly nothing! Anyone got any ideas? Rich...

Two obvious comments, first, have you tried 693 KHz, the "other" freq for Five ?? As an AM signal and Medium Wave Band, the coverage is not great and very dependant upon weather and atmospheric conditions and easily interfered with (lightening discharges!).

Second comment is, have you surpressed the "electrics" of the car. The TVR is not a good example, well any Fibre car is the same, the "generated" Am signals from ignition/alternators/wheel bearing and all sorts of other emmiters drown out the selected AM frequency very easily.

A quality AM tuner is difficult to select from the "other" features (CD/MP3/Digital tuning/RDS/TA/Power outputs etc etc) of radios these days - except DAB. But then David's antenna is not for that either !! But believe it will work well with a DAB.

Happy tuning

Trev McM

[RichB]

K4TRV said:

RichB said: Out of interest, I have Dave's aerial amplifier and for FM it made a great difference butg on AM i.e. Radio 5 909 I get absolutly nothing! Anyone got any ideas? Rich... Two obvious comments, first, have you tried 693 KHz, the "other" freq for Five ?? As an AM signal and Medium Wave Band, the coverage is not great and very dependant upon weather and atmospheric conditions and easily interfered with (lightening discharges!). Second comment is, have you surpressed the "electrics" of the car.

Yes I've tried 693/909/1548 etc. and I receive absolutely nothing throughout the AM wave-band range. I've got a decent Pioneer head unit so it sounds like some serious suppression is required! Rich...

[david beer]

Hi Rich
no AM at all? does it seek but not stop, does it make noise if you manually tune, ie even if its noise ?I would say it sounds like a fault with the head unit, i know someone who has a few kicking around !

[rbryant]

I bought one of these, kept the 6 disc autochanger, and now have enough music for any long journey, plus the exhaust for tunnels and non-motorways. (My car occasionally does Bromley to Yorkshire, and music helps when the exhaust note is steady for 3 hours)

www.caraudiodirect.co.uk/product_info.php?products_id=2381&osCsid=e10a8548a73b1765a41dfdfe38436d7a

Sounds great, looks the biz.

[The Beerhunter]

Wow, Looks fantastic, great blend of sleek modern design and retro. I feel a purchase coming on. Did you fit it yourself, at 50W / channel did you have to upgrade the speakers?

[rbryant]

Yes, changed the speakers too. The originals are ordinary at best. The fronts are 6" and nearly everything for sale is 6.5" which will not fit easily. I bought some JL 6" components from ebay, and did my research on the car audio direct forem, which is full of 18 yr olds with Novas, but they don't half know a lot about car audio. www.talkaudio.co.uk/vbb/forumdisplay.php?f=3

[MOD500]

The radio reception in my Chim 500 was proper rubbish, though became near perfect after installing the aerial amp. I did a fitting guide, link below...it is much simpler than it sounds!!!!!

www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&f=8&t=51585

BTW I also fitted the mod-wise two stage cooling kit too, also excellent.

[jem]

MOD500 said:

I did a fitting guide, link below...

you star - thanks

I was also thinking about the two stage cooling kit - wot difference does it make?

J

[RichB]

david beer said:

Hi Rich no AM at all? does it seek but not stop, does it make noise if you manually tune, ie even if its noise ?I would say it sounds like a fault with the head unit, i know someone who has a few kicking around !

Well I just tried it with the engine off in the garage and yes there is reception but it's poor, even with just the ignition on I get a constant middle frequency drone cutting across the broadcast, with the engine on all I get is full on interference in pitch with the engine revs! (don't want to take a look at it for me some time do you David and give me your considered opinion? Rich...