Radio has a life of it's own!

[Bobby Dazzler]

On my drive to work I listen to a local radio station, which has a sister station in a neighbouring county. When I reach certain points of my journey the radio changes to the sister station, and then changes back again.

It's happened in several places along my route, but tends to happen most in a couple of hot spots - usually when I'm stationary or moving slowly. It always happens when I'm listening to something interesting or a great song!!

I've been following the same route for 18 months, and I've only noticed it for the last 6 or 8 months. It's become incredibley irritating though!!

If I hit another station preset, and then hit the preset for the station I want to listen to, I can continue listening - or I just wait until it reverts back on it's own.

Thre frequencies are completely different for the two stations - 97.x and 103.x - and it happens equally on both the COMAND in my C-Class, and the Becker Mexico in my wife's ML.

Any ideas as to why it's happening, and how I can stop it?

 

[MBManInKen]

Any ideas as to why it's happening, and how I can stop it?

RDS contains a "regional links" field. You can set it to either switch to whatever the "local" region is for a certain broadcaster, swapping frequencies as you move to a different region (which sounds like the mode you're having it in) or fix it to your current region. In the latter case, the radio will remain on the same frequency.

Look up the way to switch between settings in your radio manual and you should have a fix.

 

[Dieselman]

Turn off RDS.
The set is following the strongest signal and they both send out he same RDS signature.

 

[Bobby Dazzler]

Thanks to you both.

I suspected it had something to do with RDS, although I was hoping I would be able to keep the station name visible but turn off the specific feature that causes the problem. Sounds like the regions that Guido mentions might be the key to it.

Looks like I'll be scratching my head with the manuals in my lap...