On Jan 1, 9:05*pm, "mc" wrote:
Sony makes a car stereo system that includes shortwave radio. *How well does
it perform? *Would I actually be able to hear at least the major
international outlets (BBC, RCI, etc.) while driving across town?

I'm a ham and have been an avid SWL in the past -- away from it recently -- *
but am also a linguist and would like to hear various languages regularly
(including something in Spanish with more intellectual content than the
local hit parade, or whatever it is). *I understand that this radio would
not be for serious DXing.

Any experiences? *Thanks.

Some years back, I had picked up one of those Sony car stereos w/sw
tuner. Decent all-around product. The model I had purchased was #
XR-4950X. Got it from that jackys.com in Dubai. They no longer sell
Sony's SW-capable car stereos. I believe there is a Canadian firm
that does, however. At the time that I had purchased, Sony had a
number of
models out there, and basically, the tuner internals were the same,
according to what info I was able to gather. Frequency coverage for
the model I had used included some gaps. The gaps were kind
of annoying, but not horrendously bad: SW1 : 2940 - 7735 kHzSW2 :
9500
to 10140 kHz plus 11575 to 18135 kHz. Tunes only in 5 kHz
increments.
Selectivity adequate for listening to major broadcasters. At the
time
that I installed the unit, I had also installed a power line filter
and
antenna line filter purchased from Crutchfield. Given that I put
these
in at the same time that I installed the Sony, I can't say one way or
another if either of the line noise filter REALLY helped any. But,
in
any case, reception was pretty decent for the time that I was using
it.
Driving at night in the U.S. southeast and mid-Atlantic regions,
there
was generally plenty to pick up: V. of Russia, China R. Int'l., V.
of
Vietnam, R. Canada Int'l, R. Prague, Radio Bulgaria, R. Australia, R.
Austria, R. Taiwan Int'l, R. Havana, KBS, R. Vilnius, R. Netherlands,
R. NZ, V. of Turkey, BBC, R. Japan... Mornings could yield some
interesting stuff, too: I used to listen to R. Australia, BBC's
Caribbean service, KBS on the way to work. Also, if interested,
domestic U.S. sw broadcasters were easy to pick up.
At that time, I also had one of those C. Crane car antennas (designed
for enhanced MW reception) hooked up
to the car's antenna jack.


Anyway, it provided respectable performance overall, both on the
interstate and in city traffic. The car was an old one, so I guess I
didn't have to worry about computer generated noises and that sort of
thing.


MW reception was decent on the Sony, with one exception: it was
impossible to scan in any useful way (it would stop on EVERY
frequency,
regardless of whether there was anything to be heard or not...perhaps
the C. Crane antenna was doing too good a job). The FM reception was
pretty decent, too.

Junius