Will EVs Mean the End of AM Radio In Cars? (thedrive.com) 150
Some carmakers are leaving AM radios out of their new cars. They say it's because of audio quality, but it isn't that simple. James Gilboy writes via The Drive. From the report: BMW and Volvo told me it was due to audio quality problems rooted in electromagnetic interference, of which EVs' drivetrains produce a significant amount. Cars' engines and other complex electronics have always made EM interference, but low-wattage static is relatively easy to shield against. It's not as simple with EVs that may pull hundreds of watts from their batteries, generating far more interference, reducing audio quality to a level both BMW and Volvo told me they consider insufficient. But it's hard to take them at their word when EVs are built with AM radios and in no small numbers. Detroit's Three -- Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis -- have produced or currently make EVs that include AM radio, even on flagship models. That goes for the Ford F-150 Lightning and Mustang Mach-E, GM EVs from the Cadillac Lyriq to the Chevy Bolt EUV and GMC Hummer EV, and even Stellantis's almost-forgotten Fiat 500e. Clearly, some carmakers don't think EM interference is a problem, and some EV owners agree. One user of an EV forum user said that AM radio "works fine" in their 500e and older Chevy Bolt.
We contacted all three of Detroit's giants for why they continue to include AM radios when some European makes have phased them out, but the answer establishes itself across those very same lines. AM radio has fallen out of favor in Europe, with Radio Info reporting in 2015 that stations were shutting down en masse from France to the Netherlands and Russia. The frequency has largely been superseded by the DAB format, which is a more advanced form of radio broadcasting with better audio quality and choice of stations. AM radio stations and their listeners are all but gone in Europe, so European carmakers may not need to include technology that many of its customers can't use.
In the U.S., on the other hand, radio remains a must for car buyers, with 89 percent of responders in a 2021 survey stating radio should be standard in new cars. That makes radio even more important to U.S. car buyers than USB ports, which only 84 percent said were necessary. AM audiences were in rapid decline as of a 2017 report by Inside Radio, but not to enough a degree for American carmakers to leave AM radios out of their products. It's not hard to figure out why AM's holding on here, either: AM signals travel further than FM broadcasts do and are cheaper to transmit, allowing them to cater to audiences in sparsely populated areas. Audio quality can't compare, but that's secondary to having anything to listen to at all in some parts of the continental United States.
We contacted all three of Detroit's giants for why they continue to include AM radios when some European makes have phased them out, but the answer establishes itself across those very same lines. AM radio has fallen out of favor in Europe, with Radio Info reporting in 2015 that stations were shutting down en masse from France to the Netherlands and Russia. The frequency has largely been superseded by the DAB format, which is a more advanced form of radio broadcasting with better audio quality and choice of stations. AM radio stations and their listeners are all but gone in Europe, so European carmakers may not need to include technology that many of its customers can't use.
In the U.S., on the other hand, radio remains a must for car buyers, with 89 percent of responders in a 2021 survey stating radio should be standard in new cars. That makes radio even more important to U.S. car buyers than USB ports, which only 84 percent said were necessary. AM audiences were in rapid decline as of a 2017 report by Inside Radio, but not to enough a degree for American carmakers to leave AM radios out of their products. It's not hard to figure out why AM's holding on here, either: AM signals travel further than FM broadcasts do and are cheaper to transmit, allowing them to cater to audiences in sparsely populated areas. Audio quality can't compare, but that's secondary to having anything to listen to at all in some parts of the continental United States.
But what about a CB (Score:5, Funny)
Will the new EVs come with a CB radio is what I want to know.
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Other than that things like this change slowly, More people still want AM radio than want to repurpose the band. I don't care about either personally.
Re: But what about a CB (Score:2)
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Just because it is slow does not mean it would not be useful for data. You could run so many apps on the slow bandwidth, like weather, headline news, etc. MP3 mono at 64kbps which would be doable would also be great for voice.
So 1 channel with 64kbps then? I did not say useless but it is pretty limited. Most sensor type data can use this but video is pretty limited of course audio too I think. From memory you get 3.5kHz audio bandwidth or there abouts on an AM channel (which is why it sounds bad). The advantage of the low frequency is the range particularly in am urban environment but if you have it and your neighbor has it then you are both trying to use the same bandwidth. It is kind of useless in this application as far as th
Re: But what about a CB (Score:2)
Re: But what about a CB (Score:5, Funny)
Hmm... Broadcast only... I'll bet we could do more than just a slow digital stream. Maybe use it to do something cool, like stream audio. There's not much room, but I'll bet we could squeeze in a bunch of different streams if we keep each one to a narrow band, maybe like 10kHz. That might not be that great for music, but I'm thinking more like news, talk, weather, that sort of thing.
If we did something simple, like modulate the amplitude of some carrier wave, we could even transmit audio in real time. With no complex decoding, I'll bet we could even build really cheap receivers.
Yeah, I'd say you're on to something here.
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With low dynamic range, I bet you should squeeze in some C.W. McCall.
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So use it for commonly wanted data streams in cars that doesn't take a lot of bandwidth - regional traffic info, weather forecasting, emergency alerts, etc. Make that stuff available without a cellular connection so that all nav systems can take advantage, and you can warn people in the midwest of tornados and such.
Re: But what about a CB (Score:2)
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You don't get 64 kb/s. You get that divided by however many people want to use it. Which for a massive coverage area can be quite a few, even if sparsely populated.
There's already VHF weather radio coverage over much of the world.
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The AM band, or rather the Medium Wave (MW) [531 - 1602] kHz and Long Wave (LW) [148.5 - 283.5] kHz bands are the bands that are today more or less no longer of interest in Europe and are just relics with not that many listeners anymore.
The decline of AM broadcast listening/use coincides with the demise of the Radio Luxembourg AM transmission, which in turn coincides with the end of the cold war.
AM is by the way a modulation technique and is still very much used by CB (27MHz) and Aircraft (108 to 137 MHz) a
Re:But what about a CB (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh... there's not enough bandwidth there.... Basic radio theory. Basic EM theory. Misunderstanding of the FFT schemes.
The bandwidth of the entire AM broadcast band is dwarfed by a single WIFI channel. The whole am band is about 1.2Mhz of bandwidth.
A single 2.4 Ghz WIFI channel is 20 Mhz. Sometimes 40 Mhz. And the 5 Ghz WIFI band can be as wide as 180 Mhz.
While the WiMax standard allows for a 1.2 Mhz channel width with a 10Khz carrier spacing.- care to calculate the bit rate on that for a single available channel? And no one runs a single 1.2 Mhz channel.
Furthermore WiMAX provides for 5, 10, and 10Mhz channels. It also has allocations on the 2.3, 2.5 and 3.5 GHz bands.
And you want to trash an entire radio service for a single 1.2Mhz WiMax channel?
It's like blowing up the moon because tides cause erosion.
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The OP was wondering if there was another obsolete tech available in a new vehicle
CBs are in the 27MHz band, and IIRC they do have a single channel dedicated for digital transmission. AM radio being mostly sub 1MHz wouldn't be very good for data, not enough bandwidth to move much.
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In the US and legacy in Australia perhaps. In the UK and Australia Chicken band is now up in UHF frequencies. Only the diehards and amateurs still run 27MHZ.
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https://www.essexham.co.uk/ft8-basics-explained
Plenty of bandwidth for forty channels of IRC style data or teletype transmission. 27.255 MHz permits 25 watts of transmit power for “paging” use, which is in practice just crude one-way data transmission.
Having said that, I’d really love if modern cars came with CB, MURS, ham, or GMRS radios as factory options. Or all of the above?
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FT8 is way too slow for that and you need really accurate time. What you want is RTTY.
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On the other hand, with a 25 watt channel available, that's not really a weak signal any more. If the propagation is good, you can reach the other side of the globe with that.
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I'd use Pactor 4 with Winlink or something similar.
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Sounds pretty niche.
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Not enough bandwidth... the CB radio band is 26.965 MHz to 27.405 MHz.
There not even 1 Mhz of bandwidth there. There's only about 440 Khz. Not even enough for a single 1.25 Mhz WiMax channel.
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Aircraft are also using AM.
Re:But what about a CB (Score:5, Funny)
that's a negatory, good buddy
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Breaker one-nine, you've got a smokey on your six.
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Smokey on my six - how did that become news to me? I always have a smokey on my six.
Re:But what about a CB (Score:4, Informative)
When talking about CB many people using what they call CB are not using traditional 27MHz AM but are actually using newer UHF FM bands such as PRS, PMR446, FRS and GMRS. These new bands have a lot of advantages for CB like usage so are more popular and will have a lot less problems with noise from BEV power electronics. For this reason marketers are more than happy to blur the line on what CB is these days.
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There was zero interest in the idea when I showed it working.
I'm not too surprised. No one cares about 11. If they do, they probably want to also transmit.
For this reason marketers are more than happy to blur the line on what CB is these days.
I've never heard anyone refer to anyone refer to any service other than CBRS as "CB". I certainly wouldn't expect a manufacturer to do something like that. They have rules to follow, after all. FRS radios are advertised as FRS radios. GMRS radios as GMRS.
Well, there is another CBRS, the incredibly new Citizens Broadband Radio Service, with unlicensed use around 3.6 GHz. The name sounds confusing, but you're
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Have you seen the handheld CB sets offered today, straight out the 1990's? Zero progress compared with the tiny UHF handhelds on offer. For short range local use the UHF FM is far higher quality audio and being FM stays that way until the signal drops significantly. AM falls off in quality pretty quickly with as the signal drops. BTW PRS is 5W here.
CB is still popular with truck drivers but I notice many have both CB and PRS here. If you want more range
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Some of the cheap iMars 7023B based infotainment systems look potentially hackable and a SA818S UHF transceiver module would be a good way to get it on air for UH
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No, it won't. (Score:4, Insightful)
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I drive an EV and if I'm going to be driving much longer than my typical commute I'll put on the AM radio for traffic/weather updates and regional news. Never had a noise/interference problem even when tuning in to a station the next state over.
The idea that the car is emitting so much noise that it makes AM radio unusable is fucking absurd. That's such a lame excuse for dropping a feature, especially one that doesn't seem to have much incremental cost to implement especially since software-defined radio is
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modern cars have lots of ethernet and switches (broad-r-reach, which is a wacky form of car ethernet) and there's all kinds of cpus in the car and lots of wiring.
I work in the field and you can try as you want, but emi will kill low mhz stuff. its just a fact.
if you have not been on the design side, its ok for you to not know this, but you make really strong statements for just being a user.
how much is it worth, to keep crappy am? it can be done, but most figure the content there (in the US) is hardly wor
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> modern cars have lots of ethernet and switches (broad-r-reach, which is a wacky form of car ethernet) and there's all kinds of cpus in the car and lots of wiring
There's nothing unique about EVs in this respect. Cars have been rolling computer networks for decades and there has been zero complaints about AM radio function. EV motor inverters operate in the 10-20 KHz region which is an order of magnitude below any AM frequency.
> how much is it worth, to keep crappy am?
If there's any value in keeping C
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If EVs emit enough radio interference to screw up AM radio reception, they're going to have a run-in with the FCC making them fix the excess emissions.
No they aren't. There's a difference between interfering with someone else, and interfering with yourself. Unless the EVs knock out AM transmission in the neighborhood as they drive past (which they don't) the FCC will be perfectly okay with it. The FCC makes no requirement that you shouldn't interfere with yourself. Try putting an AM antenna inside your PC, notice it doesn't work? That doesn't make your PC non FCC compliant.
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It's not a moral issue, it's a legal issue. One the FCC cares a great deal about.
They don't care about all the bullshit on 80m as long as they stay in their lane. Though I suspect they'd care a great deal more if they had the resources to do anything about it.
Writing's on the wall (Score:2)
All the sophisticated AM stations seem to be preparing for this inevitability by offering service on a sister FM station... that alone is telling.
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That's been going on for a couple decades, from what I've seen.
Can't listen to Rush anymore (Score:5, Funny)
AM radio lost its relevance in 2021. Sad!
Stuff (Score:5, Informative)
From a BEV technical point of view the challenge is the bottom of the AM band is around 531kHz and that is not far from the common switching frequencies for power electronics. If you switch at a too lower frequency it can be heard by ear and the inductors need to be too big. Too high a frequency and you can into issues with switching losses and RF leakage is harder to shield against. So it is common to see switching in frequencies below the AM band and the harmonics from that are going to be a hassle for on onboard AM band receivers. That said modern EMC test standards are pretty tough so if you can pass them then an AM receiver would probably be usable.
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There's also the issue of the antenna. Cars need multiple antennas already. FM radio, GPS, cellular, maybe WiFi.
AM is yet another antenna, and a somewhat awkward one. You can use a ferrite rod but they are quite directional. A loop antenna is better but quite large. Especially in a EV you want to reduce drag with a shark fin style antenna pod.
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Funnily enough I owned a Mitsubishi as well and the AM reception was crap. I think the antenna might have been damaged though.
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Not really. The antenna on the back of my car covers AM, FM, satellite radio, and GPS, and it's one of those little "shark fin" thingies with maybe a six-inch stub on it. It works just fine for pulling in AM.
I used to have a car in which the antenna (originally connected to an AM-only radio) was a pair of wires embedded in the windshield, go
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> the harmonics from that are going to be a hassle for on onboard AM band receivers
We just read that they work fine in American EV cars. Can you elaborate what you mean?
Couldn't fit my 8track player either =/ (Score:2)
The EV battery won't last for more than 2 hours with this technology my local dealer said...
Better coverage (Score:5, Informative)
"AM signals travel further than FM broadcasts do"
AM also provides some coverage in mountainous terrain. FM broadcasts are VHF signals, usable to only slightly beyond the visual line of sight. The ionosphere bends longer wavelength AM signals back to Earth, allowing reception even when the transmitter is far beyond the horizon or behind a mountain ridge. When you're driving through the western states (especially at night), big AM stations like KFI, KOA, KGO, and KSL are available. The FM band is white noise unless you are near a transmitter.
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That is exactly why there are designated emergency AM stations around. Not only can a single transmitter reach a multi-state area, the tech is simple in comparison so emergency improvised repairs have a decent chance of working in a situation where interference with other stations and such aren't as important as maintaining a broadcast.
No need for AM (Score:2)
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I don't believe we use AM for this. Maybe that's why European car manufacturers are moving on?
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I don't believe we use AM for this. Maybe that's why European [...]
Governments in Europe used to mandate AM radio as the communication of choice in case of catastrophe because of the range of low-frequency broadcasts. Rationale was that even if all communications are dead, the military can use one of their land transmitters to cover hundreds of kilometers, and people will use battery-powered radios that everyone has at home. But as nearly all commercial emitters have been disconnected in the 2010s and people do not own anymore portable radios, governments are now betting o
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It's still around, and I'll make a come back. Kids are absolutely amazed that they can get music "without service" for free.
The loss of AM is no loss (Score:4, Interesting)
It would be a real shame if we lost all that nationalist and religious shitcasting.
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It would be a real shame if we lost all that nationalist and religious shitcasting.
Yes, because the people most influenced by conservative talk radio are obviously those that buy the most expensive EVs. /s.
Differences between Europe and US (Score:5, Informative)
As a European it's very fascinating how different both countries are in this regard. Even back in the '90s I didn't know anybody here that still used AM radio (it probably still existed, and some people probably still used it, but I didn't know anybody personally). I remember asking my father about the AM thing on the radio back then (nearly 30 years ago), and he told me that that I could forget about that, nobody used that anymore, it's on the radio for historic reasons. And nowadays the sunset of all analog radio (even FM) is on the horizon, where most people have already moved completely to digital radio.
That said, I get why the US is different in this regard, as the average population density in Europe is 3.5 times higher than the US, and due to the large metropolitan areas in the US that skew that statistic quite a bit, this ratio is even higher when just looking at rural areas.
Still, kind of fascinating to see how different things are.
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Anyway, FM is quite used here still. I'm not sure how many stations transmit in DAB but I haven't come across many radios that support it anyway. So I'd say DAB is little used in Spain yet and that most radio usage is on the FM band
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In the 90's AM radio was definitely in use in Europe, at least in Spain. It was only a few stations and declining though. Nowadays is probably completely extinct. I haven't seen a radio that had AM in ages.
Interesting, I lived in Spain in the '90s for 5 years and I really don't remember anyone using AM radio at all. (I was still a child at the time though, and maybe it depends strongly on the region, I lived in Madrid; maybe it's different in rural areas.) Not saying that devices that could do AM weren't around (they definitely were), I just never saw anyone using AM instead of FM.
Anyway, FM is quite used here still. I'm not sure how many stations transmit in DAB but I haven't come across many radios that support it anyway. So I'd say DAB is little used in Spain yet and that most radio usage is on the FM band
Also interesting, because here in Germany FM analog radio has a practical sunset date: the end of 2029. That's when the publicly f
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AM was already less common than FM in the 90s and AFAIK most if not all the stations emitted in both ways. That may be why you didn't see anyone using it
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Yep, I drive a Ford and there isn't even an AM option any more, which I didn't even think about until this article.
FM is dying. The last time I used FM was crossing a tunnel under the Alps about 10 years ago where the emergency channel was broadcast on FM throughout the tunnel, so you were asked to have it on all the time you were in there.
I don't even use it for DAB.
People just stream direct off the Internet now, don't they? Who uses radio?
Discussing the death of AM radio makes me feel like I'm back on S
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My 2020 Escape doesn't even have a CD player, AND the Sync 3 system in it doesn't recognize my iPod Classic 160GB unit. I have to use my iPhone for music, or pop in a USB stick with music on it. Radio is just if I need a quick traffic or weather report while driving.
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And even then, in Europe we had MW and LW with plenty of channels, and could listen to others countries radios, also SW to listen to BBC or RFI etc
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As a European it's very fascinating how different both countries are in this regard. Even back in the '90s I didn't know anybody here that still used AM radio (it probably still existed, and some people probably still used it, but I didn't know anybody personally). I remember asking my father about the AM thing on the radio back then (nearly 30 years ago), and he told me that that I could forget about that, nobody used that anymore, it's on the radio for historic reasons. And nowadays the sunset of all analog radio (even FM) is on the horizon, where most people have already moved completely to digital radio.
That said, I get why the US is different in this regard, as the average population density in Europe is 3.5 times higher than the US, and due to the large metropolitan areas in the US that skew that statistic quite a bit, this ratio is even higher when just looking at rural areas.
Still, kind of fascinating to see how different things are.
It's less about population density and more about distances. In Europe, towns and cities are closer together, in somewhere like the US or Australia you can go hundreds of miles between even minor population centres. So for a vast area it's easier to use AM as it will require fewer repeaters than FM (AM can go roughly a bit over twice the distance as FM). There was a bit of consternation in Australia about the ABC (Australia) shutting down some of it's AM operations a while back.
France: FM only (Score:2)
In France I only use FM.
Despiste all my devices access both AM and FM, there are only few AM streams and those are also available as FM. Also, better quality on FM (well, the last time I tried AM by mistake, 15 years ago).
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Note that here (France) DAB+ is just being slowly deployed.
I think that very radio listeners (well except for classical music) would replace their radio receiver just to listen people talking. Especially at a time where electronic waste is a society-wide concern.
Also : cars have built-in radio receiver that you can't replace like we used to do in the 80's-90's. I will not change my car just for DAB+.
HD FM (Score:2)
A lot of the AM stations in the Detroit area also have a broadcast on FM "HD" as well, if you have a car stereo that gets those that is.
I Hate HD FM (Score:2)
Am I the only one that hates HD FM? Specifically, I hate that it takes a good second or two to lockin(decode?) after each channel change. So surfing across channels is infuriatingly slow and nearly unusable.
Plain analog FM goes from one frequency to the next and plays each station instantly.
HD FM goes Station1 -> Pause -> Play -> Station2 -> Pause -> Play -> Station3...
Is AM almost dead ? (Score:2)
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I have several. Most home A/V receivers still have them (or did as of at least 10 years ago when mine was purchased), so that's one. I have a Walkman kicking around someplace, but it admittedly doesn't see much use anymore. I also have a couple of older radios (an AM-only RCA from the early '50s and a domestic-market Grundig from the '60s with shortwave and partial FM cov
AM radio is a cesspit of extremism (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure I'll get moderated into oblivion for this but
AM radio is full of right wing kooks and cray-cray religious broadcast.. I can't see that the EV market is exactly their target audience...
Far better fit to put AM and shortwave radios into a special edition cammo paint, coal-fueled Hummer that gets 6 miles per ton... ... and comes with seventeen flag pole anchors...
How many EV drivers actually want to listen to AM? (Score:2)
Given that AM radio is nothing but right-wing talk and religious nutjobs ranting against liberal EV drivers...
No, that's not why AM radio is dying. (Score:2)
AM radio in cars is dying alright, but not because the car is an EV.
https://www.reddit.com/r/funny... [reddit.com]
Quick! Somebody call James Sokolov Law Offices! (Score:2)
EMI everywhere inside an electric vehicle to the point of borking AM radio transmissions? That sounds like a class-action lawsuit waiting to happen. People have been trying to prove that cellphone and wifi EMI and even 5G EMI are causing all manner of maladies. It won't be long before somebody decides to sue EV makers because their vehicle caused cancer in lab rats.
Odd priorities (Score:2)
Haven't turned on the car radio in something like a decade. Neither radios nor USB ports are necessary. An aux-in to connect my phone is all that matters. If I wanted to listen to commercials, I could play radio through that.
For the once a year I need to charge my phone in my car, I've got a USB adapter for the cigarette lighter.
I got the AM (Radio on!) (Score:2)
Also (Score:2)
Sounds like nonsense (Score:2)
Sounds like nonsense to me. AM radios had their heyday in the era of points and high voltage spark plugs -- objects that produced sparks -- intentional arcing. AM radios had heavy steel shields completely encasing them, and antennas outside the steel cage of the car. Oh, and they used tubes. (Valves for those of you who don't talk American.)
Re:Good (Score:4)
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AM is basically conservative jerks talking one sided BS with cherry picked facts anyway. They want Twitter to be a forced to become a public utility but refuse to let opposing voices on their talk shows. Fuck em.
And then there's KCBS radio, founded in 1909, and still broadcasting on AM 740 (and on FM, but that doesn't reliably make it through the Santa Cruz Mountains like AM does). Kind of the exact opposite of that.
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NPR is liberal talk radio but has abandoned AM.
Nearly all NPR stations are FM, which gives them far less range.
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In the NYC area AM is right wing talk and sports. Has been for decades. Sports have been migrating to FM tho.
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The reason is they are RFI monsters. The motor controllers...they just blow RF everywhere, just by their nature.
Go read on some ham radio forums, like QRZ about the pain amateur radio operators have had with EVs and attempting to operate HF.
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I'm wondering if the reason they don't want to have AM radios, ...
The huge number of crap Talk Radio stations? (That I wouldn't listen to anyway.)
Also, no (standard) AM stereo [wikipedia.org] for music. Personally, I literally can't remember the last time I listened to anything on AM except for the local automated traffic report when I need to cross one of the bridge-tunnels in our area.
Re:I think there's an alternative reason (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I think there's an alternative reason (Score:5, Interesting)
There's a low-power AM station up here in the hills where I live, and it's staffed by members of a family who play classic country, headbanger thrash, bluegrass/Americana, classic rock, and even some classic radio shows and big bands at various times of the day. I don't know how they stay on the air, because I have never heard a single commercial on the station (although I hear PSAs and occasional announcements of local events. I can get that station in places where there is no cell or FM signal, so I find a lot of value in it. All the DJ's have that really rich VA/WVa accent which makes it all better. And better still, they take calls for requests on the air.
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I think you're still living in the 70's my friend, by the sound of it.
AM radio is dead in most of the rest of the world, FM radio is almost dead, DAB is the standard for people who do that (and has far better traffic information capacity, etc.) and we find out about new laws and rules through public broadcast TV, leaflets, notifications, email and the news.
You - quite literally - sound like a grandfather who was once told they should tune in the wireless to hear what the government has to say this week, and
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No, but the EV interfering with that transmission is a pretty big deal.
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Many places have local road info or weather broadcasts or information broadcasts -- are those being abandoned?
We've had an AM station for highway/bridge/tunnel traffic status in our area for-*ever* but it's being replaced by calling "511" -- which I find less convenient/useful.
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Surely they have around here: hasn't this been part of RDS forever on FM and DAB?
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Hahaha Haha Ha. You're funny.