In 1932 in Germany the Blaupunkt AS 5 medium wave and longwave radio was marketed for 465 Reichsmark, about one third of the price of a small car.

A Plymouth sedan, 'wired for Philco Transistone radio without extra cost,' is advertised in Ladies' Home Journal in 1931. It was expensive: the contemporary Ford Model A cost $540. In 1930, the American Galvin Manufacturing Corporation marketed a Motorola branded radio receiver for $130. In 1924, Kelly's Motors in NSW, Australia, installed its first car radio. Voltage was stepped up with a vibrator that provided a pulsating DC which could be converted to a higher voltage with a transformer, rectified, and filtered to create higher-voltage DC. A technical challenge was that the vacuum tubes in the radio receivers required 50 to 250 volt direct current, but car batteries ran at 6V. Īround 1920, vacuum tube technology had matured to the point where the availability of radio receivers made radio broadcasting viable.

In 1904, well before commercially viable technology for mobile radio was in place, American inventor and self-described 'Father of Radio' Lee de Forest did some demonstration around a car radio at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Weighing 24 kg and taking 8 litres of space, it was floor mounted with a wired remote control to be fitted to the dashboard. The same loudspeakers may also be used to minimize road and engine noise with active noise control, or they may be used to augment engine sounds, for instance making a smaller engine sound bigger.ġ937 Philips Auto Radio. Initially implemented for listening to music and radio, vehicle audio is now part of car telematics, telecommunication, in-vehicle security, handsfree calling, navigation, and remote diagnostics systems. Once controlled from the dashboard with a few buttons, they can now be controlled by steering wheel controls and voice commands. Additions since then have included FM radio (1952), 8-track tape players, cassette players, record players, CD players (1984), DVD players, Blu-ray players, navigation systems, Bluetooth telephone integration, and smartphone controllers like CarPlay and Android Auto. Until the 1950s it consisted of a simple AM radio. Vehicle audio is equipment installed in a car or other vehicle to provide in-car entertainment and information for the vehicle occupants.

Blaupunkt car radios