I hope this is not an issue because it's off topic a bit

Hi everyone,
I love this site and the administrators are doing a great job and I support all their efforts.
I know this site is about mainly boomboxes and Walkmans and other vintage gear and media.
But what about vintage car radios from the 80's? My new first car I ever owned was a 1980 or 81 Honda Civic hatchback. It only came with an AM radio so when I was able to I added a Realistic tape deck and a Pyramid EQ and 4" 2-way Kenwood speakers in the dash and it rocked! I finally scrapped the car as it had terminal rust and the floorboards rusted through. So I took out the stereo and stored it and forgot about it until last week.
I didn't think it would work but it did. Realistic made good equipment! An FCC ID search told me the OEM was Hitachi in Japan. The EQ/amp was a Pyramid made in Taiwan and it was noisy and buzzy. Several caps failed so I restored it and made a workshop stereo. I am playing this through an old pair of bookshelf speakers I had and it sounds good and it reminds me of the days driving around with my tunes blaring and when gas was 29 cents a gallon. My daughter says I'm having a midlife crisis LOL I love this hobby on a cold winter day.

Things have come a long way though My Chevrolet car and truck sound systems are vastly superior and the car makers are slowly killing the aftermarket audio business.

 

Just selling one of these

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/292020344949

 

I remember that brand!

 

My first car, 1987 Cavalier RS just came with a AM/FM. I found an 84 Camaro being parted out and got its AM/FM/CASS and it plugged right in. Plug and play. I later got a Cadillac radio with Eq and it too was plug and play. The good old days and Delco radios!
I could repair them too with new light bulbs and belts.

Radios now a days cost $400 or more for stock stuff and of course have screens and take up one quarter the depth in a dashboard now for space. CD players are gone, gone!

 

Yeh Sparkomatic was big back in the day

 

I love my CD's I literally have over 2000. Along with my LP records (I don't like 45's) and of course my cassettes. It took me over a year to transfer my entire media collection to a 1 TB external HD and several USB drives. The fact that I can take a device the size of a deck of cards and plug it into my car radio or home system is amazing. But I still love my analog media. Dimming the lights and watching my tape deck and other components play is relaxing. My Onkyo CD player is amazing. I just purchased it on Amazon to replace my 1986 Sony CD player that finally failed. But I like the idea I can still buy a modern stereo component that is built like a tank.
But you are right, CD's are passe' and cassette tapes are bordering obsolesence. My 2015 Chevy Cruze has a CD player and my 2017 Chevy Avalanche does not. Both have USB and audio ports so it makes a CD player redundant. And Sirius XM is non-stop music. In fact walking around the dealers lot and all the new models I saw no longer have a CD player.

 

Love car audio from the 80's!!

Why wouldn't I?

Will write one of my 'Special Journals' on this later on as I am a bit pressed right now.................

 

Love car audio and high end car eq's ran plenty in my bedroom years ago, let's see some decent car audio lads

 

I remember all those radios, the 80s great era!!

 

You youngsters with their fancy gear

My first car back in 1981 was a MK1 Ford Escort which didn't even come with a radio.

I very quickly bought a non descript MW LW Push Button Car radio from Halfords.
My next purchase was a Motorola standalone Car Cassette player and a couple of cheap shelf speakers which I mounted on the front shelf under the dash. I connected both the radio and the cassette through a relay energised my the cassette deck power so when you inserted a cassette the speakers switched automatically.

Thinking back to 1980s car audio did anyone have an electric aerial that went up when you witched on the radio ?
I haven't seen one of those for years, possibly as they usually broke as soon as the guarantee ran out.

With Valentines coming up did any of you fit a Radio Cassette to a Girlfriends car ? That seemed to be part of my courtship ritual with three units fitted. The cars were a Mini Metro, Austin Allegro and Triumph Acclaim which all came with a basic radio if anything. The Metro and Acclaim were fitted with old units I picked up cheap at radio rallies while the Allegro owner bought her own and asked me to fit it.

 

I have a National Panasonic Car Compo, which is all separates, pre amp, tuner, cassette deck, power amp and speakers great quality, it's packed away in a box, but here's some pictures (not mine).I'll dig it out and take my own pictures.

 

WOW I saw this once in J and R Music World in NYC. The sales guy says they fit Toyota Supra and the Chevrolet Camaro perfectly.

 

My girlfriend in 1986 had a Honda Prelude with that power antenna and it worked fine but the Buick Regal I had at the time had one and it kept jamming. The dealer replaced it under warranty and it was fine.

 

I have a Nakamichi TD 400 that was supposed to go into my car some years ago. It never saw the inside of any of my cars. But I did connect it to my arcam amp and small 12v lead acid battery to power it. With RCAs it was a breeze to hook up. Much like the sound. Bright and breezy . Wonder if they'll skyrocket in price like the home decks?

 

Nakamichi made great car audio but their home tape decks were wonky. Not that they were bad but weird designs. Non standard bias and EQ settings and complex mechanisms. Nackamichi appealed to the techno geeks. The average (dumb) consumer had no interest due to expense and complexity.

 

I wonder if there are any modern cars it would fit in ? I don't think I could find room for a single unit in my 2013 Golf. I reckon I could have fitted three complete systems along the shelf at the front of my 1974 Escort, but a single system would have probably cost more than the car

 

I doubt it. Modern cars today have systems that are so integrated into the car they are difficult to change. But auto makers got their game together and are slowly killing the car audio aftermarket. My Chevy car and truck have the my link system and honestly they sound good and I have no interest in updating them. I think think retro rack would look better in a retro 1980's sport like a Toyota or Camaro

 

Way back in 2002, when I drove cars I liked rather than something "practical," I bought a 1983 RX7 in absolute pristine condition (had roughly 30K). Being an 80's junkie well before it was fashionable, I had to have it (I also had a '85 Jeep CJ-7 at the time). It had a factory-installed premium sound system - shaft-style head unit with tape deck and digital display tuner, joystick fader, 7-band graphic EQ, factory amps under the driver's seat (left-hand drive, US). I left it as-is for the first few weeks I drove it, but I wanted a CD player, so I gutted the system and installed some Pioneer aftermarket system. Seemed like a great idea at the time. I sold the factory system for $5 at my Mom's yard sale that summer.
If I'd only known then what I know now...

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I was thrown out of empty parking lots pretty regularly for doing donuts on wet pavement. Wasn't a turbo model, but it was still pretty easy to throw it ass-over-teakettle in the right weather conditions. Burned a $#!+-load o' gas for such a tiny car - I'm sure my driving style didn't help.

 

Since we seem to have a car stereos thread going; guess the car from its speakers.


I think they designed the back seat around the speakers. I remember the first day I had this blasting out Kylie Minogue "Better the Devil You Know" and thinking how much better it sounded than any car audio I had had before.

A clue is that it is a 1980s car about the same size as your Mazda. Not as powerful, although there was a fuel injected version back when fuel injection was a big deal.

 

Ha a kylie fan i had all her old 12""s on record, couldn't get enough of her, used to watch neighbours just because of her, sadly now i have lost interest in the ladies and everything else lol