US car radio doesn't work in Europe
Hans Borgman
I own a '94 Taurus with a Ford US factory installed car radio. In Europe
(where I now live) the radio hardly picks up any stations because of
frequency differences (the tuner only stops at uneven frequency decimals
like 98.1 or 98.3, not 98.2). Are there any fixes possible? Help is
greatly appreciated at hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl
--Hans Borgman
Valery Levchenko
Hans,
Yes, it is true. Frequency intervals in Europe are 50 kHz as
opposed to 200 kHz in USA. Starting frequency in Europe is 87.5
MHz compared with 87.9 MHz. Unless your particular car radio can
be user programmed to either (my Clarion can) it would be quite
difficult to solve the problem. And, it's not only FM but AM
too...
Best regards,
Valery
Hans Borgman wrote in message
<34FC4483...@fac.fbk.eur.nl>...
Dylan Smith
Hans Borgman wrote:
>
> I own a '94 Taurus with a Ford US factory installed car radio. In Europe
> (where I now live) the radio hardly picks up any stations because of
> frequency differences (the tuner only stops at uneven frequency decimals
> like 98.1 or 98.3, not 98.2). Are there any fixes possible? Help is
> greatly appreciated at hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl
You will have to install a European Ford radio.
The European ones are better anyway since they have RDS.
Since you have a 94, and not one of the new Tauri with
the funny oval radio, it shouldn't be a problem to do.
(The reason why the radio only has odd frequencies after
the decimal is because the FCC does not allow broadcasters
to use the even frequencies)
--
Email: dy...@vnet.IBM.COM
Dylan Smith 1810 Space Park Drive, Houston, TX 77573
Standard disclaimer applies.
Anti-spam - Change 'r' to raleigh, 'i' to ibm and 'c' to com.
Zaner1273
In article <34FC4483...@fac.fbk.eur.nl>, Hans Borgman
<hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl> writes:
>I own a '94 Taurus with a Ford US factory installed car radio. In Europe
>(where I now live) the radio hardly picks up any stations because of
>frequency differences (the tuner only stops at uneven frequency decimals
>like 98.1 or 98.3, not 98.2). Are there any fixes possible? Help is
>greatly appreciated at hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl
>
>
Yeah...do what I did and get a deck identical to a US spec model, but which has
50 kHz separation for the radio stations. By the way, simply having 100 kHz
separation MIGHT get all of the stations you should be picking up, but 50 kHZ
will guarantee that you get as many stations as you should be getting. Just as
an example, I'll use my own deck. If you look at my sig, you will notice that I
own a Pioneer DEH-P736. If you go to a Pioneer dealer here in the states,
chances are they will tell you that they have never heard of that model (unless
they REALLY know their products). The closest unit to this one in the US is the
DEH-P735. The only difference I can see between my deck and the P735 (other
than the slight difference in model #) is the fact that mine can be setup to
tune in 50 kHz steps (which allows me to tune all of the stations when I am in
Italy). Hope this helps.
Scott Zane
1989 Honda CRX Si
Pioneer DEH-P736
Everything else Kicker
140cubic_inches
>I own a '94 Taurus with a Ford US factory installed car radio. In Europe
>(where I now live) the radio hardly picks up any stations because of
>frequency differences (the tuner only stops at uneven frequency decimals
>like 98.1 or 98.3, not 98.2). Are there any fixes possible? Help is
>greatly appreciated at hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl
I don't know of any way other than replacing the radio, or doing some
soldering and re-engineering beyond the scope of a NG post.
You could also get a regular-type radio (analogous tuning) pretty
cheap in North America, or pretty much any radio in Europe.
Joel Sturm
Why not try sci.electronics.repair? I found some very knowledgable people
there. Who knows? Your radio might have a switch inside. Someone in that
group will know.
Good luck
Priit
I had once a Kenwood with similar problem.
So what we did - we just widened the tuning band or what You call
it. The result was that when You tune your radio to 90.1 f.e
it will receive actually 90.0 until 90.2. If there's only one
station, no problem, You can here it.
It's of course not a correct solution and You have to know, which
knob to turn inside the radio. Or if You don't, just try them all, one
by one. Very Important! Remember the exact initial positions!! Otherwise
it's very likely that you totally screw up your lovely radio :-)
Priit Pirita
Richard
No!
You dont' have to put in a European Ford radio, but simply any radio
that will fit.
There are digital tuner circuits that aren't incremented at all. In
fact, I'd prefer one that way, since radio stations aren't always
exactly on their assigned frequencies (indeed, I onced worked at an FM
station that was always significantly "off-channel").
I'd recommend going to a car audio dealer who really knows their
products (I'd look ofr one with a repair shop). If you think you'll be
coming to an "American broadcast standard"-country with the car, you
might want to check into a radio from Blaupunkt, who at my last check
manufacture in Singapore.
When I worked in the stereo field, people would occasionally show up
with Japanese-brand receivers that they'd bought in Hong Kong. These
units were unusual (here in the US) in that they were convertable to
work properly anywhere in the world. However, it was often impossible
for us to obtain repair data for them, since althhough they were
designed to work on American electricity and could be calibrated for US
broadcast standards, they'd never been sold in this country and
therefore their service organizations had no data for these models. And
for that reason, couldn't "cross-reference" to appropriate repair parts.
Richard
Dylan Smith wrote:
>
> Hans Borgman wrote:
> >
> > I own a '94 Taurus with a Ford US factory installed car radio. In Europe
> > (where I now live) the radio hardly picks up any stations because of
> > frequency differences (the tuner only stops at uneven frequency decimals
> > like 98.1 or 98.3, not 98.2). Are there any fixes possible? Help is
> > greatly appreciated at hbor...@fac.fbk.eur.nl
>
> You will have to install a European Ford radio.
> The European ones are better anyway since they have RDS.
> Since you have a 94, and not one of the new Tauri with
> the funny oval radio, it shouldn't be a problem to do.
> (The reason why the radio only has odd frequencies after
> the decimal is because the FCC does not allow broadcasters
> to use the even frequencies)
> --
> Email: dy...@vnet.IBM.COM
> Dylan Smith 1810 Space Park Drive, Houston, TX 77573
> Standard disclaimer applies.
> Anti-spam - Change 'r' to raleigh, 'i' to ibm and 'c' to com.
--
!! NOTE: TO REPLY, REMOVE THE STRING: "REMOVE.THIS.TO.REPLY" FROM MY
ADDRESS !!
Richard
Yes. You see, here you have a model designed for worldwide use. I
don't think you can expect to find this ability in many car stereos,
though.
BTW Priit: How did you know to do this, and how did you know what you
were doing?
Richard
--
Priit
> BTW Priit: How did you know to do this, and how did you know what you
> were doing?
I don't know why, but radios just have a lot of tunable stuff inside.
Probably there's so much circuits where some parameters must be exact. In
amplifiers it's not the case, capacitors and resistors can vary a little
without problem.
This makes curious people to turn this knobs and to find out what they do
of where to they affect. It's just so simple.
Priit
Richard
All that tunable stuff is for alignment. Alignment is done with
instruments and a road map, provided by the manufacturer. The
adjustments are done in a precise sequence. Usually, these are for
peaking the FM circuits. You are correct about the amplifier parts.
Sounds like its time for you to take your car radio to a repair shop for
a professional alignment.
BTW: The amplifier parts allowances do not apply to British audiophile
amplifiers (non-automotive), which can be very touchy about even the
manufacturer of a capacitor. However, these amps sound very transparent
and musical.
Richard
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