SSB or single side band is where there seems to be more action on these days vs AM. The am crowd usually are guys with large antennas or big amps or a combo of both. On SSB 12 watts and a good antenna setup you can talk a long way. Not dissing AM one bit, there are still a lot of AM'ers out there. But not near as many as 10-15 years ago and certainly not from the 70's. Maybe get yourself a uniden 980 CB/SSB radio and tune to channels 36-40 LSB. Use the clarifier to adjust people in. Most of of the time if you sit long enough you will find someone that is on freq, tune to him and leave it. Those radios are locked on the transmit side and are normally dead on frequency out of the box. Not a big power house radio, but best bang for the buck for a new radio that doesn't need much to make contacts other than a good antenna setup and some decent conditions. You might get lucky and make some dx contacts on AM with the radio you have now, but sounds like you got a truck stop golden screwdriver special. He most likely clipped the AMC which controls the modulation. This can cause distortion and depending on what else he turned, the radio could be transmitting onto other freqs as well. This is not good. If possible and you can see the clipped wire, resolder it back together. You may lose a bit of power on a watt meter but at least you won't be over modulating. JMHO. As far as radios go and what you want to accomplish, there are several variables. Get the radio back to stock, JMO, and get the best antenna setup you can afford. Again, JMHO. Good day.