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Chicago Tribune's Motormouth - Pulling the plug on AM

Danddd

Danddd

Somewhere on the Edge
Subscriber
I was reading the Sunday Chicago Tribune and Bob Weber's Motormouth column https://wheels.rep-am.com/2021/05/motormouth-pulling-the-plug-on-am/ . It's a column where people send in car repair questions. One person noted in his car that there was no AM radio. Bob answered: Electric motors generate radio frequency interference (RFI) in the same wavelengths as amplitude modulation (AM) signals. All you would hear from an AM radio is static.

It seems like there should be a work around for car manufacturers, but AM radio listener-ship is down so motivation is lacking.

In big cities and some rural areas there are many stations to listen to on AM.

Any of you still listen to AM radio?
 
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I listen when the news doesn't get too depressing.

I have noticed that a large local station that added an FM signal of the same broadcast has stopped mentioning their AM station and just refer to themselves as FM.... now.
 
From an article. Feb 2016

Electric cars may be energy efficient Earth-saving futuremobiles, but their rise could also have a strange unintended consequence: killing off the oldest form of radio.

Two popular electric cars, the BMW i3 and Tesla Model X, are ditching terrestrial AM radio because electromagnetic noise from the electric motor interferes with the broadcast reception, causing static, as the blog Music 3.0 recently pointed out.



Electronics have always been a source of AM radio static, and electric motors are no exception. EVs are powered by a rechargeable battery, electric motor, and a frequency converter that controls how much power the car's electrical motors put out by turning voltage on and off thousands of times a second, basically chopping up energy. This process causes electromagnetic interference that gets picked up by the radio.

AM radio has always been more susceptible to static than its partner on the dial. "AM" stands for amplitude modulation, which means the height of the radio waves are varied over time to encode the information, versus "FM," frequency modulation, which varies their speed. Since amplitude, not frequency, is affected by electrical noise emitted by gadgets like smartphones, TVs, computers, even vacuum cleaners and hairdryers, AM signals are prone to distortion and crackling.

That crackle apparently just doesn't fly with luxury auto brands. BMW spokesperson Rebecca Kiehne told me, "Electric motors cause interference on AM which is why BMW decided to remove this option. While it could be offered, BMW's performance standards are very high and we don't offer a product that meets less than those high standards."

But while BMW disabled AM radio in the i3 because the company was worried customers would complain about the poor sound quality, some customers have instead taken to complaining about the lack of AM radio. Consumers took to forums to bemoan the omission, a few even saying they wouldn't buy an i3 without it. One BMW owner commented, "I plan to drag out my portable AM radio and leave it in the car." Some owners are hacking the car to get AM radio back.
 
Makes you wonder how many people were seriously considering these vehicles and decided not to because of the lack of AM. I half suspect its people who wouldn't buy them anyway, and just happen to be citing the lack of that specific feature as the reason why.

The only thing worth listening to on AM is at night when conditions are right. I can get WSM out of Nashville or CFZM 740 out of Toronto. Both actually play music. Everything else is babble of one variety or another. Once in a while its fun to band surf just to see what you can find from where, but beyond that the programming is rarely worth bothering with.
 
gadget73 said:
Makes you wonder how many people were seriously considering these vehicles and decided not to because of the lack of AM. I half suspect its people who wouldn't buy them anyway, and just happen to be citing the lack of that specific feature as the reason why.

The only thing worth listening to on AM is at night when conditions are right. I can get WSM out of Nashville or CFZM 740 out of Toronto. Both actually play music. Everything else is babble of one variety or another. Once in a while its fun to band surf just to see what you can find from where, but beyond that the programming is rarely worth bothering with.
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I listen to am every week driving when the sister fm station has games on but the am station doesn't so yes I would not for this reason.
 
gadget73 said:
Makes you wonder how many people were seriously considering these vehicles and decided not to because of the lack of AM. I half suspect its people who wouldn't buy them anyway, and just happen to be citing the lack of that specific feature as the reason why.

The only thing worth listening to on AM is at night when conditions are right. I can get WSM out of Nashville or CFZM 740 out of Toronto. Both actually play music. Everything else is babble of one variety or another. Once in a while its fun to band surf just to see what you can find from where, but beyond that the programming is rarely worth bothering with.
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We had several customers complain up a storm when they found out their newly purchased 911 (992 chassis) didn’t have AM radio.
Not sure if that would have steered them away if they knew beforehand but they certainly weren’t happy.
 
What's old is new again? My second oldest receiver (HH Scott 340B, circa 1964) does not have an AM tuner. That was available on the TOTL 380, which I'd love to have, but I've never actually seen one.
 
OMGCat! said:
We had several customers complain up a storm when they found out their newly purchased 911 (992 chassis) didn’t have AM radio.
Not sure if that would have steered them away if they knew beforehand but they certainly weren’t happy.
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still makes me wonder if its a complaint because they just expect it to be there, or legitimately make use of the feature and now don't have it.
 
gadget73 said:
still makes me wonder if its a complaint because they just expect it to be there, or legitimately make use of the feature and now don't have it.
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I work in the service department and hear quite a few cars tuned to AM, KNX most times which is your typical talk station. .
Seems either that or NPR is what Porsche owners listen to if they aren’t streaming, I rarely hear other stations.
 
But this is a technical decision on the part of the EV manufacturers... That the interference from the electronics renders the AM listening unacceptable has nothing do do with the fact that the content on AM is - mostly - lousy.

Now, there are plenty of "why does radio suck" threads on AK and all over the internet, but that's not the point here.
 
Another issue is cars with old metal antennas the hood was integral to am reception as it had a ground strap to it and acted as a ground plane.("used" to be one of the first things to check when diagnosing AM issues in a vehicle) Hard to do with composites and the absolute garbage antennas cars have on them now.
 
NH-MAN said:
Another issue is cars with old metal antennas the hood was integral to am reception as it had a ground strap to it and acted as a ground plane.("used" to be one of the first things to check when diagnosing AM issues in a vehicle) Hard to do with composites and the absolute garbage antennas cars have on them now.
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I do not think too many cars have composite bodies. Perhaps the bumper are but that is about it. My F150 is aluminum, the Edge is steel. The Edge has HDFM and works pretty awesome (also both have CD players).
 
Danddd said:
Bob answered: Electric motors generate radio frequency interference (RFI) in the same wavelengths as amplitude modulation (AM) signals. All you would hear from an AM radio is static.

It seems like there should be a work around for car manufacturers, but AM radio listener-ship is down so motivation is lacking.
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The RFI can be handled easily enough, but it would add cost to add appropriate filtering. Bottom line is, it all depends on demand.

** Bonus points for the first to find out the feature is available, but just not enabled in the car's controller software. Bonus bonus points for anyone who manages to do it without bricking their car, eh ... ;-}

And ya, I still like playing with AM, but not on the road. Sitting by one of the old tube sets around sundown to see what you can drag in can be fun if you're extremely bored.
 
AM is dead in the sense that most young folks don't listen ( or no one I know perhaps ) and us older blokes will gradually 'fade out'..

There was talk years ago to allow digital broadcasting in the current AM band allocation, which, possibly would eliminate or reduce received noise.

There were technical issues with this proposal, so it never happened ( that I'm aware of anyway )

Edit : more reading for those inclined
 
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