AM Radio is dead

[TurnThePage]

My '15 Ram 1500 with the Uconnect 8.4AN radio has no AM output. No sound at all. Doing a scan finds no stations at all. Suggestions? Should I pull a fuse or disconnect the battery? It's not that I use it that often, but there are times when local news, or immediate traffic or weather reports would be nice.

[rk911]

assuming the problem is is not simple and the OP chooses to replace the radio an in-dash am/fm/u-connect or even a simple am/fm/cd in-dash or similar radio can be a lot more than $50.

[ajriding]

Radios are cheap. $50 gets you are very nice unit. Why bother chasing ghost?

[wa8yxm]

About AM going away.. I seriously doubt it but I will admit it's not what it used to be many long years ago.

On my "Friends" list (2 on facebook one elsewhere) I have three folks named RON who are all On Air Radio Personalities some going back to the great days of AM (Gregory) and others from FM only.. One I've met in person. along with some others including one with my last name as his first name.. Turns out his family and mine both came over on the same ship.

But then I know a lot of music types.

[mtofell1]

A bit off topic but may be of help to some - many AM stations also broadcast on the #2 or #3 setting of an FM station. If you are ever on a FM station and see a "2" or "3" somewhere on the display try to navigate to it. I found this on my truck and now get my local AM crackling sports talk radio in glorious HD FM!!

I thought I heard somewhere that AM radio was going the way of the dinosaur in a few years anyway but maybe it's a regional thing?

[PaulJ2]

When going through the car wash i removed the roof antenna while listening to an AM station, no difference. However FM stations went dead! So----car manufacturers are not even bothering with am antennas any more.
They may have a small internal coil inside the radio itself is all.
Same situation on my RV. Car was a Toyota Prius.

[wa8yxm]

Those highway info transmitters are often in the less than 10 watt range. Sometimes less than one watt. Not much power or range

IF you are SURE the AM is dead

Www.crutchfield.com

Otherwise. I"d forget about it. I'm no about to listen to Raving Rush.

Try one of the frequencies RK mentioned or 800 or 760 Windsor/Detroit)

or on a shortwave (AM) try 5080 KHz WTWW Transmitter 2 (Gave the URL last post)

[rk911]

TurnThePage wrote:
rk911, the first sign is similar to what I'm talking about, except this was digital signage. Maybe when I drove by, I simply didn't crank the volume high enough.

ok, those are very low power stations designed to cover just a smaller area in contrast to a commercial AM radio station.

we have 3 'blowtorch' AM stations here in the windy city...WGN/720khz (once a clear channel station); WLS (The Big 89!)/890khz and WBBM (News Radio 78)/780khz. all three can still be heard in 38-states at night.

[TurnThePage]

rk911, the first sign is similar to what I'm talking about, except this was digital signage. Maybe when I drove by, I simply didn't crank the volume high enough.

[wa8yxm]

WJR Detroit is still out there (50KW)

[rk911]

if you're referring to Emergency Advisory Radio/Travelers Information Radio, those are low-power stations usually found on 530-khz or brtween 1600-1710 khz. they can be heard usually only within a few miles of the transmitter and are usually identified by a sign like this:



if you're referring to a highway sign listing area AM and FM stations for weather info...



those are commercial radio stations which, assuming no technical issues are keeping them off the air, should be able to be heard. some AM stations are 1000-watt daytime only stations, others are 5K-watts and the big blow torches are 50KW.

[TurnThePage]

So... The only reason I brought this up was because of those signs on the side of the interstate (locally) that recommended tuning to a particular AM frequency to learn about traffic/road/weather conditions ahead. When I tried, nada.

Just a bit ago, I went out to my travel trailer and tried that AM tuner. I know it's connected to a good antenna that I installed myself. Well, it pulled in a couple stations, but just barely. So back to the truck, this time with the volume on max and manually tuning to each incremental location. I did get a little noise here and there on frequencies that should supposedly be broadcasting. I think the sensitivity is just not very good. No go for AM.

Thanks for the feedback! 🙂

[rk911]

Bill.Satellite wrote:
Hasn't AM been dead for something like "forever"?

not yet. talk radio in general and Rush Limbaugh in particular have
given the AM band a new life. syndicated programming is all well and good but what has changed is the disappearance of local programming on small town radio. i still enjoy listening to small town AM radio but more and more one station sounds like another.

[TurnThePage]

Yeah, FM works perfectly. I knew I should have included that tidbit. Guess I'll try disconnecting the battery since I can't find a fuse to pull.

[Reisender]

You wouldn’t want to test it around here. No AM stations for years.