“AM radio is a lifeline,” lawmakers say; tech and auto industries disagree
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Sigh, Europe is flipping huge when you really look at it beyond France and Germany.
Despite some dodgy comparisons with overlayed maps. Europe is actually larger.
Additionally the vast majority of Americans live in clumps around the country - the vast majority of the landmass of the US is barely occupied (less than 1 person pe sq km) Road tripping between the clumps is not entirely unusable, but the fly-over region is called that for a reason - it is an insanely dull drive (1000 miles) between say Denver and Memphis, there is literally nothing for hours on end.
In Europe we have pretty much removed AM/MW from our lives, we adopted DAB a bunch of years ago, which means that if I select a station here at home, if it is national, I can listen uninterrupted if I drive 500 miles north, or if I drive 435 miles south west - both of which are actually possible. Now if I drive to Paris - also ~500 miles, I lose access to my local stations, but will be able to find endless others along the way - extending that drive to Hammerfest, Norway (2400 miles) or Athens (2100 miles) or Lisbon (1566 miles) will have a similar effect - I lose the local and even UK national, but there are plenty of local stations.
And because EU roaming is free, I would be more likely to listen to Apple Music.
Last time I drove across country in the US, I went from Los Angeles to Kissimmee in Florida - a trip of 2400 miles, being unable to unsubscribe from XM, that was what kept us company on that drive - the coverage was great the whole trip, but the repetition got on our nerves and we ending up stopping off an buying a few CD's to listen to on the way home. I am not sure I even had a working AM radio back then.
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There's a NPR station on AM? Odd. They're almost always somewhere between 88-92 MHZ at the low end of the FM dial, often relatively low-powered. Maybe we should get a NPR clear-channel AM station that can be received nationwide?
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I'm sure that others have said this in the preceding 10 pages, but I've picked up AM stations from literally about a thousand miles away when the clouds were just right to bounce it around.
Which actually taught me decades later how to better pick up cell service when working in super remote areas... cloudless days can be quiet days, that's for sure.
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As for >OMG the AM radio can't work in the electrically noisy EV environment< ... you haven't seen electrical noise until you've had a ICE car with traditional non-electronic ignition (i.e. breaker points, distributor, etc.) and a DC generator or early alternator. AM worked fine in such cars. And I have AM in my 2017 Bolt (the radio doesn't make it easy to access, but it's there) ... it works reasonably well without undue noise, though the only available stations are either right-wing panic or in a language I don't understand (sorry, have never been able to do multi-lingual in a functional way outside of programming languages).
As for >OMG that'll kill EV efficiency< ... how, exactly? The capability is already there in most radio chips. And AM requires a much simpler circuit than even FM let alone satellite, etc. that are also built-in to the standard chips. This argument is pure smoke screen. Oh yes, and my 2017 Bolt has AM, and still achieves 4+ miles/kwh (EPA 119 mpge iirc) - not the most efficient, but near the top of the list. I don't see the radio, in any form, affecting that - though if you load it up with the premium sound and subwoofer perhaps you could drag down the "gas mileage" a bit, but if you're regularly using that you probably aren't regularly listening to AM anyway.
The best argument I see for keeping AM is the emergency info one. When your phone dies, after a day or 3 at most, you won't get emergency notifications that way. If you don't pay for OnStar (or its equivalent in other brands) you won't get cell network access through the car. The cell network is not long-range anyway, and if all the sites are down you're SOL. But AM stations are simple and cheap, and even at relatively low powers can be received over surprisingly long distances. Ask any ham, or even a highway department using AM for site-specific highway information radios. For emergency broadcast information (not 2-way communication) they're a very practical and cheap solution. All cars should have AM radios - it's perhaps worth a dime to delete it.
As for >OMG that'll kill EV efficiency< ... how, exactly? The capability is already there in most radio chips. And AM requires a much simpler circuit than even FM let alone satellite, etc. that are also built-in to the standard chips. This argument is pure smoke screen. Oh yes, and my 2017 Bolt has AM, and still achieves 4+ miles/kwh (EPA 119 mpge iirc) - not the most efficient, but near the top of the list. I don't see the radio, in any form, affecting that - though if you load it up with the premium sound and subwoofer perhaps you could drag down the "gas mileage" a bit, but if you're regularly using that you probably aren't regularly listening to AM anyway.
The best argument I see for keeping AM is the emergency info one. When your phone dies, after a day or 3 at most, you won't get emergency notifications that way. If you don't pay for OnStar (or its equivalent in other brands) you won't get cell network access through the car. The cell network is not long-range anyway, and if all the sites are down you're SOL. But AM stations are simple and cheap, and even at relatively low powers can be received over surprisingly long distances. Ask any ham, or even a highway department using AM for site-specific highway information radios. For emergency broadcast information (not 2-way communication) they're a very practical and cheap solution. All cars should have AM radios - it's perhaps worth a dime to delete it.
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AM radio is from 600-ish kHz to 1.2MHz or so. This is in the HF frequency range (30Mhz and under) which is a very prized commodity because anyone with radio experience knows HF goes global. That's why many AM radio stations shut down at night because their footprints expand during the night, while other stations must reduce power during the night.
The larger stations with backup generators and such generally have priority on the footprint as they can be more emergency stations to broadcast over a wider area, while a smaller station will shut down for the night to avoid interference.
AM and FM also have different properties when interfered - FM has the capture effect, which means their footprints can be smaller because which station you demodulate depends on the power at the receiver - the receiver will demodulate the stronger signal, the weaker signal will simply disappear as if it was never there.
AM radio interferes and mixes - if two stations are precisely the same frequency, the receiver will mix the audio from both. In practical use, you usually get a whistling sound because the radios are slightly off. This is why aircraft still use AM - if two people transmit at the same time, you can either hear both, or you can tell this has happened (very important when you're getting instructions).
My radio in the car is tuned to a local AM news station, which is perfect for the commute. I care little for FM radio, so I'd be horribly upset if I lost my AM radio. (Yes, I could get it via streaming, but still). AM radio is free - no subscription fees are required to receive it. And honestly, the radio chips used today already handle it - it's basically "free" for the automakers. I worked with a radio chip for automotive purposes - it supports AM, FM and DAB reception in a single chip. And there was basically nothing you need to do to the circuit - you stick the antenna into a pin and the chip handled everything internally in software. Oh, and the chip was also an audio chip, so it handled the analog input and output, so your infotainment system could use it as the audio chip as well for navigation or Bluetooth with your phone. (it even allowed priorities so radio, Bluetooth music, phone and navigation audio could step on one another).
Honestly, the EMI issue may be true, but it's also a false one - because modern ICE vehicles still contain 4/6/8+ spark gap transmitters (aka spark plugs) that transmit at fairly high power given the proximity to the radio. Car radios have developed immunity to AM interference out of necessity - it's a well known trick that AM radio stations often use a car radio to monitor their station output because they have far better rejection of interference out of necessity. And this was the 80s
The larger stations with backup generators and such generally have priority on the footprint as they can be more emergency stations to broadcast over a wider area, while a smaller station will shut down for the night to avoid interference.
AM and FM also have different properties when interfered - FM has the capture effect, which means their footprints can be smaller because which station you demodulate depends on the power at the receiver - the receiver will demodulate the stronger signal, the weaker signal will simply disappear as if it was never there.
AM radio interferes and mixes - if two stations are precisely the same frequency, the receiver will mix the audio from both. In practical use, you usually get a whistling sound because the radios are slightly off. This is why aircraft still use AM - if two people transmit at the same time, you can either hear both, or you can tell this has happened (very important when you're getting instructions).
My radio in the car is tuned to a local AM news station, which is perfect for the commute. I care little for FM radio, so I'd be horribly upset if I lost my AM radio. (Yes, I could get it via streaming, but still). AM radio is free - no subscription fees are required to receive it. And honestly, the radio chips used today already handle it - it's basically "free" for the automakers. I worked with a radio chip for automotive purposes - it supports AM, FM and DAB reception in a single chip. And there was basically nothing you need to do to the circuit - you stick the antenna into a pin and the chip handled everything internally in software. Oh, and the chip was also an audio chip, so it handled the analog input and output, so your infotainment system could use it as the audio chip as well for navigation or Bluetooth with your phone. (it even allowed priorities so radio, Bluetooth music, phone and navigation audio could step on one another).
Honestly, the EMI issue may be true, but it's also a false one - because modern ICE vehicles still contain 4/6/8+ spark gap transmitters (aka spark plugs) that transmit at fairly high power given the proximity to the radio. Car radios have developed immunity to AM interference out of necessity - it's a well known trick that AM radio stations often use a car radio to monitor their station output because they have far better rejection of interference out of necessity. And this was the 80s
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It’s going to be difficult to replace an EV’s gas tank but I’m sure Audi will find a way.
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No one uses AM on amateur radio frequencies because it is heinously inefficient. Amateurs use SSB for voice, CW, or a wide variety of hyper efficient digital modes.
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Multiple Gen-Z co-workers have been completely stymied by having to plug in a SATA drive. They only know m.2. If you're not over 35 at minimum you're not making an AM radio, and there's about fuck all people doing it from memory from scrap parts.
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Correction: It is not possible to contain MF RFI in an EV to the extent possible to make AM radio work while keeping the cost of the car out of 6 figures.
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ColdWetDog
Ars Legatus Legionis
I sort of agree, but the emergency that AM radio is really good for is a regional Major Clusterfuck on the order of an nuclear attack or a enormous earthquake. Otherwise FM / Cellular / Internet transmissions will do fine.
The question here is whether or not putting an AM radio in every new car is something you want the government to mandate. If the gov was really serious, they would also mandate the 162.5xx frequencies that NOAA weather radio uses. That has the extra advantage of being useful in everyday clusterfucks. And really just requires a minor tune on a regular FM receiver.
If new car manufacturers just stuck a multiband emergency radio in the glovebox along with flare or two and a couple of cans of mutant repellant then they could leave it off the car itself and do everybody a favor.
Most people don't even know that they need mutant repellent these days.
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Well I guess Nielsen has proved themselves to be a garbage source of listenership!
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AM BCB is in the MF range, not HF. HF is characterized by sky-wave propagation. MF uses exclusively ground-wave propagation. They are utterly different in every respect.
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ColdWetDog
Ars Legatus Legionis
But we've already got one, you see. Oh, and it's very nice.
It's called the NOAA weather radio service. 7 frequencies in the mid VHF band, slightly above normal FM frequencies but close enough that virtually any modern FM radio (which are largely software defined) could receive the signal. Already set up with 24 hour weather reports, weather alerts and general the-sky-is-falling alerts.
Every emergency radio sold receives these broadcasts. Simple and paid for.
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I haven't listened to AM radio since the 80's. Today, all my music is on a thumb drive. AM Emergency alerts have never reached me. However my cell phone does all the time. I see this as more big government telling people what to do.
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You can buy an EV with an AM radio. There is a big difference between not possible, and you get some interference if you are not careful of antenna placement and shielding.
I am not sure how much quality matters for an emergency mandate either. You may not want to listen to a talk show all the time where it interferes and you get a hum, but you should be able to understand what they are saying unless the antenna is very poorly placed.
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Exactly. This alone is an annoying problem. I'm one of the few that actually listens to AM occasionally because my local NPR station is AM-only. I live in (somewhat) rural Oregon, and the majority of the central Willamette valley is covered by AM550. It's really frustrating, when driving around town, that there are blocks where I know non-FCC compliant devices are. It's completely consistent.
And this is the super-important crux of the issue. How many times have you seen, while driving in rural areas and national parks, "tune to 560AM for road alerts" on billboards. There's a ton of road infrastructure and safety devices that still use AM. This really is a safety and emergency preparedness issue. During a large-scale event, you can forget about cell service and the internet.
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It would make all kinds of sense to have that in car radios. I've never seen a car radio with it. So I can only suspect that since NOAA doesn't sell ads it's unattractive for carmakers (or anybody else making consumer radio receivers other than prepper devices, now that Radio Shack is out of business) to support.
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ColdWetDog
Ars Legatus Legionis
Those are done with low power transmitters. You can replace the sign and put up a low power FM transmitter as well. Or leave both.
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CBK, the CBC AM station for Saskatchewan has backup generation that can keep it going for weeks without power.
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Because auto manufacturers want to be the new Vizio on wheels. I'm just waiting for ads on my touchscreen in my new car.
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100% in favor of this. Unless the government wants to subsidize free internet access for things like EAS alerts, AM radios should remain a feature.
'Doesn't sound good' isn't a very good excuse for them to take it out of EVs. You have engineers, engineer something to make sound good
'Doesn't sound good' isn't a very good excuse for them to take it out of EVs. You have engineers, engineer something to make sound good
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The amazing thing here is that people are talking about saving AM instead of modernizing it. There is no reason why we couldn't broadcast a digital signal on those bands and get similar range and characteristics.
With digital, we could even enable cars to automatically do things if the car is in an alert area, so even if they aren't listening to an info station or emergency station the driver could be alerted.
The migration would take time, though, but it is probably long over due.
With digital, we could even enable cars to automatically do things if the car is in an alert area, so even if they aren't listening to an info station or emergency station the driver could be alerted.
The migration would take time, though, but it is probably long over due.
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Engineers are still restrained by the laws of physics. While you can have AM in an EV the range and reception isn't going to be nearly as good, which eliminates the only advantage of AM in an emergency.
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They do! Even if you have a cell phone with an expired plan, it will still get EAS alerts.
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I meaaan, there kinda is tho. There's a Nyquist limit about how much information you can encode to a signal, and it's 1 bit per cycle. If you have 20MHz of bandwidth, the theoretical maximum data rate is 20Mbit.
The total bandwidth of the entire AM BCB is 1.16MHz. If you used the entire AM BCB you could transmit 1.16Mbit in optimal conditions with no overhead. Not terribly useful for any kind of content delivery.
When you do digital modes on HF (and the AM BCB is MF, not HF), you're using data signals that are hyper optimized to send bits, not bytes. If you wanted a national alert system in the MF band that sent out a digital alert, for in-radio voice synthesis and read-off, you could do that with one "AM channel" already. There's amateurs doing this kind of communication intercontinentally, bouncing the HF waves off stuff like meteor showers, and it's very noise tolerant.
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Given the fact the only real justification for this law is for health and safety reasons, I believe that what you've indicated is not only good enough, but is in fact more useful.
This wouldn't have been practical 50 years ago, but today it can be done very cheaply on the receiver side.
The best part is you probably can do this without having to force the current AM stations to shut down or significantly interfering with current radios.
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For me this seems like it is more because Auto makers want to make a buck. AM is not encrypted and due to how it works you can't customize ads to each listener so why would they want to keep it? They want to sell you radio as a subscription. Why do AM radio when you can do XM that requires a subscription or better yet a streaming service like Spotify where you can sell a connection as well as the service. I am sure enshitification will happen in the future and they will also give us ads even on the paid tier.
I would love for AM radio to be modernized but I have little faith it would actually be good for us. ATSC 3.0 is the latest update for ota and they added encryption which breaks it on a ton of setups as well as adding you home internet connection to it so they can track what you watch and show you customized ads. No thanks. Leave AM radio as it is and require it everywhere because corporations are too greedy to let us have anything good.
I would love for AM radio to be modernized but I have little faith it would actually be good for us. ATSC 3.0 is the latest update for ota and they added encryption which breaks it on a ton of setups as well as adding you home internet connection to it so they can track what you watch and show you customized ads. No thanks. Leave AM radio as it is and require it everywhere because corporations are too greedy to let us have anything good.
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82 MILLION people supposedly still listen to AM Radio?
In the US? On a regular basis?
You expect me to believe that 1/4 of the US population uses it? I can count on one hand (the one with no fingers) the number of times I've even heard someone say "so I heard on AM1020 yesterday..."
In the US? On a regular basis?
You expect me to believe that 1/4 of the US population uses it? I can count on one hand (the one with no fingers) the number of times I've even heard someone say "so I heard on AM1020 yesterday..."
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I asked my Gen-Z Liaison how many time's he'd used AM radio in his life and he threw up the big "0" hand sign. I've never used it seriously, and i'm The Oldest Millennial.
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AM radio antennas and some reasonable EM shielding will cost literally pennies to install on vehicles. What's next? No FM radio? Will it turn into subscription only?
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From my understanding, that isn't necessarily easy or cheap to do. There is a reason why EV's that do have an AM radio don't get great reception.
FM doesn't have this problem.
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What would digital improve here? You said it yourself that switching to digital for other services has reduced coverage and reliability. And for the record government mandate is how changes to broadcast get off the ground, the government had to mandate reception of UHF as the market was choosing to ignore it under pressure of the big 3 initially. FM got off the ground as the government protected it from AM stations monopolizing the band with simulcasts. Here the government is preventing corporations from taking the choice of what service we listen to away from us, protecting access to a publicly licensed service, so I don't see a problem here
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They had a few radio stations after their purchase of Fischer Communications, but they mercifully left them pretty much alone and then sold them off a couple years ago, annoyingly they made them change some historic call signs too as they "kept" the call signs for their TV stations they retained
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Bingo.
Yes, it's easier to cram a functional FM antenna into that little roof bump intended mainly for cell and XM reception. AM antenna is harder to do in limited space if you want decent reception. But it can be done, and it's not expensive. But you did nail it: nothing OTA requires a subscription, so it has to go. FM is next.
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Midland at least still makes proper weather radios that are very popular in tornado prone areas. They even decode the SAME headers for silent continuous monitoring, only going off mute when an alert for your location is issued and playing an alarm tone
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AM stereo exists (actually broadcasted only briefly, with few receivers ever offered for purchase) as a standard. And it's possible (with more care on the transmission side than needed for talk radio) to broadcast a signal on AM that reaches 10khz audio frequencies so it can sound pretty good even if not the nearly full-audible-spectrum of FM and HD (digital) FM.
Digital in fact (based on theory, and personal experience with TV) does reduce useful range. There's no fringe reception - it either works or it doesn't. Yes, in some fringe cases, a signal might partially work, but in the TV case it's pixellated and broken, and the sound is mostly missing or undecipherable. In the analog days, a snowy fringe picture might still be able to transmit visible information even if not really watchable, and the analog FM sound usually worked if a picture was visible.
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AM digital also exists using HD radio. And frankly the issues we both seem to agree on with the digital cliff and loss of reception are the reasons I push back when someone chimes that we should just switch to DAB+ and why I think HD radio was a better solution even if it was initially patent encumbered.
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This is why I keep a spare Starlink terminal in my trunk, along with an additional paid subscription and a power supply that mumble*mumble. Easy!
(to be clear, the snark wasn't really directed at you)
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