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4 of the May 2021 homepage archives. Friday the 7th
 Sometimes finding an existing instance of
one of the vintage radios is difficult or impossible. The
RCA Victor Model 54Bx portables are an exception. Plenty can be found for purchase
on eBay as this is written, as was a 54B1, 54B3, and a 54B4. I did a capture of
some of the listing images for a Model 54B2, and had Archive.org story a copy for
once the eBay site deletes it. In the internal photos, all four miniature vacuum
tubes (3S4, 1S5, 1R5, 1T4) can be clearly seen. Note also in the photos you can
see where, per the alignment procedure, rubber bands have been place around the
tubes in order to keep them from moving. The extremely cramped space required particular
attention to the routing of interconnect wires...
 Triad RF Systems is a fast-growing leader in
the design and manufacture of RF power amplifiers and radio systems. We are looking
for an experienced Electronic Assembly Technician to support our growth. This position
will work in our Assembly Team under the direction of our Production Manager. Required
skills and qualifications include assembles electronic components, assemblies, subassemblies,
RF modules and systems with work orders and visual work instruction as directed
by the Production Manager. Performs mechanical assembly operations while building
electronic assemblies using standard measuring tools and techniques, performs electronic
assembly operations such as wire termination, and installation...
 Remember the Sunday comics feature for kids
where there was a picture drawn with things wrong in it, and you had to find them
all? This 1950 advertisement for the Sangamo Electric Company's line of capacitors,
which appeared in Radio & Television News magazine, could server as a modern-day
version for the Cancel Culture "woke" crowd that believes it has a duty to criticize
and impugn everything it happens to fear, not like, or not understand. My list is
at the bottom of the page if you want to compare it to yours. On other Sangamo ad
post pages I have provided a bit of research on the background of "Samgamo" to try
to determine whether the use of Native Americans (aka "indians" at the time) was
based on a local tribe. No link has ever been found. Below the ad are a few of the
items discovered...
 The "Rainy
Day Amusements" feature was not usually a mathematical challenge; for that,
see the "Old & New Mathematical Puzzles" section. Some years they were worthwhile,
end others not so much so. 1982 was a pretty good year for Rainy Day Amusements,
so they are included here. Each autumn I used to anxiously await the appearance
of the newest edition of The Old Farmer's Almanac on the store shelf, and such was
the case with this 1982 issue. It is not that I was/am an avid farmer, just that
I enjoy reading the anecdotes, tales, and interesting historical tidbits included
amongst the pages along with tables of high and low tides, moon and sun rising and
setting times...
 Electromagnetics simulation software company
CENOS continues on its mission to democratize simulation software by releasing its
newest application designed for radio frequency and antenna design engineers. After
a year of development and testing in close cooperation with its avid beta-tester
community, the Antenna Design simulation software was finally released for public
use at the end of April, 2021.
CENOS Antenna Design is an intuitive FEM-based software that helps engineers
to speed up RF antenna design, it solves Maxwell’s equations directly with no simplifications
or limitations. CENOS Antenna Design is free to try for 10 days, after which the
users can choose from the two subscription plans - for an individual or business
use, starting from €20/mo ($25/mo)...
 Berkeley Nucleonics Corporation (BNC) is
a leading manufacturer of precision electronic instrumentation for test, measurement,
and nuclear research. Founded in 1963, BNC initially developed custom pulse generators.
We became known for meeting the most stringent requirements for high precision and
stability, and for producing instruments of unsurpassed reliability and performance.
We continue to maintain a leadership position as a developer of custom pulse, signal,
light, and function generators. Our designs incorporate the latest innovations in
software and hardware engineering, surface mount production, and automated testing
procedures.
Thursday the 6th
 This story was posted sometime around 2009.
Since that time, research has been conducted by members of the
Harvard Wireless Club
regarding the veracity of the claim. RF Cafe visitor Fred Hopengarten, Esq. (K1VR),
wrote to apprise me of the situation. It concludes as follows: "Back in 1999, the
late K3UOC, who received his Ed.D. from the Harvard Graduate School of Education
and was very active with our club, wrote: Note: This legend has been published and
told by word-of-mouth countless times over the past 90 years. Unfortunately, it
isn't so. HWC members researched this story, even obtaining the copy of the Congressional
Record for the date in question. We could find no record of Mr. Hyman appearing
before congress. We have to admit, though, it's a very entertaining story!"
 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...
 You always need to pay careful attention
to "breakthrough" type articles when they appear in April issues, since many magazines
have a tradition of burying an "April Fools' Day" item without notice. This April
1932 issue of QST magazine seems to be legitimate. The term "lycopodium
pattern" aroused my suspicion, but it turns out to refer to a pattern of vibration
that resembles the needle orientation of certain pines and cedars. As radio frequencies
continued to increase during the early years of "wireless" development, the use
of quartz crystals as a stable reference source ran into a physical limitation because
as crystal slices reached a certain thinness, overtone and subharmonics appeared
that caused problems in circuits. A new mineral called tourmaline saved the day.
With an elasticity much greater than quartz, tourmaline is able to vibrate at higher
fundamental frequencies for a given thickness...
Triad RF Systems is a fast-growing leader in the design and manufacture of RF
power amplifiers, bidirectional amplifiers, and RF systems. We are looking for a
Senior RF Design Engineer to join our team in New Jersey. The Senior RF Design Engineer
will lead the development of new SSPA and transmit / receive products for our rapidly
expanding catalog and customer base. Required skills and qualifications include
Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering or equivalent related experience, minimum
5 years professional experience in RF engineering, experience with the simulation,
design, test, and realization of RF power amplifiers and low noise receiver front-ends
operating up through C Band, SSPA design knowledge or experience up to 50 W...
 Exodus Advanced Communications'
AMP2043P-4KW Solid State Pulse Amplifier (1.0-2.0 GHz, 4 kW Pulse)
is designed for Pulse/HIRF Mil-Std 461/464 and Radar applications. Other frequency
ranges & power levels available all providing Superb Pulse Fidelity. Up to 100 μsec
pulse widths, 6% duty cycles and 66 dB gain. Available monitoring parameters
for Forward/Reflected power, VSWR, voltage, current, temperature sensing for outstanding
reliability and ruggedness in a 10U chassis. Features Small form factor rack-mounted
system, Class AB linear advanced technology design, instantaneous L-Band octave
bandwidth, linear high peak pulse applications, designed for EMI/RFI, lab, HiRF/pulse
applications...
 LadyBug Technologies was founded in 2004
by two microwave engineers with a passion for quality microwave test instrumentation.
Our employees offer many years experience in the design and manufacture of the worlds
best vector network analyzers, spectrum analyzers, power meters and associated components.
The management team has additional experience in optical power testing, military
radar and a variety of programming environments including LabVIEW, VEE and other
languages often used in programmatic systems. Extensive experience in a broad spectrum
of demanding measurement applications. You can be assured that our Power Sensors
are designed, built, tested and calibrated without compromise.
Wednesday the 5th
 Here is another trio of vintage electronics-themed
comics from Radio-Craft magazine. Two are part of illustrator Frank Beaven's
"Radio
Terms Illustrated" series, where readers would write in with suggestions and
Mr. Beaven would put the ideas in ink. These two are "Poor Reception, and "Regeneration."
If you look at the bottom of the page, you will find a big listing of other comics,
with many of the other "Radio Terms Illustrated" instances ("High Potential," "Signal
Generator," "Overload Capacity," "Amplitude," "Transmission Loss," etc.) labeled.
Enjoy!
 Each autumn I used to anxiously await the
appearance of the newest edition of The
Old Farmer's Almanac on the store shelf, and such was the case with this 1982
issue. It is not that I was/am an avid farmer, just that I enjoy reading the anecdotes,
tales, and interesting historical tidbits included amongst the pages along with
tables of high and low tides, moon and sun rising and setting times, astronomical
events, and weather patterns expected for the year that lay ahead. Most of all,
I liked working the puzzles and riddles. Over the years the difficulty levels gradually
got lower and lower (aka dumbed down), to the point where for the last decade or
so I have not even bothered buying the OFA. Now it is full of numbnut stuff. Because
quite a few of the Mathematical Puzzles from the older editions are worthy of an
engineer's cerebration...
 Rohde & Schwarz has produced a webinar
entitled "Pulse
Stability Measurement of Radar Signals," which is available for viewing on their
website. They appreciate your registering, but if for some reason it doesn't work,
click on the thumbnail above to go directly to it. "With the arrival of sophisticated
radar and communication systems, phase noise has become the most important factor
engineers focus on during the design and validation phase. Phase stability is the
key parameter for defining target acquisition in radars, spectral integrity in communication
systems and precision beam steering capabilities in active electronic scanned array
antennas (AESA)..."
 It is important to concentrate your transmitter
power into the proper beam if you wish to deliver the best signal to the other fellow's
receiving antenna. This has logically led to the popularity of the Yagi beam antenna
on the higher-frequency amateur bands. A beam antenna for the 80-meter band should
have a 140-foot reflector and a 77-foot boom on a 250-foot tower. This makes the
beam antenna impractical for the 80-meter band, and even for 40-meter operation
a full-size Yagi is a forbidding structure to the neighbor's narrow-minded view
- even a well-trained XYL might view such a monster beam with alarm. There is no
easy solution to the need for a good DX antenna at low frequency, but the conical
monopole antenna may be of interest to the more eager radio amateur as a more practical
solution. The
conical monopole antenna is a base-fed vertical antenna that has an omni-directional
pattern in azimuth but with an elevation...
 Axiom Test Equipment, an electronic test
equipment rental and sales company, has published a new blog post that aims at informing
people about the importance of carbon neutrality and about the different test equipment
that support it with the help of
regenerative energy. It suggests a thinking-out-of-the-box approach regarding
how "test applications can strive for low carbon footprints by characterizing the
quality of a device under test (DUT) that supports carbon neutrality, such as regenerative
energy in an EV's charging system. Efficient use of energy is possible by feeding
power generated by a DUT during the measurements back to the power grid, rather
than dissipating the energy as heat lost to the environment." On a single DUT (Device
Under Test) basis that might seem insignificant, but when hundreds of millions of
vehicles are being tested of time, the energy saved can be enormous...
 Exodus Advanced Communications is a multinational
RF communication equipment and engineering service company serving both commercial
and government entities and their affiliates worldwide. Power amplifiers ranging
from 10 kHz to 51 GHz with various output power levels and noise figure
ranges, we fully support custom designs and manufacturing requirements for both
small and large volume levels. decades of combined experience in the RF field for
numerous applications including military jamming, communications, radar, EMI/EMC
and various commercial projects with all designing and manufacturing of our HPA,
MPA, and LNA products in-house.
Tuesday the 4th
 It is little wonder that advancements in
technology, mathematics, finance, medicine, chemistry, and other disciplines requiring
massive
numerical computation began accelerating at a rapid pace following the invention
of computers. The mechanical computers of Blaise Pascal and Charles Babbage were
some of the earliest attempts to make laborious, repetitious calculations faster
and less error prone, and they quickly led to many other types of general- and special-purpose
machines that by the mid-twentieth century were calculating ballistic flight paths,
astronomical positions, electrical circuit functions, probabilities, and other quantities.
Programmable electronics computers like the ENIAC greatly enhanced the ability to
apply mathematics to just about any problem. However, even by the early Apollo era
the government and private institutions employed teams of human calculators to crank
out large volumes of tabular data...
 "China launched the first module for its
space station into orbit late Wednesday, but the mission launcher also reached orbit
and is slowly and unpredictably heading back to Earth. The Long March 5B, a variant
of China's largest rocket, successfully launched the 22.5-metric-ton Tianhe module
from Wenchang Thursday local time... Designed specifically to launch space station
modules into low Earth orbit, the Long March 5B uniquely uses a core stage and four
side boosters to place its payload directly into low Earth orbit... this core stage
is now also in orbit and is likely to make an uncontrolled reentry over the next
days or week as growing interaction with the atmosphere drags it to Earth. If so,
it will be one of the largest instances of uncontrolled reentry of a spacecraft
and could potentially land on an inhabited area..."
 Windfreak Technologies designs, manufactures,
tests and sells high value USB powered and controlled radio frequency products
such as RF signal generators, RF synthesizers, RF power detectors, mixers, up /
downconverters. Since the conception of WFT, we have introduced products that have
been purchased by a wide range of customers, from hobbyists to education facilities
to government agencies. Worldwide customers include Europe, Australia, and Asia.
Please contact Windfreak today to learn how they might help you with your current
project.
 Anyone who has done a lot of
electronics troubleshooting - especially on a wide variety of hardware - knows
that proficiency depends on acquiring a 'feel' for how things ought to be. An oft-given
example is that bank tellers and store clerks are taught to spot counterfeit bills
not by showing them what all the different phony currency looks like, but what real
money looks like. That way, anything that does not look familiar is readily apparent.
The same philosophy has served technicians and engineers well since the beginning
of electrical and electronic circuits. The more senses that can be drawn upon to
facilitate troubleshooting, the more quickly you are likely to pinpoint the problem.
Depending on the symptoms of the failure, sniffing the assembly for toasted or cracked
components and looking for discolored areas is a good first step for catastrophic
scenarios. Broken wires and failed solder joints are very common causes, as are
partially plugged-in or contaminated...
 Triad RF Systems, a leading designer and
manufacturer of innovative RF/Microwave amplifiers and integrated radio systems
for challenging environments, is proud to announce that in partnership with Blue
Canyon Technologies (BCT), now a wholly owned subsidiary of Raytheon, a Triad RF
amplifier is providing high
RF power in the transmitter of a BCT nano-satellite. The units are presently
stored in the Northrop Grumman Cygnus spacecraft which docked with the International
Space Station (ISS) in February of this year. The spacecraft is part of the NG-15
commercial resupply mission and will remain attached to the ISS until May. The BCT
nano-satellite powered by the Triad RF amplifier will be released from Cygnus on
the return trip. Once launched, it will be enabling the ultra-long range data communication
link needed to continuously monitor the spacecraft from earth...
 "There
were few bright spots in the pandemic summer of 2020. One of the most dazzling was
the flight of U.S. astronauts to the International Space Station and their safe
return to Earth aboard a commercial spacecraft from SpaceX. This demonstration was
significant for many reasons, one of which was that it suggested a future in which
NASA, freed from the demands of getting people to low Earth orbit, could aim much
farther. Perhaps as far as Venus. Excitement over a possible mission to Venus was
stoked by the (now somewhat disputed) discovery of phosphine gas - a possible sign
of microbial life - in that planet's atmosphere. But the second planet from the
sun has such an
extreme environment that the longest-lasting lander, the Soviet Venera 13, was
able to send data for only 2 hours and 7 minutes. The average surface temperature
on Venus is 464 °C..."
 Withwave manufactures an extensive line of
metrology quality coaxial test cable assemblies, connectors (wave-, end-, vertical-launch,
board edge, panel mount), calibration kits (SOLT), a
fully automated
4-port vector network analyzer (VNA) calibrator, between- and in-series connector
adaptors, attenuators, terminations, DC blocks, torque wrenches, test probes &
probe positioner. Special test fixtures for calibration and multicoax cable assemblies.
Frequency ranges from DC through 110 GHz. Please contact Withwave today to
see how they can help your project succeed.
Monday the 3rd
 At the end of World War II, much of
the basic technology developed under the cover of secrecy was made available to
the public for the purpose of stimulating research and development for commercial
purposes. As with selling surplus material to the American public at significant
discounts, the plan was to reward citizens for a five-year-long sacrifice in the
effort to beat back the advances of Communism, Socialism, Marxism, and the other
oppressive forms of "isms" around the world. History shows that the effort resulted
in a major post-war era of prosperity and a general feeling of well-being by the
country. This
Sperry Gyroscope Company advertisement appeared in a 1946 issue of Radio-Craft
magazine, promoting its development of gyroscopically stabilized marine radar. Other
magazines of the era and into the 1970s...
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...
 Here is an interesting article on the EE
Times website entitled, "Radar
Safety Warning: 'Don't Cross the Streams'." In it, author Junko Yoshida tells
a tale of potential problems that can emerge when a highway filled with radar-equipped
vehicles need to content with each other's broadcasts. He begins, "The little-noted
issue of radar safety is emerging as a potential Achilles heel of driver-assist
and highly automated vehicles: radar signals interfere with each other. Radar has
become an essential sensing modality complementing CMOS imaging cameras. Radar works
in all weather conditions and enables a range of automated driving features, including
automatic emergency Brakes (AEB). But radars can be foiled or faulty if they end
up, like Ghostbusters' particle accelerators, crossing each other's streams..."
 Here is an interesting article that appeared
in a 1962 issue of Popular Electronics magazine discussing some of the
early electronic system developments that were based on
sensory elements found in nature. I'm a bit surprised and disappointed that
the author made the mistake of equating a bat's sound-based detection and navigation
system to radar rather than sonar. Yes, the principles of operation are the same
regarding transmitting a signal and then computing the distance based on the round-trip
time of the reflected signal, but there is a fundamental difference between radar
which uses radio (the 'ra' part of radar) signals and sonar which uses the sound
(the 'so' part of sonar) signals. I would bet that if I had the following December
or January edition of the magazine, I would find a letter to the editor...
 Each autumn I used to anxiously await the
appearance of the newest edition of
The Old Farmer's Almanac on the store shelf, and such was the case with this
1981 issue. It is not that I was/am an avid farmer, just that I enjoy reading the
anecdotes, tales, and interesting historical tidbits included amongst the pages
along with tables of high and low tides, moon and sun rising and setting times,
astronomical events, and weather patterns expected for the year that lay ahead.
Most of all, I liked working the puzzles and riddles. Over the years the difficulty
levels gradually got lower and lower (aka dumbed down), to the point where for the
last decade or so I have not even bothered buying the OFA. Now it is full of numbnut
stuff...
 PCBONLINE supplies complex rigid and flex-rigid
printed circuit
boards (PCBs)，and one-stop production with maximum flexibility ranging from
prototype sample to mass production. Rigid-flex, HDI, multilayer, IC-loadboard,
LCP 5G optical module, ceramic, MCPCB. Materials include Rogers, Taconic, Arlon,
Isola, Bergquist, Kapton, Panasonic, and more. After more than 15 years of continuous
efforts, PCBONLINE constantly updates our equipment, improves our technology, and
serves you with the highest quality. Cost and delivery quotations online without
the need for multiple phone call and/or e-mails.
Sunday the 2nd
 This
Wireless
Theme Crossword Puzzle for May 2nd has many words and clues related to RF, microwave,
and mm-wave engineering, optics, mathematics, chemistry, physics, and other technical
subjects. 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., Reginald Denny or the Tunguska
event in Siberia). The technically inclined cruciverbalists amongst us will appreciate
the effort. Enjoy!
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