National Public Radio’s most popular hour, Car Talk, is broadcast at different times throughout the country, seemingly impossible for a live call-in show. And yet, every week, Click and Clack are urging their audience to “call us at 1-888-CARTALK.” But when is the show actually taped? How do people from all over the country manage to call in at the right time? What about that guy that called in from an undisclosed armed services location? Well, sorry to shatter any illusions, but the show is not, strictly speaking, a live call-in show. It’s a taped call-out show. Callers to the toll-free number are instructed to leave their information and someone from the staff calls back prospects with promising personalities. The callers are auditioned by producers and ones that make the cut are called during the Friday taping to be put through to Tom and Ray Magliozzi. However, the brothers aren’t given information about their callers beforehand, so it isn’t a canned or scripted interaction. About 20-30 percent of the calls don’t make it into the final show.