AM radio static

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67Dart273 said:
Unless you crossed a speaker wire to a power connection, you did not hurt the radio. Generally, you have the speaker wires, the orange dial lamp wire, the red main power, and the case ground. Do you actually have power to the radio? I mean, did you check?
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Yes. I checked with a voltmeter and the full power is going to the radio. First thing this morning I replaced my starter relay which crapped out on me and had turned the Battery power off with a battery cut off switch I have installed. When I turned battery power on to crank the car I noticed smoke coming from the back of the gauge cluster which like I said was hanging out of the dash because I have been working on it. Either what looks to be like some sort of regulator or the noise suppressor touch the frame of the car . That’s the only thing that changed since last night when the radio work
 
teringer said:
sometimes on the back of the alt
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Mopar alternators have this built in since 1960s per FSM. My 2014 Caravan has crappy AM too, but the 2002 Silverado is clear as a bell? My SC400 AM drones with a 3/4 second pulse that is maddening. IIRC its the SRS system talking to its sensors as I had to do an air bag light reset and you have to short a pair of pins in the ECU at a certain 'beat'. They said sing 'staying alive' while you are shorting the pins off and on to the beat for 10 seconds....worked the 3rd attempt.
 
Sorry to read about the smoke, I feel your pain(electrical/voodoo).
I have a jar of condensers if interested.
 
4spdragtop said:
Sorry to read about the smoke, I feel your pain(electrical/voodoo).
I have a jar of condensers if interested.
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Thank you for the offer. I just don’t know what condenser part number is the one to put on the coil or if they’re all the same.
 
There should be nothing in the radio connected to anything in the gauge cluster except the radio dial/ cluster lighting. I don't know how in hell you could have damaged the radio doing so

You didn't say, connect a booster battery or charger up reversed polarity did you?
 
No problem. I'll chk for numbers on the one on back of my spare inst panel.
midlifecuda said:
Thank you for the offer. I just don’t know what condenser part number is the one to put on the coil or if they’re all the same.
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20200919_105020.jpg
 
67Dart273 said:
There should be nothing in the radio connected to anything in the gauge cluster except the radio dial/ cluster lighting. I don't know how in hell you could have damaged the radio doing so

You didn't say, connect a booster battery or charger up reversed polarity did you?
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No nothing like that. I just have a battery cut off switch installed mostly for anti-theft purposes. I killed the power when I swapped out the starter relay and then turn the power back on to confirm the new starter relay was working which it is. But the back of the gauge cluster was touching the frame of the dash and started to smoke so I shut everything off. Once I knew I had everything clear of the dash frame I restarted the engine with no problem and no smoke coming from the dash area. It was at this time but I realize that the radio wasn’t coming on but the heater blower cigarette lighter etc. all work as they did before. Only the radio seems to have no power even though there’s power to the wire feeding the radio
 
midlifecuda said:
I just don’t know what condenser part number is the one to put on the coil or if they’re all the same.
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there is a radio noise suppression condenser on RA and it shows 0.3mfd and the listings in the FSM show .25 to .50 so I would think that would be the range.

this might help as well.

How to Spot and Eliminate Mobile Radio Noise, June 1966 Popular Electronics - RF Cafe

also MSD has a noise suppressor

MSD Noise Filters 8830MSD

I also updated and added photos to my earlier post
 
Dana67Dart said:
there is a radio noise suppression condenser on RA and it shows 0.3mfd and the listings in the FSM show .25 to .50 so I would think that would be the range.

this might help as well.

How to Spot and Eliminate Mobile Radio Noise, June 1966 Popular Electronics - RF Cafe

also MSD has a noise suppressor

MSD Noise Filters 8830MSD

I also updated and added photos to my earlier post
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Great stuff! Now I just need to figure out why my radio won’t come on even though it’s getting power. While digging around the fuse panel I also discovered that I’m not getting power to the instrument lighting fuse. All of the other fuse blocks are getting power. Just something else to try to figure out. I did all my own welding,bodywork, painting, headliner, upholstery etc. but when it comes to electrical, I’m damn near an idiot
 
I could be wrong and I'm electrically challenged but I think power to inst lights runs thru headlight switch?
midlifecuda said:
Great stuff! Now I just need to figure out why my radio won’t come on even though it’s getting power. While digging around the fuse panel I also discovered that I’m not getting power to the instrument lighting fuse. All of the other fuse blocks are getting power. Just something else to try to figure out. I did all my own welding,bodywork, painting, headliner, upholstery etc. but when it comes to electrical, I’m damn near an idiot
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where exactly did the smoke come out of? Photos are helpfull.

Also how troublesome is it to pull the radio?
 
The value of these suppression caps is unimportant, although as old as some of they are, they could be shorted, leaky or so low in capacity that they are ineffective. Just about any "real" parts store should show universal supression caps in their numerical/ pictorial books. Even a breaker points distributor cap would work, it's all "if" you can figure a way to mount the thing.
 
OK so disregard power feeding the instrument panel lights and radio lights. The dimmer part of my light switch is not working correctly so I need a new light switch. Still need help about the radio not coming on
 
I’m thinking that the smoke was coming from the condenser wire on the back of the gauge cluster if not from inside the gauge cluster and just seem to be by the wire of the condenser. I shut everything off immediately so I didn’t get a real good look but again it seem like it was coming from the pigtail of the condenser
 
OK so remember the part about me being an idiot? So this whole time we’re having this wonderful discussion my gauge cluster has been out of the dash but still connected to both the nine pin connector and the ignition. Then I thought well maybe the gauge cluster needs to be mounted in and somehow grounded to the frame of the dash and I put the gauge cluster back into the opening of the dash and the radio came on. I then removed the gauge cluster again as it was and the radio is still working still. WTF???
 
But now I actually have static that I didn’t have yesterday with the car not running. But I will take everyone’s help to heart and figure out these different noise suppression techniques.
 
Maybe I fried the condenser on the back of the gauge cluster
 
I’m just going to continue to babble here. Perhaps my ranting might help somebody else down the road. I had another old Gage cluster and swapped out the condenser but still the same static. At least I know I didn’t fry the first condenser. Yes maybe the voltage regulator got stuck. The static may be atmospheric but not sure because I have no interference on my other car. But I thank everybody for their help and giving me some direction to go with this static issue.
 
The only thing in the cluster that would affect the radio is the ammeter. It must be jumpered to provide power to the rest of the car. Anything else, if shorted, would blow the fuse supplying the radio
 
Well I went back to Later in the day to try the radio and now it’s not working again
 
The antenna trimmer is sometimes behind one of the outer knobs , you must pull it to find the small hole and use a long thin plastic screwdriver to turn the pot that is inside.
 
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