Brenda Ann wrote:
wrote in message
ups.com...

dxAce wrote:
wrote:

Ed wrote:
I thought this was kind of interesting, I do spend alot of time
driving
and cannot stand 98% of local radio broadcasts.
I don't know the quality of this particular manufacturer.


http://www.mfjenterprises.com/produc...prodid=MFJ-306

The only comments I remember reading about shortwave converters were
not very good. Poor reception, lots of adjacent signal interference,
etc. Additionally, tuning the shortwave bands may be a real pita
unless you happen to have an analog am radio. Most cars come equipped
with digital radios having 10khz channel separation. Consequently band
tuning for stations will involve punching up a frquency on the AM
receiver and tuning back and forth with the clarifier dial on the
converter while driving down the highway at 65mph.

You would be better off trying to find one of the increasingly rare
after market radios designed to receive shortwave. I believe Sony
still makes one. But count on only getting strong signals at night.

Didn't the place known as Jackies (sp) over in Bahrain or some such carry
some
auto SW receivers?

The rental cars we used to get in Spain, Italy and elsewhere (mid to late
70's)
used to have radios with at least the 6 MHz band installed.

dxAce
Michigan
USA

This guy in the USA is apparently still selling the Sony Shortwave
radio for cars:

http://www.shortwavestore.com/sws/pr...5&cat=0&page=1

And the old european standby Blaupunkt has at least one radio with 49
meter and LW coverage (whoppee) for sale in Germany. It didn't appear
in the UK listings for them however.

http://www.blaupunkt.com/

My honest opinion is that the money and effort it will take to get
shortwave coverage in a car isn't justified by the likely results.
Signal strength won't be what it is in europe so reception will be
subject to a lot of fading, static and car generated noise.


I have had considerably better luck with shortwave reception in a car than
at home, to be honest. Out on the road there is considerably less noise than
at my home. Even just using the whip antenna on the radio (and I've used
everything from the ultra cheap Jwin's to a Satellit 700) I get good signals
on all the international broadcasters (program listening). Remember that a
car radio made with shortwave in mind will make use of the same sort of
front end that MW car radios have used from the beginning, thus optimizing
the use of the relatively short automobile antenna. Think how well that
antenna works for MW reception.. for SW it would be more efficient. As for
fading, that's a given on SW, just as it is for MW at night. Anyone who
listens to SW regularly expects and accepts it.

I've used a 2010 in the car and gotten decent performance on stronger
stations. Dxing from inside a steel enclosure is difficult...;-) As
you mentioned radios designed for receiving shortwave will do very
well. The shortwave converters can work after a fashion however
finding and clarifying shortwave stations with a digital AM radio that
tunes in 10khz increments will at best be labor intensive and probably
quite frustrating.

Listening to shortwave is a bit of a challenge to begin with, but the
result can be satisfying with the right equipment. A shortwave adapter
would take the owner in the opposite direction however because the
equipment will be difficult to use and will provide barely acceptable
results. The AM display will not register the actual frequency so that
will just add to the fun. For not much more money a radio designed
for shortwave reception would be a far better alternative than some
add-on adapter than one has to find a place to store that is
immediately available for tuning and clarifying.