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$19 Spamazon purchase made my life happier

Melensdad

Melensdad

Jerk in a Hawaiian Shirt & SNOWCAT Moderator
Staff member
Melen's 2010 VW Jetta Diesel has 180,000+ miles on it. Body in good shape. Interior is very good shape. Runs well, despite fairly loud diesel clattering noises when you are standing outside the car during idle. 45-ish miles per gallon makes it a keeper.

But it is a 2010 and there is no Bluetooth way to get my iPhone to connect to the entertainment system. My iPhone will connect to the car for PHONE CALLS but not for podcasts.

So for about $15 to $35 US$ you can choose a little FM transmitter thingy that plugs into the cigarette lighter adapter. The adapter has Bluetooth to connect to my cellphone and an FM transmitter to send a signal to the car's radio. Tune the radio & the little transmitter to the same station and all of a sudden I can play my "podcasts" or music or audio books or whatever from my iPhone directly through the car's stereo system.

Since I frequently drive this car south 90 minutes to Purdue and north 90 minutes to the UIC campus for coaching those 2 teams, I tend to sit in this car's driver's seat a lot. Amazon sells about 100 different variants of these little transmitters at various price points. If you have an old car with an FM radio and are tired of having to carry and charge a separate bluetooth speaker, which tends to fly around the inside of the cabin when you brake or turn, and all the unsatisfying sound of separate speakers, this is the way to go.

Screenshot 2024-12-31 at 7.40.44 AM.png


This little thing turns on/off when I power up the car. It auto-connects to my iPhone so I don't have to do anything after the initial set up. I set a radio station to match the transmitter. Now I get in the car, select the 'podcast' I want to listen to and drive off in happy bliss, listening to what I want to hear, and I can just as easily switch to a live local radio without having to mess with a separate speaker, settings, etc.

Who knew that $20 could make someone so happy?!?
 
I use the same cig plug=in device to pair my iphone with the stereo on my Goldwing trike.
Reminds me of the old FM converter I installed in my 66 chevelle convertible. Added FM to my AM only radio. Then of course I had to add the underdash 8 track player to the mix. I was rocking. 1970 or 71.
 
My son has one of those in the old grand am. I keep taking it out of the cigarette lighter port to plug in my heated seat. I prefer to listen to our local rock station anyway. I only use the car to run back and forth to the city for appointments.
 
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These things are obviously not new. I just always thought they were crap. Perhaps they used to be. But the sound is amazingly clear and it works very transparently, auto on, auto connect.

The ONLY real issue I have is that there is a lighted circle around the perimeter of the face ... and the light intensity "pulses" to the music or even words. The light can be turned off by pressing a button on the side. Problematically it has a default setting of ON. During daylight driving times it is not an issue, you don't notice it at all. During nighttime driving it is distracting as the light pulses when someone speaks and also along with the beat of music. But again, easy enough to turn off, just wish it could be set to STAY OFF all the time.
 
Doc said:
I use the same cig plug=in device to pair my iphone with the stereo on my Goldwing trike.
Reminds me of the old FM converter I installed in my 66 chevelle convertible. Added FM to my AM only radio. Then of course I had to add the underdash 8 track player to the mix. I was rocking. 1970 or 71.
Click to expand...
same exact thing in my 62 ford falcon with the big 6 cylinder
 
Doc said:
I use the same cig plug=in device to pair my iphone with the stereo on my Goldwing trike.
Reminds me of the old FM converter I installed in my 66 chevelle convertible. Added FM to my AM only radio. Then of course I had to add the underdash 8 track player to the mix. I was rocking. 1970 or 71.
Click to expand...
What no reverberator ?
 
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Melensdad said:
Check in the bedside table on Mrs_Doc's side of the room :hide: :yum: :tiphat:
Click to expand...
Must be before your time, when I was in high school if you wanted a stereo sound in your car you used a reverb, what it did was play the music twice in a short sequence that made sound stereo, when the radio DJ came on it sounded like an echo.
 
tommu56 said:
that'd scratch your records on pennsylvania roads there's nothing smothe for more than 2 seasons here. i think they modeled the moon craters after out potholes.
Click to expand...
It never worked well when the car was on the road under power. But, the front and back seats in that car were 6 feet wide and double dating at the drive in, it was perfect.

With the exception of stopping what you were doing every 3 minutes to put on another Nat King Cole.
 
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