By 1970, the airwaves were really getting crowded.
Lots of high power commercial and military gear was online, and the radio listening public was setting new record highs
every year. As such, many new sources for
radio interference were being discovered, and sometimes the problems caused went well beyond just a little
noise being superimposed on top of Neil Diamond's newly released Cracklin' Rosie or the lads from Liverpool's
The Long and Winding Road. Often, the interference was overwhelmingly annoying. The FCC was being flooded with
complaints. Digital computers were creating a whole new...
Antennas for Wireless Comms
This quiz is based on the new book
Frequency-Agile Antennas
for Wireless Communications , by Aldo Petosa. Proliferation of smart phones, tablets, and other portable devices are
placing greater demands for services. Many of the proposed solutions to deal with these demands will have a significant
impact on antenna designs. Antennas with frequency agility are considered a promising technology to help implement these
new solutions. This book provides readers with a sense of the capabilities of frequency agile antennas, the widely diverse
methods for achieving tunability, the current achievable performance, and the challenges still facing FAA designs.
The term "super-radar"
would be sort of meaningless these days since just about everything is "super" anymore, especially with regard to military,
space, or aerospace systems. Lately, when I hear the term "super-something," I think of a really funny radio commercial
with a meeting of super-geniuses. I don't recall the exact subjects, but the chairman asks his members for items to add
to their agenda of things to do. Someone pipes up with an idea to solve world hunger, then another suggests they design
a nuclear fusion generator to power the world with clean energy, etc. Enthusiasm exudes from the empaneled super geniuses.
Finally, someone suggests that they do whatever it is the commercial is trying to sell...
by Fairview Microwave
Fairview Microwave
a preeminent supplier of on-demand microwave and RF components, has released a new line of compact
hot-switchable variable attenuators.
RF attenuators are used to reduce the amplitude of an electronic signature in many common electronic scenarios including
lab testing equipment, distributed antenna systems (DAS) and power and signal monitoring systems.
Fairview Microwave's new line of variable step attenuators come in 3 and 6 GHz frequency models and several different
connector configurations including
This is really clever. Appearing in a 1955 edition of
Popular Electronics, "The Electronic Husband" is one wife's attempt to quantify her husband's interest in all things
electronic by adapting forms of Ohm's Law to fit observed behavior. In the process of writing the parody, Mrs. Jeanne DeGood
demonstrates a good basic knowledge of Mr. DeGood's second passion. I think after all the articles that Melanie has
proof read for me that she probably knows a lot of these equations as well.
Provides Better Access
AWR Corporation announces
a new university portal added onto its main
navigation menu that provides focused, in depth content to the company's rapidly-growing academic user base. The site is
clearly and concisely organized with dedicated areas for students, faculty, and graduates to easily navigate and get the
information they need. The student portal offers links to educational content, tutorials and how-to, technical content,
and information about other AWR University-focused content. The graduate portal provides ongoing educational
400° Analog Phase Shifter
Planar Monolithics Industries has
introduced Model Number PS-5G18G-400-A-SFF, a 5 to 18 GHz, low phase noise,
analog
phase shifter with capability for phase shifting from 0 to 400°. Operates from a single positive control voltage of
0 to +10 VDC with a phase voltage sensitivity of 40°/volt. This model offers a typical modulation bandwidth of
50 MHz and is supplied in our PE2 housing measuring only 1.08” x 0.71” x 0.29” and can be used with the SMA connectors
or in a surface mount configuration. A new test report has been added to our web site wish contains phase noise data.
RCA's
Numitron
was their answer to the Nixie tube (manufactured by Burroughs Corporation). It was a simpler
7-segment incandescent display that, with all lines energized, formed the number 8. It worked off +3.5 to +5 volts, with
each element requiring 24 mA of current. The number 8 drew 192 mA of current and dissipated 0.672 W at 3.5
volts and a whopping 0.96 W at 5 volts! RCA marketed a BCD-to-7-segment display driver. The Numitron was pitched as
a sensible alternative to the 7-segment LED display, but with an element size of 0.35" wide by 0.6" high, there was no real
advantage over the LEDs, which were just...
for Continued Support!
NuWaves Engineering is a veteran-owned
premier supplier of RF systems, subsystems, RF products and Engineering Design
Services designed to customer requirements. We are a turnkey provider for RF and
Microwave communication
custom designs with full project management and design responsibilities; taking ownership from the conceptual idea
to production. Learn about NuWaves' capabilities.
Here is a little electronics hobbyist humor in the
form of a comic series titled "Hobnobbing with Harbaugh," compliments of Popular Electronics. Citizens Band radio and dirty
hippies were the topic of the day in the 1970, so that's what you see in a couple of these comics. The marriage proposal
comic can be considered as 'amateur' in more ways than one! You don't need to be an amateur radio operator to appreciate
these comic strips.
Sure, these articles are used to pitch company products, but they also
offer useful information on application and state of the art components and systems. Companies like Hittite have a huge
inventory of RF components that cover a wide array of technologies. Lots of radar-related stuff this time...
& Aerospace Hi-Rel Designs
Skyworks
Solutions an innovator of high performance analog semiconductors enabling a broad range of end markets, today announced
that is has captured hi-rel and COTS sockets with several aerospace and defense suppliers such as Cobham, EADS, Herley and
Teledyne. Skyworks' solutions are being leveraged for microwave switching, attenuation, receiver protection and mixer
and detector applications in commercial and military radios, avionics systems, software defined radios and navigation platforms
that support major tier-one aerospace and defense companies such as Boeing, L-3 Communications, Northrup Grumman and Raytheon.
As legend goes, the use of microwaves for preparing food
was pursued after a serendipitous discovery by Raytheon engineer Percy Spencer whereby he noticed the chocolate bar in his
pocket had melted while he was working near a radar transmitter magnetron. Being a newly discovered phenomenon in 1945,
Mr. Spencer was probably not aware that his own body parts were being likewise cooked, but he did recognize the commercial
potential of an oven that used microwaves to cook food. It only took Raytheon (Amana) to have
the first Radarange
available for sale to professional kitchens. This article was printed a full decade after the discovery and even then the
size and power consumption was too great for grandma's countertop. Of course grandma would never even...
for January 28, 2014
Microwave and Millimeter-Wave
Electronic Packaging, by Rick Sturdivant. Packaging of electronic components at microwave and millimeter-wave frequencies
requires the same level of engineering effort for lower frequency electronics plus a set of additional activities which
are unique due to the higher frequency of operation. Without careful attention to these additional issues, it is not possible
to successfully engineer electronic packaging at these frequencies. This resource presents the packaging issues which are
unique to microwave and millimeter-wave frequencies and reviews lower frequency packaging techniques and how they can be
tailored or analyzed for higher frequency designs.
Broadband Coaxial Isolator
VidaRF introduces the VCI-120145-1, a 12.0 GHz
to 14.5 GHz coaxial isolator which features a rugged body with stainless steel SMA connectors, sealed and painted if
required. Isolation is 20 dB min, with an insertion loss of 0.4 dB or less, VSWR of 1.25:1, maximum power
handling of 1W, and operational temperature of -54 to +85C. Other frequencies and connector configuration available per
request in this package size of 0.50" x 0.67" x 0.50".
Pixel Count for Width & Height
Website design has unarguably become a major
source of headache for designers because of the widely varying non-standard standards for both desktop and
mobile device displays. Compound that with the
massive amount of information which needs to be fitted into the available space and the task is daunting. RF Cafe screen
space has been necessarily (some say annoyingly) crammed with content. Some of the "clutter"
has been necessitated by the need to make a living (i.e., advertising), but the majority is
driven by a desire to provide as much data as possible without the need to endlessly scroll up and down pages and, most
importantly, not having to click all around the website to find what you're looking for. One thing I implemented a long
time ago was a unique (my original idea) menu system that avoids an HTML file...
Studied by NBS
In the days before space-based radio astronomy, observations on
many frequencies required waiting until nightfall because the Earth's ionospheric activity interfered with signals in many
bands of interest. Two such bands are 18 MHz and 20 MHz (16 and 15 meters, respectively),
on which information on lightning-type discharges from Jupiter are received. Near-real-time maps of ionospheric absorption
in the D layer (caused by solar x-ray activity) are available on the
Solar Terrestrial Dispatch website for 5 through
30 MHz, which is where long-range high frequency (HF) communications occur. The F2 layer
is where signals are usually reflected, but absorption in the lower D layer can be severe enough to limit reception.
"Do not blame Caesar, blame the people of Rome who have so
enthusiastically acclaimed and adored him and rejoiced in their loss of freedom and danced in his path and gave him triumphal
processions and laughed delightedly at his licentiousness and thought it very superior of him to acquire vast amounts of
gold illicitly. Blame the people who hail him when he speaks in the Forum of the 'new, wonderful good society' which shall
now be Rome's, interpreted to mean 'more money, more ease, more security, more living fatly at the expense of the industrious.'
Julius was always an ambitious villain, but he is only one man." - Cicero, as quoted by the Honorable Millard F. Caldwell
in Cicero's Prognosis
from Electro-Photonics !
Electro-Photonics
LLC is a global supplier of RF & Microwave components.
Our products include SMT hybrid couplers, wire bondable passive 
components, coaxial products, test fixtures
and very useful test boards for evaluating components. The Electro-Photonics team can support your small R&D design
requirements with RF & Microwave test fixtures and save you valuable design and characterization time. Built-to-print
and custom evaluation boards available.
Puzzle for January 26, 2014
This
RF Engineering crossword puzzle
is guaranteed to stump the most ardent weekly workers of the New York Times Sunday puzzle since its word selection is comprised
entirely of the kinds of words and abbreviations that you and I are familiar with. Unless grandma was an engineer or scientist,
it is doubtful she would know the answer to the clue, "Related to FM by a differential," but you probably do. Go ahead,
give it your best shot.
Feedback has been widely misunderstood by many electronics
enthusiasts, even those who have a fairly extensive background in circuit design (that which does
not involve feedback). In fact, there have been instances of articles being printed in magazines like Popular
Electronics, Radio-Electronics, etc., where the authors got relatively simple
feedback equations wrong due to improper summing of nodes, necessitating a correction in a later issue
based on reader feedback (a convenient and appropriate word for this comment). This article
discusses feedback in audio circuits to avoid distortion, but the concepts apply to any frequency of operation. It is possible
in many cases to implement seat-of-the-pants feedback schemes successfully...
Controlled SAW Oscillator
The API725
Series is a high performance line of SAW oscillators providing superior communication distances for frequencies of 350 MHz
to 4,000 MHz and phase lock loop for heritage applications. The radiation tolerant voltage controlled SAW oscillators
(VCSO) are designed for space, satellite communications and aerospace systems. The VCSOs deliver
low phase noise performance (-109 dBc/Hz at 1 kHz) and low vibration sensitivity
(2 x 10-9 per g). API's space-qualified VCSOs are standard products that can be modified
to customer
Being able to pass a 5 words-per-minute
(wpm)
Morse code
test at one time was a primary requirement for obtaining the lowest level amateur radio operator license - Novice Class
- in addition to passing a written test. Many more people failed the code test than failed the written test. In fact, the
code portion kept many aspiring amateur radio operators from ever even taking the test. It was a barrier which anyone worthy
of the brotherhood must overcome. The intimidation factor was pretty significant. As time marched on and the ranks of amateur
license holders was dwindling quickly, the FCC in 1990 dropped the code requirement and created
the Technician Class license that required only the passing...
Finger Wrench
Many people have contacted me over the years searching for the little "finger wrenches,"
aka "torque multipliers" and "thumb wrenches," that many display vendors have handed out for free at trade show booths.
Like a lot of people, I have one of those plastic SMA tools as well with Agilent's name on it. Other people reportedly have
versions with LeCroy's, National Instruments', Noise Com's, and other companies' names on them. My e-mails to at least three
companies have never gotten responses. Another request just arrived, so I again searched the Internet using terms like "sma thumb wrench," "sma finger wrench," "trade show gift wrench,"
"sma plastic wrench," "plastic connector...
Shattered
During Snow Storm
Witnesses suspect a rock from a snow blower might
have hit the
glass panel at Apple's 5th Avenue store. Maybe so, but if it were not for the Earth's rising temperatures,
the extreme cold and massive snowstorm would never have happened and Apple's insurance company would not be looking at a
$450,000 repair charge. It's yet another victim of anthropogenic global warming. Your 4WD pickup truck in effect broke the
glass. A stander-by commented on the irony of the iStore's glass breaking like so many iPhone displays.
to Monthly Book Drawing
Thanks to the gracious contributions of Artech House, there are now
four great new titles available for selection by winners of the monthly
RF Cafe Book Drawing:
-
Microwave and Millimeter-
Wave Electronic Packaging
- Bayesian Multiple Target
Tracking
- Frequency-Agile Antennas
for Wireless Communications
- Reflectarray Antennas:
Analysis,
Design, Fabrication
and Measurement
I use many
of the books as the subjects of RF Cafe Quizzes and then make them available
for selection in the drawings. Many times the selected winners never respond to my e-mail notifications, so after three
e-mails I give up on them, making even more options available for the subsequent months' winner(s). Maybe you will be next!
Electronics Resources Website
The website is hosted in Greece by a Greek
gentleman who contacted me about the "Subminiature
Magnetic Amplifiers" article which I posted a couple days ago. Everything is published in English. He has a
vast collection of technical data,
much of which was self-published, and it is full of great photos from actual projects. You could spend hours clicking through
the site looking at all the cool stuff. There is a section on magnetics with things like rope memory
(used on the Apollo 11 moon shot), square loop toroids, and coincident current NOR gates, hand-drawn
reverse engineering schematics...
IEEE JobSite Career Alert just sent out their latest list of
good employment-related stories that you might find interesting. Well, the truth is I only post the ones I think you might
find interesting. Visit their website to see everything.
-
In Asia, Indian Workers
Happiest, Singaporean's
Unhappiest
-
Using Your iPhone for Work?
Bringing Your Own Device
Might Mean Losing Your
Data Later
-
Engineering Leadership
Lessons from Japan
-
Discover Engineering
Family
Day Scales New Heights
-
The HR Capitalist: The 3
Ways Candidates Get
Beheaded Expecting
Counter Offers
-
7 Reasons You Should
Update Your Resume Right
Now, Even If You're Not
Looking for a Job
-
Jobs Open
Up in Automobile
Mechatronics
by Cathode Corner
What do you buy the techie who has everything? How about a wristwatch that
has a nixie tube display? I apologize for not discovering this little gem of Nerdom a couple months earlier to be in time
for Christmas, but nearly everyone has a birthday, anniversary, graduation, or other special occasion between now and next
Christmas for which the Old Nixie Watch can be presented. From the
Cathode Corner website: "The Old Cathode Corner Nixie Watch is the perfect way to show your retro-geek cred. It is a two-digit
wristwatch using Nixie tubes, a forty-year-old display technology that is delightfully easy to read. The watch requires
no button-pushing to operate. Just hold the watch at your standard viewing angle, and the hours...
Anyone who has dealt with older electronics
equipment knows that one of the first kinds of components to go bad is the
electrolytic
capacitor. Materials used at the time degraded fairly rapidly, especially compared to modern materials, which facilitated
leakage of stored charge between the rolled up layers of conductive plates and interstitial insulating paper
(or other material) layers. Symptoms of electrolytic capacitor malfunction in radio and television
are most often some form of audible noise, light or dark lines within the picture scan, or outright power supply failure.
Since electrolytics are typically large valued capacitors, they are used in power supply circuits for filtering the line
50 or 60 Hz (depending on your country) AC...
Passed by Elected Officials
If you think your life in America is dictated
by people you elect to office, think again. Unelected bureaucrats routinely write regulations that affect every aspect of
your existence, including whether you will be considered for a particular job that you are technically qualified to perform,
whether you are too 'privileged' to receive financial assistance for college, whether you can manufacture a particular type
of light bulb, what kind of circuit breakers must be installed in your new home, how much of certain ingredients your food
may contain, how many gallons your toilet may use...
Win Awards for Public Service
In
the middle of the last century, television technicians were considered nearly as god-like as doctors, especially those who
made house calls to cure an ailing entity - be it a TV with its vertical synch circuit running amok or a child running a
fever. OK, I exaggerate a bit, but General Electric mounted a media campaign to build a favorable image of TV repairmen
in the public eye. People from every walk of life and of every type employment (well, maybe not mafia
hit men and politicians), gave of their free time to help community efforts in charitable ways without any expectation
of returned favors (which is why I included politicians along with mafia hit men). This 2-page
advertisement which appeared in a 1958 edition of Radio-Electronics depicted TV technicians who were bestowed the
"All American Award" for public service...
Transmitter
This article is provided
as a reference to how these early vacuum tube transmitters were designed and built. Modifications in the circuit would be required to adapt
this transmitter to modern standards. It is also a good reference for theory and operation of some of the older equipment
that might be valuable for hobbyists who restore old radios - and there are a lot of us out here!
Energy Suckers: How
to Deal With Bullies in the Workplace, by Barbara Bartlein. The work world is full of bullies who criticize, blame,
intimidate, and humiliate others. In a study of U.S. workers, 41% reported experiencing psychological aggression at work
in the last year. Bullying occurs in every industry and every profession. It is estimates that more than two million professionals
and managers are pushed out of their jobs each year by bullying. This comes at a cost to employers of $64 billion a year.
Decreased productivity, absenteeism, low morale and teamwork are all outcomes of a toxic work culture.
If you happen to be Estonian, you might think of something entirely different than
most of us do when we hear the word "getter."
In fact, you probably capitalize the word since it is the name of a pop singer from your country,
Getter Jaani.
If you are a child living in Japan, you would probably think of
Getter Robo,
an anime from a popular cartoon series. I, and I dare say just about everyone else that visits RF Cafe, knows getter
as that silvery deposit (typically barium) that resides inside vacuum tubes for the purpose
of helping to maintain the vacuum and to absorb pesky random molecules that might otherwise cause electrical noise in the
circuit. This article from a 1958 edition of Radio-Electronics discusses the purpose of getter...
"It
is inconceivable that inanimate Matter should, without the Mediation of something else, which is not material, operate upon,
and affect other matter without mutual Contact…That Gravity should be innate, inherent and essential to Matter, so that
one body may act upon another at a distance thro' a Vacuum, without the Mediation of any thing else, by and through which
their Action and Force may be conveyed from one to another, is to me so great an Absurdity that I believe no Man who has
in philosophical Matters a competent..." - Sir Isaac
Newton, letter to Richard Bently, c. 1692
Signal Generator
Robert Yarbrough, an independent consulting RF engineer, sent me information
on a nice compact, inexpensive, wideband
RF signal generator that he has developed. Joining what has become a very extensive array of USB-powered test instruments
- signal generators, power meters, oscilloscopes, multimeters, spectrum analyzers, software defined radios, etc. - from
various vendors, the TPI Synthesizer generates high spectral
purity signals ranging from 35 MHz to 4.4 GHz with programmable output power levels from -55 to +10 dBm.
Sweeping can be set for both frequency and power for testing both frequency and amplitude responses of passive and active
devices. The unit can be locked...
for Supporting RF Cafe
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PCB fabrication, component procurement, and PCB assembly services. Because we do everything in-house at our ISO9001 certified
and IPC-A-600 & IPC-A-610 compliant facility, we ensure your project is top quality and remains on schedule.
This was sent to me by an RF
engineer friend of mine, who wrote it for his friend's wife whose husband is an RF engineer: "Ode to Old RF Guys: I'm sure you know, we old RF guys have bad joints (high
power RF burned all the stuff between our bone joints away). A common malady is our ears don't work (too many loud booms
from power amplifiers on the bench blowing up, too many straight out of school college kids telling us we don't know what
we're doing, and managers yelling at us for schedule slips as physics is hard to trick). We have arthritis in our hands
from too many times grabbing the needle nose pliers to tune coils, using tweezers to wrangle parts we can't see anymore,
and the countless times we've tightened the RF connector at the end of a cable. We suffer from numb fingers from inadvertently
touching too many over-temperature RF parts..."
Articles Posted
2014 is shaping up to be a great year for magazine articles if
these I have selected from Microwaves & RF and Test & Measurement World are any example.
-
The Future of Connectivity:
Mobile & Automobiles,
by Jean-Jacques DeLisle
-
Feedthrough in Negative-
Feedback Circuits,
by Sergio Franco
-
Two-Wire Remote Sensor
Preamp, by Vlad Rentyuk
- Communications
Continues
to Inspire Technology
Advances, by
J-J DeLisle
Needed at SecureRF
SecureRF, a Connecticut based company, develops solutions
that combine security and cryptography with low resource computing devices. Our breakthroughs in authentication and data
protection performance are being applied to mobile payments, wireless sensors, machine-to-machine (M2M) and automated identification
technologies such as NFC and RFID. As we bring our secure products to market and develop new security and sensor solutions,
we are looking for RFID Hardware Engineers who have
experience with RF wireless communication systems such as NFC and RFID to join our experienced team. More information and
additional job openings can be found at the SecureRF
website.
Crossword Puzzle for 1/19/2014
Here is this week's installment of my engineering,
science, mathematics, chemistry, physics, astronomy, etc., based
crossword puzzle. My custom
dictionary of about 5,000 hand-picked words assures you that no idiotic clues for movie stars or clothing designers will
get in the way. Enjoy!
from Microwave Journal
Microwave Journal just posted a slew of good articles on their website. Here are
a few of the ones I found most interesting, but you might find others that interest you.
-
Next Generation Affordable
Smart
Antennas, by
J.R. Guerci, T. Driscoll,
R. Hannigan, S. Ebadi,
C. Tegreene, D.E. Smith
- Generating Radar Signals
with an Arbitrary Waveform
Generator, by Chris Loberg
-
Prototyping Massive MIMO
James Kimery, Ian Wong
-
A Method to Design an
Aperture-Tuned Antenna
Using a MEMS Digital
Variable Capacitor, by
Paul Tornatta
-
A Very-Near-Field
Measurement Technique to
Test Large Antennas in the
Lab, by Ruska Patton
in Appreciation of Support
Established in November 1999, WOKEN is a Taiwan-based company that specializes in Microwave / RF coaxial connectors, cables, cable assemblies, Microwave / RF antennas and RF accessories.
With the experienced R&D engineers & technicians, active marketing 
staff, up-to-date production equipment and measuring instruments,
WOKEN designs its own RF / Microwave products for meeting all kinds of requirements demanded by its customers at communication
markets.
Project Echo
Echo 1
launched in August of 1960, finally allowing America to participate in the Space Race, which until then was roundly being
won by the USSR. Electronics magazines of the day were filled with prognostications of the future of space communications.
Electronics World dedicated most of their November issue to satellite Earth stations and advancements being made in ultra
sensitive receivers and powerful transmitters. Since the earliest satellites were literally metallic balls for reflecting
radio signals, it was necessary to optimize both ends of the communications path since there were no circuits onboard the
satellite to perform signal processing and re-transmission.
Bell Labs, of course, was at the forefront of the technology. In fact a famously serendipitous discovery
was made by a couple scientists in 1964 using the very antenna featured...
at Radio Wireless Week 2014
AWR Corporation, the innovation leader in high-frequency
EDA software, will preview in Booth #1 new features and enhancements in its soon-to-be-released AWR Design Environment™
V11 at Radio Wireless Week 2014 in Newport Beach, CA from January 20 to 21. Of special interest are demos of
the new configurable PCells (library of parts) antenna measurement capabilities in AWR's Analyst™
3D finite element method (FEM) EM simulation software.
w/500 MHz Analysis BW
Rohde &
Schwarz has once again expanded the analysis bandwidth for its R&S FSW high-end signal and spectrum analyzers. In the
past, 320 MHz was considered an excellent value. Rohde & Schwarz is the first company to offer
analysis bandwidth of 500 MHz. The new R&S FSW-B500 hardware option is now available for all analyzers
of the R&S FSW family and can therefore be used for measurements in a frequency range up to 67 GHz. This enables completely
new applications for the signal and spectrum analyzer in research and development as well as for tests on fast wireless
connections such as WLAN or Beyond 4G (5G).
