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4 of the July 2021 homepage archives. Wednesday the 21st
 Westinghouse is yet another of the original
stalwart titans of companies that helped build America to her state of greatness,
but is now mostly a footnote in the historical notes of the many companies which
over the past few decades have bought out portions of the business. Founded in the
late 1800s by George Westinghouse as a locomotive air brake manufacturer, the company
added other markets including, notably, electric power generation and distribution.
Emerging as the winner in the famous "War of the Currents" fought between Westinghouse
and Thomas Edison secured George's place in history. Westinghouse also got into
the commercial, military, and domestic electronics and appliance markets. I worked
at the Westinghouse Oceanic Division in Annapolis, MD, from 1982 through 1986 and
though it was a great company to work for. This advertisement for "Westinghouse
Directional Equipment;" i.e., antennas, appeared in a 1945 issue of Radio News
magazine.
 "From
assembly development to mitigating crosstalk to signal integrity, these tips can
help streamline the
high-speed PCB design process. Vigorous competition in the electronics market
means developers must keep modification in mind when designing systems. High-speed
PCBs are increasingly important to high-performance solutions, but high-speed PCB
assembly is costly. That's why you can't experiment with these boards or generate
a lot of prototypes. This article offers five tips to help streamline and improve
those high-speed PCB designs while keeping costs at bay. High-speed assembly needs
some additional components compared to any other type of PCB assembly, such as conventional
or rigid-flex assembly. These components change according to every application's
need, but all must be given extra care during the manufacturing phase. The main
factors that professionals..."
 "Most next generation wireless communication
technologies require integrated radiofrequency devices that can operate at frequencies
greater than 90 GHz. Two of the semiconductors most widely used to fabricate radiofrequency
devices are silicon complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) field-effect
transistors (FETs) and transistors based on III-V compound semiconductors, particularly
GaAs. Both these
semiconductor RF technologies, however, are unable to simultaneously achieve
high operating frequencies and be easy to integrate within wireless communication
technologies. A promising candidate for the development of high-speed FETs (up to
terahertz frequencies) are semiconducting single-wall carbon nanotubes (CNTs), due
to their favorable electronic and physical properties. Remarkably, the material
requirements of CNTs for the fabrication of RF analog and digital devices are almost
the same..."
 Chapter 2 of the U.S. Navy's Basic Navy Training
Courses covers
Static Electricity. Chapter 1 is entitled "Matter - Electricity Does It!," and
contains Figures 1 through 4, which explains why Figure 5 is the first one
here (in case you were wondering). The first few chapters cover the fundamentals
of electricity and electronics, and the material is as relevant and true today as
it was in the 1940s. Many chapters were originally posted more than a decade ago
and many people have written to comment on the quality of the Navy's courses. Employers
have long preferred former Navy-trained electronics personnel for technician jobs
because of their reputation. Navy hands-on experience combined with an Associate's
degree in electronics technology was (and may still be) an almost guaranteed ticket
to a great civilian career. If you are young and considering a career in electronics,
you might consider enlisting in the military (any branch, really) for training...
RF Cafe's raison
d'être is and always has been to provide useful, quality content for engineers,
technicians, engineering managers, students, and hobbyists. Part of that mission
is offering to post applicable job openings. HR department employees and/or managers
of hiring companies are welcome to submit opportunities for posting at no charge.
3rd party recruiters and temp agencies are not included so as to assure a high quality
of listings. Please read through the easy procedure to benefit from RF Cafe's high
quality visitors...
 Empower RF Systems is a global leader in
power amplifier solutions. Empower RF Systems is an established and technologically
superior supplier of high power solid state RF & microwave amplifiers. Our offerings
include modules, intelligent rack-mount amplifiers, and multi-function RF Power
Amplifier solutions to 6 GHz in broadband and band specific designs. Output
power combinations range from tens of watts to multi-kilowatts. Unprecedented size,
weight and power reduction of our amplifiers is superior to anything in the market
at similar frequencies and power levels.
Tuesday the 20th
 This you might find hard to believe. After
reading about my sister's severe reaction to the Wuhan Flu vaccination, someone
sent me a link to this "60 Minutes" television show video from 1979. Intrepid newsman
Mike Wallace reports on the debacle that was the government's effort to hurriedly
get everyone vaccinated against the
Swine Flu "pandemic" - which turned out to not be a pandemic at all. It
was a knee-jerk reaction that caused more harm than good through misinformation,
mismanagement, and, honestly, misanthropy on the part of government and industry
"professionals" following the science. Sound familiar? The difference is that now
we don't have total lap-dog media abetting the aforementioned string-pullers...
 Reading an episode of "Mac's
Radio Service Shop" always has me wishing I had been born a couple decades earlier
and had taken the path of running an electronics repair shop. For sure it was no
picnic either from the standpoint of needing to keep abreast of constantly changing
product designs and finicky customers, but the thrill of the hunt (for the cause
of "trouble") and the satisfaction in knocking them out (the "shooting") is something
people like us (you, too, I assume, since you're reading this) understand. Back
in my USAF days as an air traffic control radar repairman, day-to-day routine system
alignments and preventative maintenance could be pretty dull, and most problems
were fairly easily resolved in an hour or two. However, every once in a while a
real doozy of a case would crop up that would have a full shift or two of fellow
technicians agonizing over it until the cause was finally discovered. Often, as
with some of the scenarios Mac describes, an intermittent component or connection
ended up as the culprit. One time I remember having a particularly bad time with
the signal path from the transmitter to the rotating antenna on the roof of the
equipment trailer (AN/MPN-14 mobile ASR/PAR radar). We had deployed the system...
 This vintage
Heathkit
SA-5010 μMatic Memory Keyer kit is one the latest unbuilt Heathkit kits which
appeared on eBay. I have been saving the images in order to preserve the history.
The constantly growing list is at the lower right. The first instance I could find
for SA-5010 being offered for sale was in the Christmas 1982 Heathkit catalog, at
a cost of $99.95 ($250.40 in 2021 money per the BLS). It went to model number SA-5010A
sometime around 1985. Zenith bought Heathkit in 1979 (and kept the Heathkit name),
so that explains whey their name appears on the errata sheet in the photo. Heathkit
SA-5010 μMatic Memory Keyers can still be found on eBay fairly often, both in unassembled
kit form and completed units...
 ConductRF is continually innovating and
developing new and improved solutions for RF Interconnect needs. See the latest
TESTeCON RF Test
Cables for labs. ConductRF makes production and test coax cable assemblies for
amplitude and phased matched VNA applications as well as standard & precision
RF connectors. Over 1,000 solutions for low PIM in-building to choose from in the
iBwave component library. They also provide custom coax solutions for applications
where some standard just won't do. A partnership with Newark assures fast, reliable
access. Please visit ConductRF today to see how they can help your project!
 Sam Benzacar of Anatech Electronics, an
RF and microwave filter company, has published his July 2021 newsletter that features
his short op-ed entitled "Wi-SUN:
The Most Pervasive Wireless Technology You May Not Heard Of," where he notes
"Like ZigBee, WirelessHART, ISA100, SNAP, and 6LoWPAN, Wi-SUN (doesn't even have
a Wikipedia entry yet) is based on the IEEE 802.15.4 standard and employs a mesh-type
rather than star topology, making it inherently self-healing. There is no need for
base stations because each node talks to the others, eliminating a single point
of failure." Not only haven't I heard of Wi-SN, but I haven't heard of WirelessHART
(HART = Highway Addressable Remote Transducer) or ISA100. Sam also presents some
relevant industry news items as well...
 "The hot next trend in automated driving
is L2+, with semi-autonomy guided by both camera and HD radar sensing. What demands
does radar add, and how can they be addressed? It's a technology that feels like
it's been nearly there for years, but we're still waiting for full autonomy in cars,
and it's much further out than we originally thought. Industry body SAE defines
six levels of driving automation, from no automation up to full self-driving
at level 5. As vehicles become more automated and reach higher levels, they're more
tightly regulated and require more sophisticated systems to provide a safe, reliable
solution. The automotive industry has been looking to a move to level 3 (L3), but
right now this seems unrealistic. Instead, there's a very active push from SAE level
2, conventional advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), to something now being
called L2+. This is a chance for OEMs and Tier 1s to monetize their investments
in full autonomy systems..."
 Here is an amazingly detailed article on
how to construct and operate a near-lab-quality
impedance bridge out of relatively inexpensive components. It appeared in a
1944 issue of QST magazine. A bridge is used to determine the precise value of a
resistor, capacitor, or inductor. Prior to modern, easily affordable digital impedance
meters, both amateurs and professionals relied on such devices for lab and field
work. Why might you need to measure the value of a component when most are marked
with a value? One common application is when a variable version of a component (or
components) is soldered into the circuit while tweaking for optimal performance,
and then the variable is replaced either with a single fixed component or a fixed
component with a smaller-range variable component. It is not uncommon when doing
the initial tuning on a complete home-built transceiver to have many variable components
in place initially, and then solder in fixed versions later...
 With more than 1000
custom-built stencils, this has got to be the most comprehensive set of
Visio Stencils available for RF, analog, and digital system and schematic
drawings! Every object has been built to fit proportionally on the provided
A-, B- and C-size drawing page templates (or can use your own). Stencils are provided
for equipment racks and test equipment, system block diagrams, conceptual drawings,
and schematics. Unlike previous versions, these are NOT Stencils, but instead are
all contained on tabbed pages within a single Visio document. That puts everything
in front of you in its full glory. Just copy and paste what you need on your drawing.
The file format is XML so everything plays nicely with Visio 2013 and later...
 Anatech Electronics (AEI) manufactures and
supplies RF and microwave filters for military and commercial communication
systems, providing standard LP, HP, BP, BS, notch, diplexer, and custom RF filters,
and RF products. Standard RF filter and cable assembly products are published in
our website database for ease of procurement. Custom RF filters designs are used
when a standard cannot be found, or the requirements dictate a custom approach for
your military and commercial communications needs. Sam Benzacar's monthly newsletters
address contemporary wireless subjects. Please visit Anatech today to see how they
can help your project succeed.
Monday the 19th
 According to the National Bureau of Standards'
(now National Institute of Standards, NIST) website, In October 1949, Congress authorized
$4.5 million for "the construction and equipment of a radio laboratory building
for the National Bureau of Standards," for the planned new location of
WWV in Ft. Collins, Colorado. WWV was initially established in 1919 in
Washington, D.C., later moved to Beltsville, Maryland, then finally relocated to
Ft. Collins, Colorado, in 1955. Construction began on the facility in 1951
and was dedicated in September 1954 by President Dwight D. Eisenhower. This item
from the June 1945 issue of Radio News magazine reports on the Colorado location,
with WWV's addition of a 15 MHz time standard broadcast...
 "A paper based on joint research by Prof.
Yuan Changzheng from Institute of High Energy Physics of the Chinese Academy of
Sciences, and Prof. Marek Karliner from Tel Aviv University of Israel, was published
in Physical Review Letters. It points out a new abundant source of
antineutrons and hyperons. These rare subatomic particles are essential for
studying forces governing the behavior of matter at the smallest distances, from
atomic nuclei to neutron stars. Physicists investigate the subatomic world by bombarding
their subjects with a hail of tiny subatomic 'bullets.' Based on how these 'bullets'
bounce off their target, one can infer a wealth of detailed information about the
target's structure. This method was pioneered by Ernest Rutherford..."
 Being a great appreciator of good humor,
and especially technology-related humor, I made sure to scan these
electronics-related comics from the pages of vintage Radio-Electronics
magazines. You might have to have lived through the era of televisions with cathode
ray tubes (CRTs) to fully appreciate the frustration of trying to acceptably grab,
align, define, sharpen, tone, and lock an over-the-air broadcast signal on track.
Stories of people putting feet or baseball bats through the sets were a big source
of situational humor.
 RF Cascade Workbook 2018 is the next phase in the evolution
of RF Cafe's long-running series, RF Cascade Workbook. Chances are you
have never used a spreadsheet quite like this (click here for screen capture). It is a full-featured RF system
cascade parameter and frequency planner that includes filters and mixers for a mere
$45. Built in MS Excel, using RF Cascade Workbook 2018 is a cinch
and the format is entirely customizable. It is significantly easier and faster than
using a multi-thousand dollar simulator when a high level system analysis is all
that is needed. An intro video takes you through the main features...
 Axiom Test Equipment allows you to
rent or
buy test equipment,
repair
test equipment, or sell or trade test equipment. They are committed to providing
superior customer service and high quality electronic test equipment. Axiom offers
customers several practical, efficient, and cost effective solutions for their projects'
TE needs and is committed to providing superior customer service and high quality
electronic test equipment. For anyone seeking a way to offload surplus or obsolete
equipment, they offer a trade-in program or they will buy the equipment from you.
Some vintage items are available fully calibrated. Please check out Axiom Test Equipment
today!
Sunday the 18th
 This
Wireless Engineering Theme Crossword Puzzle for July 18th contains only words
and clues related to engineering, mathematics, chemistry, physics, and other technical
words. As always, this crossword contains no names of politicians, mountain ranges,
exotic foods or plants, movie stars, or anything of the sort unless it/he/she is
related to this puzzle's technology theme (e.g., Hedy Lamarr or the Bikini Atoll).
The technically inclined cruciverbalists amongst us will appreciate the effort.
Enjoy!
 Centric RF is a company offering from stock
various RF and
Microwave coaxial components, including attenuators, adapters, cable assemblies,
terminations, power dividers, and more. We believe in offering high performance
parts from stock at a reasonable cost. Frequency ranges of 0-110 GHz at power
levels from 0.5-500 watts are available off the shelf. Order today, ship today!
Centric RF is currently looking for vendors to partner with them. Please visit Centric
RF today.
Friday the 16th
 It took me way too long, but I finally got
the June 1945 issue of Radio News magazine with Part 1 of the "Practical
Radar" series of articles by Jordan McQuay. The opening sentence said a lot
to the readers of the day: "The veil of secrecy has been lifted." Radar technology
was a highly guarded science during World War II, and, along with its related
technology, sonar, is widely credited with providing Allied forces the tools needed
to eventually emerge victorious against Axis forces on land and sea. Yes, Germany
and Japan (and Italy, but they didn't produce any systems) also had radar and sonar,
but American and British engineers managed to keep a step ahead, providing a major
advantage. The same goes for countermeasure techniques. This very extensive introduction
to radar was followed by four more equally lengthy articles. By the time this edition
of Radio News was published, the war in Europe and Africa was over, and would soon
be ended in Japan, so divulging "secrets" approved by the Department of War was
not a big deal. There were, however, many readers of this and other publications
that were upset...
 "A
defect-resistant topological laser emits pure telecommunication-wavelength light
at room temperatures. Novel devices known as topological lasers can prove more efficient
at shining light than conventional lasers. Now scientists have created the first
electrically driven topological laser that works at room temperature, which could
find use in telecommunications. Topology is the branch of mathematics that investigates
what aspects of shapes can survive deformation. For example, an object shaped like
a ring may deform into the shape of a mug, with the ring’s hole forming the hole
in the cup's handle. However, this object could not deform into a shape without
a hole without changing into a fundamentally different shape..."
 Those of us born in the 1950s and later have
for our lifetimes been familiar with
atomic clocks and the
incredible accuracy they provide for science experiments and physical standards.
A 1957 issue of Scientific American magazine published an article on the newfangled
devices, and discussed the ammonia-based and cesium-based types. The National Bureau
of Standards' (now NIST) first atomic clock used an ammonia molecule (NH3) with
the nitrogen atom back and forth within a triangular hydrogen base at a frequency
of 23,870 MHz (23.870 GHz). The current NIST time service can be accessed
at www.time.com. One of the displays reports the time error of you computer, cellphone,
watch, or however you log on. Their latest publication is entitled, "A New Era for
Atomic Clocks," which reports on the newest timekeeper - the NIST-F2, a cesium clock.
"NIST-F2 would neither gain nor lose one second..."
 We are solidly in the middle of baseball
season in America, so this "Carl & Jerry" story from a 1950 edition of Popular
Electronics comes at a good time. As is the case with many "Carl & Jerry"
episodes, this one involves the use of an amateur radio rig. Find out how and why
Jerry willingly commits "Baseball Interference" (BBI) to beat the opposing team
at their own game. I feel obligated to point out that although it was for a good
cause, Jerry actually violated the FCC regulation for Amateur radio operators stating
that no broadcaster may intentionally interfere with another person's transmission.
Title 47 CFR 97.101(d) General Standards - "No amateur operator shall willfully
or maliciously interfere with or cause interference to any radio communication or
signal." BTW, up until a few years ago, we didn't have MLB with a bunch of virtual-signaling
players and club owners who regularly insult half (or more) of their supporters...
 RF Cafe typically receives 8,000-15,000
website visits each weekday and about half that on weekends.
RF Cafe is a favorite of engineers, technicians, hobbyists, and students all
over the world. With more than 15,000 pages in the Google search index,
RF Cafe returns
in favorable positions on many types of key searches, both for text and images.
New content is added on a daily basis, which keeps the major search engines interested
enough to spider it multiple times each day. Items added on the homepage often can
be found in a Google search within a few hours of being posted. I also re-broadcast
homepage items on LinkedIn. If you need your company news to be seen, RF Cafe
is the place to be.
 NextPCB is one of the most experienced PCB
manufacturers in China, has specialized in the PCB and assembly industry for over
15 years. NextPCB provides the most innovative printed circuit boards and assembly
technologies in the highest quality standards, turnaround time as fast as 24 hours,
the lowest manufacturer direct prices, and the most dedicated customer service in
the industry. Turnkey service without a broker including components sourcing, PCB
prototyping, manufacturing, assembly, quality testing, and final shipment. Certified
by IATF16949, ISO9001, ISO14001, UL, CQC, RoHS and REACH.
Thursday the 15th
 This is the final installment of an 11-part
series in Radio News magazine entitled "Theory
and Application of U.H.F.," written by Milton Kiver. It spanned from December
1943 to June 1945. Topics included basic electrical, magnetic, and electromagnetic
theory, cavity resonators as tuning units of klystron and magnetron oscillators,
waveguide, free space propagation, high frequency amplifiers, transmission lines,
and coupling energy to/from cavity resonators. As the list suggests, there was a
great concentration on field theory. Being that the Radio News readership covered
a broad range of experience and education, Mr. Kiver went light on use of equations
and heavy on use of diagrams, charts, and textual descriptions. Everything described
throughout the series is as valid and applicable today as it was 75 years...
 I found a copy of the 1941 Radio Engineering
Handbook, by McGraw-Hill Book Company at a Goodwill store. The cover was beat-up,
but the inside pages are all good. The "Mathematical and Electrical Tables" section
has an interesting method for calculating up to the sixth harmonic of any periodic
waveform by dividing the period into twelve equal parts (in time) and noting the
amplitudes at each point - aka "The
Twelve Ordinate Scheme." Those values are plugged into a host of equations that
yield essentially the Fourier coefficients for a 12-element polynomial describing
the curve. The text also provides equations for calculating harmonic content. Calculating
the polynomial coefficients is a simple process of doing iterations of sums and
differences of amplitudes, a la the Fourier analysis. Care must be taken to get
the numbers right or the resulting equation will not reproduce the original waveform.
In 1941, the user needed to look up in a table or find on a slide rule the sines
and cosines of nωt angles associated with each term, then multiply that by the calculated
coefficient. Finally, after all twelve points were figured...
 RF
Cafe Forums closed its virtual doors in 2012 mainly due to other social media platforms
dominating public commenting venues. RF Cafe Forums began sometime around August
of 2003 and was quite well-attended for many years. By 2010, Facebook and Twitter
were overwhelmingly dominating online personal interaction, and RF Cafe Forums activity
dropped off precipitously. If the folks at phpBB would release a version with integrated
sign-in from the major social media platforms, I would resurrect the RF Cafe Forums,
but until then it is probably not worth the effort. Regardless, there are still
lots of great posts in the archive that ware worth looking at.
 Part I of this article appeared in last month's
(September 1966) edition of QST, which explains why Fig. 3 is the
first one in this article. It introduced concepts in antenna types and siting. This
second part talks about cost tradeoffs for various aspects of a
DX setup.
Author Paul Rockwell does a nice job of providing graphs of cost versus performance
increases for transmitter power, antenna gain, tower height and constructions, etc.
He uses prices typical of the mid 1960s, but even without knowing the equivalent
modern day equipment prices, the shapes of the curves are good indicators of where
the point of diminishing returns exists. Paul Rockwell wrote a 4-part series on
station design for long distance (DX) communications that covered antenna selection
and siting (Part I), economics and construction (Part II), station configuration
and receiver...
RF Cascade Workbook 2018 is the next phase in the evolution
of RF Cafe's long-running series, RF Cascade Workbook. Chances are you
have never used a spreadsheet quite like this (click here for screen capture). It is a full-featured RF system
cascade parameter and frequency planner that includes filters and mixers for a mere
$45. Built in MS Excel, using RF Cascade Workbook 2018 is a cinch
and the format is entirely customizable. It is significantly easier and faster than
using a multi-thousand dollar simulator when a high level system analysis is all
that is needed. An intro video takes you through the main features...
ConductRF is continually innovating and
developing new and improved solutions for RF Interconnect needs. See the latest
TESTeCON RF Test
Cables for labs. ConductRF makes production and test coax cable assemblies for
amplitude and phased matched VNA applications as well as standard & precision
RF connectors. Over 1,000 solutions for low PIM in-building to choose from in the
iBwave component library. They also provide custom coax solutions for applications
where some standard just won't do. A partnership with Newark assures fast, reliable
access. Please visit ConductRF today to see how they can help your project!
These archive pages are provided in order to make it easier for you to find items
that you remember seeing on the RF Cafe homepage. Of course probably the easiest
way to find anything on the website is to use the "Search
RF Cafe" box at the top of every page.
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