Comforts of home... Radio while you drive

Nothing like being distracted & this enhancement is moving away somewhat from the sparse racing car.

My motorway run to work is 42 miles each way & on some of the best/worst traffic roads in the UK, so often nose to tail/stationary. I miss the radio - I've got used to BBC Radio 2 - Chris Evans Breakfast show on the way in and Simon Mayo Drive time on the way home.

This is just a test, i.e. a number of factors will affect if its fitted - including how embarrassing it is listening to radio in an open vehicle. The Radio is a £20 Motorcycle Waterproof FM Radio so cheap enough to experiment with:

The unit seems reasonably well made, i.e. plastic feel is fine and not cheap, proper click buttons & basic FM radio functionality with a 15 station memory, headphone jack and Aux in jack. At ignition off/on it remembers if it was off or on and the radio channel.

Volume is plenty loud enough - even on the first setting its loud, so it would appear theres plenty of scope even with the car noise.

For now I've wired it to a standard lighter socket plug for testing & everything is sitting lose so I can try it out at speed etc & see if its worth fitting. Ultimately the two speakers would sit in the panel behind the seats roughly at ear level:

The speakers are a little too bright for me but they are screwed together and can be dismantled so if I decide to fit it long term I'll spray the covers black:

This is my intended mounting position, out of the way on the tunnel, it will be installed from underneath giving a reasonably tidy appearance & relying heavily on its waterproof design:

The only niggle is the display viewing angle, its setup for motorbike handlebars so the display is visible when looking down on the unit. When looking at it square as in the first picture the display is not readable:

I took a look inside incase it was a removable filter/polariser in front of the LCD, no luck though its a solid state unit. I'll just have to live with not seeing the frequency indicator. The controls are straight forward once presets are tuned i.e. only needing access to volume +- and a button to cycle through the stations so it may be ok:

A brief sound test - all on the lowest volume setting, music and speech both seem clear and reasonably bassy:

Just need the rain to let up a little and I'll give it a field test.

Update 12/10/13 - Sound test result, its fine up to around 40-50mph, then you have to ramp the volume above setting 12 and there is distortion. I did only have the speakers rolling around on the passenger seat too. Seems like for motorway earphones via the aux out would be a must.

If nothing else, its something to listen to when stuck in traffic, when on the move theres plenty to keep me occupied driving anyway.