Homepage Archive - June 2017 (page 1)

Friday 9

Electronics-Themed Comics Vintage Electronics Worlds

Finally, it's Friday again - Friday afternoon even, depending on where you live. What better way to wrap up a week than to get a good laugh at these electronics-themed comics from a few of my vintage Electronics World magazines? A huge list of other pages with similar comics is at the bottom of the page. They would make good additions to in-house presentations 

Axiom Test Equipment June Specials

Axiom Test Equipment, a provider of efficient and cost effective solutions customers' test equipment needs, offer the following special deals on their inventory. Axiom offers our customers several practical, efficient and cost effective solutions for their business or projects' test equipment needs. Whether you need to rent & buy test equipment, repair test equipment, sell or trade equipment, we are committed to providing superior customer service and high quality electronic test equipment 

Army Electronic Warfare Technology Attacks and Disables Tank

"Army trainers successfully used cyber weapons and electronic warfare (EW) technology to thwart a simulated tank assault at a training exercise conducted at the Army National Training Center at Fort Irwin, Calif. The exercise reinforced the need for the EW and cyber protection technology that is under development by entities such as the Army Rapid Capabilities Office (RCO) and U.S. Cyber Command. 'These tanks had to stop, dismount, get out of their protection, reduce their "

1930 U.S. Census - Do You Own a Radio?

For Mother's Day this year, the kids and I got Melanie a 23andMe DNA testing kit. She has spent a fair amount of time over the years researching the family lineage which, in case you care, traces back primarily to Germany and Switzerland. Along with some of the online ancestry websites, she searched the U.S. Census database for immigration and early American household information (number of people, ages, names, occupations, etc.) The entire 1930 Census form consisted of a single page seeking basic information on whether you own or rent, value of the home, live on a farm or not, color or race 

Starry Lobbies for Simple Sharing in Lower 37 GHz Band

"Starry CEO Chet Kanojia and others representing the company recently met with FCC Chairman Ajit Pai and his legal adviser Alison Nemeth to discuss Starry's proprietary 5G technology and its deployment progress in Boston and other cities. Starry took the opportunity to reiterate its support for preserving commercial-to-commercial sharing in the lower 37 GHz band as proposed in the FCC's Spectrum Frontiers Report & Order. Starry investors Richard Sarnoff of KKR and Amish "

Who Will Be the First 5G City in Europe?

"Last September, the European Commission announced the 5G Action Plan. According to the plan, each member must specify at least one major city where the commercial launch of 5G can be made by the end of 2020. Since then, the European countries have been issuing their plans to promote 5G deployment. In November 2016, the Italian Government announced at the second 5GPPP Conference in Rome that 5G networks would be first deployed in five cities in the northern, central, and southern regions of the country. In March this year, the Italian Government "

Thursday 8

5 nm Nanosheet Transistors Cut Power by 75%

"Researchers at IBM have developed a practical way to build transistors on a 5 nm process that provides a reduction in power consumption of up to 75% or a performance boost of 40% for the same power. Instead of using FinFET structures, engineers at the IBM-led Research Alliance at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute Colleges of Nanoscale Science and Engineering's NanoTech Complex in Albany, NY, used a 'gate-all-around' (GAA) built with silicon nanosheets. For the last ten years IBM has been working on nanosheets where "

Heathkit DX-60B Amateur Radio Transmitter Restoration

Long-time RF Cafe visitor and occasional contributor Gary Steinhour, KF6U, recently sent me a note saying he had acquired a very used Heathkit DX-60B amateur radio transmitter and was in the process of restoring it. Gary's first transmitter as a freshly minted Ham over 50 years ago was a DX-60, so this was an effort to satisfy a nostalgic emotional attachment. The project is complete now, and boy does it look nice! Gary provides a brief account here 

RCA Institutes Ad

If you wanted a career as an electronics technician at the end of WWII, the world was your oyster - so to speak. Electronics and communications trade magazines and publications like Mechanix Illustrated and Popular Science ran a plethora of ads monthly that offered unlimited opportunity to men seeking a career servicing the burgeoning market of postwar technological marvels. Even though the enclosures were not yet being marked with "No user serviceable parts inside," that fact was most people were not qualified - nor did they want - to monkey with the guts of radios, televisions 

Southwest Antennas Intros Rugged GPS Passive L1 Antenna

Southwest Antennas, an industry leader in innovative rugged RF / microwave antennas and accessory products, has released a newGPS passive L1 antenna with integrated coaxial RF gooseneck, adding to their existing line of passive and active GPS antenna products for the military, law enforcement, and commercial markets. The integrated gooseneck allows the GPS antenna to be utilized on tactical radio systems where multiple antenna RF connectors and control knobs can located in a small space, giving users the ability to position 

314 Action Wants to Help Engineers Run for Office

I normally avoid political topics, but having a few more technically savvy people in Congress might be a good idea. Who can forget genius Congressman Hank Johnson saying to Admiral Willard regarding the presence of military equipment on the island of Guam, "My fear is that the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize?" "We don't anticipate that," replied the admiral, barely able to constrain 

AMEBA Antenna for Underwater / Underground Communications

"As the Navy continues to develop unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs), the next question is how these underwater drones will communicate and collaborate. One answer to this conundrum, proposed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency is A Mechanically Based Antenna (AMEBA), which will enter the early development stage this summer. 'One of the things we want to look at is the ability of UUVs … to communicate and collaborate together. How do we tie in multiple unmanned platforms to work with each other autonomously "

Wednesday 7

Before Silicon Valley, NJ Reigned as Nation's Center of Innovation

"New Jersey has a history to brag about. Thomas Edison invented the light bulb, the phonograph and the movie camera there. Many decades later, Bell Labs invented the transistor in the state. Geography favored New Jersey. On one end, it borders New York City, and on the other end is Philadelphia. That means easy access to Wall Street financing, transportation and industry headquarters. It all started in the 18th century, when Alexander Hamilton took one look at the plunging Passaic River waterfall in Paterson and his eyes lit up with "

FCC/OSHA Release Communications Tower Best Practices Guide

"The FCC and OSHA have announced the release of a free publication, Communications Tower Best Practices guide. While aimed more at those who tend commercial communication towers, the guide offers guidance applicable to the Amateur Radio community and contractors working on Amateur Radio antenna support structures. The FCC said the guide was a result of two tower safety workshops. 'Recognizing the risks that tower employees face, OSHA and the FCC held a workshop on communication tower employee safety on "

Cassette Tape Recorders - A New Breed

As with restorers of vintage radio equipment, there are avid restorers of vintage computers, vintage televisions, vintage kitchen appliances, and vintage tape recorders / players. In 1969 when this article appeared in Electronics World, magnetic tape was a big deal. Reel-to-reel was the domain of true audio aficionados - the most expensive type of equipment - while the rest of us settled for cassette and 8-track tapes. Cassette tape people generally regarded 8-trackers as audio Neanderthals, Philistines, bumpkins, non-sophisticates. I was - and still am 

Notable Tech Quote: Walter Underwood, K6WRU

"There is a way to tell who is used to working on transistor equipment from those used to working on tube equipment. Before those used to working on tube equipment touch their equipment, they put one hand in their pocket to avoid electrocution. Before those used to working on low-voltage equipment begin to work, they put one hand on the chassis to avoid damage from electrostatic discharge." - Walter Underwood, K6WRU, as reported by Joel Hallas in his "The Doctor Is In" column in the May 2017 issue of QST (p61) 

ConductRF Intros Flexible Alternatives to Semi-Rigid or Hand Formable Cable

ConductRF's LSA cables provide one of the most optimum and cost effective solutions for applications as diverse as alternatives to semi-rigid cabling, where complex forming is required, to easy to install jumper cables inside densely packaged RF enclosures where EMI is of concern. Using our low profile SMA and type-N "Swept Cable" configurations, ConductRF can provide R/A assemblies with no VSWR performance loss when compared 

Inside the Quietest Place on Earth

"If LeSalle Munroe stands still for a few moments in his 'office,' something unsettling can happen - he can hear the blood rushing around his body and his eyes squelch as they move in his skull. While many people work in places filled with the tip-tap of keyboards, the hubbub of chatter from colleagues and a constant hum of computers, Munroe is surrounded by almost total silence. His office is the quietest place on the planet "

Tuesday 6

Europe Finally Approves WiFi on Shoestring Initiative

"The European Commission (hereafter known as the Gaggle of Red-tapers) has announced an agreement with other regulatory bores to fund the WiFi4EU initiative. The project itself will see the Gaggle combine forces with the European Parliament and the Council to drive free public WiFi hotspots throughout all of its member states. Forming part of Digital Single Market strategy, the play for public WiFi will see €120 million made available for up to 8000 municipalities throughout the European Union. It took "

Designing a Receiver for Cable TV... Bye-Bye to Interference

In the early 1970s when this story was written, the television industry was just getting started with building out infrastructure for cable delivery to homes. All signals were analog of course, and there was very little digitization of receiver circuitry in TV sets; i.e., synthesized tuners. A large percentage of televisions used vacuum tubes and relied on twin lead transmission cable between a rooftop antenna and the back of the set. The plug-in connection of vacuum tubes often caused problems due to high resistance contacts (or no contact) between the tube pins and the sockets, and could also suffer from passive intermodulation (PIM) signals 

WHO Ambient Air Pollution Map

The World Health Organization (WHO) publishes a map of the air pollution levels present worldwide. "The mean annual concentration of fine suspended particles of less than 2.5 microns in diameters is a common measure of air pollution." Darker indicates higher levels of pollution. If a picture is worth 1,000 words, this one speaks volumes. "India's Air Pollution Rivals China's as World's Deadliest" - NY Times  

Vaunix Intros Attenuators and Signal Generator in IMS2017 Booth #848

Vaunix, a leading developer of programmable wireless test devices, will be introducing their latest attenuators and signal generator in the 5G/IoT Pavilion at booth #848 at IMS 2017 in Honolulu, Hawaii, June 6th-8th. Capable of bidirectional fixed attenuation, swept attenuation ramps, and fading profiles, the Vaunix LDA-602Q 4 port programmable attenuator provides up to 120 dB of control range with a 0.1 dB step size from 200 MHz to 6 GHz. Each of 4 RF ports of this device has a 50 ohm impedance with VSWR less than 

D-Day Article in Air & Space Smithsonian Magazine

"Even more difficult to explain is the moment I placed my hands on the grave of my Silent Hero and felt as if our times, his and mine, were not so far apart" - Erin Stender in "Mac and Me," June/July 2017 Air & Space magazine. That line stood out to me when reading the short story written by a high school girl who visited the Normandy Memorial Cemetery as part of voluntary assignment. It is nice to see a young person display a positive emotional response to the memory of our brave servicemen -- Army Air Forces Captain Malcolm A. Smith in this case. "Mac" gave, in President Lincoln's words, "the last full measure of devotion," on D-Day, June 6, 1944 

Budget Proposal Puts NASA Satellite Servicing Mission in Doubt

"NASA plans to shelve a robotic demonstration mission to refuel an aging Landsat Earth-imaging observatory and join forces with the private sector and a U.S. military research and development agency in a public-private partnership to commercialize satellite servicing technologies, according to language in the White House's budget request released Tuesday. A blueprint of the White House proposed budget in March indicated the Restore-L satellite refueling mission would be 'restructured,' calling the effort "

Monday 5

New Method of Characterizing Graphene

"New method of characterizing graphene - ScienceDaily Scientists have developed a new method of characterizing graphene's properties without applying disruptive electrical contacts, allowing them to investigate both the resistance and quantum capacitance of graphene and other two-dimensional materials. Researchers from the Swiss Nanoscience Institute and the University of Basel's Department of Physics reported their findings in the journal Physical Review Applied. Graphene consists of a single layer of carbon atoms "

IEEE '69 International Convention & Exhibition Advertisement

This being the beginning of the IEEE's Microwave Theory and Techniques Society's (MTT-S) International Microwave Symposium in Honolulu, Hawaii, it is the perfect time to post this advertisement from the January 1969 issue of Electronics World. Per the MTT.org website, the very first IMS show was held in 1995, in Orlando, Florida. The 1969 IEEE International Convention & Exhibition, which was not specifically a microwave electronics theme, was held in the New York Coliseum, located in New York City 

89th ARFTG Microwave Measurement Symposium

ARFTG (Automatic Radio Frequency Technologies Group) is a technical organization interested in all aspects of RF and Microwave test and measurement. It is conducting the 89th ARFTG Microwave Measurement Symposium on Friday, June 9th, 2017, at the Ala Moana Hotel, Honolulu, Hawaii, which is during the IMS 2017 show. Chairs will be Jon Martens of Anritsu, Dave Blackham of Keysight Technologies, Jeff Jargon of NIST, and Ron Ginley of NIST 

everythingRF Reporting on IMS2017

everythingRF will again this year be providing up-to-the-minute coverage of the IMS2017 show in Honolulu 

The Most Complex 2D Microchip Yet

"Scientists hope that two-dimensional materials such as graphene or molybdenum disulfide will allow Moore's Law to continue apace once it becomes impossible to make further progress using silicon. A 3-atom-thick microchip developed by researchers at the Vienna University of Technology (VUT) may be the first example of 2D materials following the seemingly inexorable growth in the number of transistors in integrated circuits that Gordon Moore observed decades ago. Previously, the number of transistors on ICs made from 2D materials "

Sunday 4

RF Systems Analysis Crossword Puzzle for June 4

This week's crossword puzzle has an RF system analysis theme with words are terms you will find in cascade calculators such as RF Cascade Workbook. Avid cruciverbalists amongst us appreciate that each week I create a new crossword puzzle that has a theme related to engineering, mathematics, chemistry, physics, and other technical words. You will never be asked the name of a movie star unless he/she was involved in a technical endeavor (e.g., Hedy Lamarr). Enjoy 

Friday 2

Please Visit Triad RF System to Thank Them for Their Support

Triad RF Systems designs and manufactures RF power amplifiers and systems. Triad RF Systems comprises three partners (hence 'Triad') with over 40 years of accumulated knowledge of what is required to design, manufacture, market, sell and service RF/Microwave amplifiers and amplifier systems. "We view Triad more as a technology partner than a vendor for our line-of-sight communications product line." Please check to see how we can help your project

Saelig Intros LeCroy's WaveSurfer 510 10 GSa/s Touchscreen O-scope

Saelig Company has announced the availability of the Teledyne LeCroy WaveSurfer 510 oscilloscope, which combines advanced 1 GHz 10 GSa/s specifications including MAUI with OneTouch user interface, powerful waveform processing, as well as advanced math, measurement, and debug features, to create an engineering tool that can help quickly analyze and find the root cause of circuit problems. The 12.1" touch-screen display of the WaveSurfer 510 is the largest in its class and makes viewing intricate waveforms fast and easy. The WaveSurfer 510 Oscilloscope 

Nanogenerators Could Charge Your Smartphone

"Researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology have been exploring the applications and commercial potential for triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs) since 2012. These so-called TENGs essentially harvest static electricity from friction. Now a team of researchers at Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) in South Korea have overcome one of the hurdles preventing the technology from gaining wider adoption: low power output. To do this, they have developed a new polymer that serves as a dielectric material "

Electronics-Themed Comics from Radio & Television News

Once again I provide here for your Friday, winding down the week amusement, three electronics-themed comics from vintage Radio & Television News magazines. I'm not sure what the horse racing comic is meant to depict, other than maybe 'now' you can watch your pick lose the horse race on the TV rather than needing to actually be at the track. Enjoy 

Lotus Communication Systems Added to RF Cafe Vendor Pages

Lotus Communication Systems, located in Weston, Massachusetts, offers a line of RF modular system components up to 20 GHz including amplifiers, filters, attenuators, limiters, oscillators, bias-Ts. Also COTS shielded enclosures w/SMA connectors for RF / electronics prototyping. Customization to your specification from prototype to production 

Triad RF Systems Intros 3000-3600 MHz Broadcast Power Amplifier

The new TA1205 is a GaN amplifier that operates at 3000-3600 MHz and offers an output power of up to 10 watts. It boasts a small form factor and light weight, while keeping a high power output which makes it ideal for ENG Broadcast applications where distance and mobility is key. This class A, GaN module is designed for both military and commercial applications. It is capable of supporting any signal type and modulation format, including but not limited to 3-4G telecom, WLAN, OFDM, DVB 

South Korea to Launch 1st Commercial 5G Network in 2019

"The government said that 5G subscribers will probably account for 5% of total base by 2020 South Korea aims to complete the deployment of a commercial 5G mobile network in the second half of 2019, Heo Won-seok, director of ICT and Broadcasting Technology Policy at South Korea's Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning, said during a keynote presentation at the Global 5G Event, taking place this week in Tokyo, Japan. The official said that the Korean government estimates that 5G technology will have a penetration rate of nearly 5% "

Thursday 1

MWJ Offers 5G mmWave Communications Course and eBook

Microwave Journal is now providing Professor Ted Rappaport's 2-day online course, slides and eBook. Previously recorded by IEEE Com Soc, the course covers the fundamental communications, circuits, antennas and propagation issues surrounding emerging 60 GHz wireless LAN and mmWave cellular / backhaul applications. The course was developed and delivered by Professor Theodore (Ted) Rappaport, a pioneering researcher and educator in mmWave wireless communications, wireless systems and radio propagation 

The Radio Month in Review, May 1936 Radio-Craft

In 1936, the FCC was busy regulating radio broadcasting via transcription programs (pre-recorded segments), deciding that listeners deserved to be warned at least every 15 minutes that they were not listening to a live announcer. A note on the death of ARRL founder Hiram Percy Maxim was reported to have succumbed to a throat infection, which (my conjecture) might have proven non-fatal had penicillin been in use in the day. Miniature 'pocket-sized' radio transmitters and receivers were introduced for those who wore 

Diamond Sensors Boost NMR Resolution

"A new way of boosting the resolution of quantum magnetic sensors has been developed independently by three teams of physicists. The technique has already been used to achieve a huge improvement in nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) spectroscopy. Quantum sensing is used to measure frequencies in multiple areas of physics, but for a quantum sensor to measure anything, it must interact with its environment. This degrades its quantum properties very quickly - and this limits the measurement accuracy. Now, however, three "

Lightning Protection Systems

If you have ever seen the result of a lightning strike on electronic equipment, then you know how devastating it can be - often total destruction that includes molten metal. Woe be unto any human operator who happens to be in contact with it at the time of the strike. Unprotected antennas are begging for contact. Shortly after leaving a company where I worked on a Tx/Rx system for a phased array weather radar I got word that the indoor equipment rack took a major hit because the guy who maintained the site forgot to reconnect a lightning rod system cable after moving it during 

ConductRF Low-PIM Cable Assemblies - DC to 110 GHz - RF Cafe

ConductRF offers Straight & R/A low PIM connectors for 7/16, N, SMA, QMA, 4.1/9.5 and 4.3/10 interfaces. PIM levels vary depending on cable and configuration. We also offer Adapters. Download our datasheets by clicking the pictures above for more detail of call us at +1 978 374 6840 

Method to Control Light Propagation in Waveguides Invented

"A team of Columbia Engineering researchers, led by Applied Physics Assistant Professor Nanfang Yu, has invented a method to control light propagating in confined pathways, or waveguides, with high efficiency by using nano-antennas. To demonstrate this technique, they built photonic integrated devices that not only had record-small footprints but were also able to maintain optimal performance over an unprecedented broad wavelength range. Photonic integrated circuits (ICs) are based "