Electronic Menu Quiz
August 1963 Popular Electronics

August 1963 Popular Electronics Table of Contents Wax nostalgic about and learn from the history of early electronics. See articles from Popular Electronics, published October 1954 - April 1985. All copyrights are hereby acknowledged.

This Electronic Menu Quiz appeared in the August 1963 edition of Popular Electronics magazine. Robert Balin created many such quizzes for Popular Electronics over the years (see list below). It challenges you to match the common food-related term for a device with its picture. If you've been around electronics labs and/or read electronics hobbyist magazines for a while, chances are you have run across most of the terms. I suggest you click on the image to get a full-size view of the drawings to be able to see all the detail. A couple of the names I have to admit not being familiar, so they seem rather 'corny'... get it?

Electronic Menu Quiz

By Robert P. Balin

Many of the nicknames most technicians use for electronic parts, effects, or methods, are also names of common foodstuffs, such as those on the electronic menu below. Of course, any resemblance is purely a visual one! Nevertheless, see if you can match the electronic dishes (1-10) with the corresponding sketches (A-L).

1  Spaghetti __ 

2  Ham __ 

3  Link __

4  Acorn __

5  Prune __

6  Banana __

7  Honey__

8  Pie __

9  Cone__

10  Salt __

Answers below.

Quizzes from vintage electronics magazines such as Popular Electronics, Electronics-World, QST, and Radio News were published over the years - some really simple and others not so simple. Robert P. Balin created most of the quizzes for Popular Electronics. This is a listing of all I have posted thus far.

1 - J  SPAGHETTI is the slip-on sleeving used to insulate bare wiring.

2 - C  A HAM is a radio operator who has been granted an FCC amateur radio license and call letters.

3 - G  The part of a fuse that melts when the rated current is exceeded is the LINK.

4 - A  The ACORN is a type of vacuum tube for UHF applications, which has no base, and has its pins

          brought out through the sides of the glass envelope.

5 - H  To PRUNE a coil means to adjust the spacing between turns or to remove turns to alter its inductance.

6 - F  A BANANA plug has a segmented springy metal prong that maintains a low-resistance contact in the

         mating socket.

7 - I  A HONEYcomb coil has a pattern in which the position of adjacent turns is continuously shifted to

         minimize distributed capacitance.

8 - D  The PIEcrust effect is a kind of TV picture distortion due to a hunting action in the horizontal

          automatic frequency control circuit.

9 - B  A CONE is the conical paper diaphragm in a loudspeaker.

10 - E  Rochelle SALT crystals having the chemical name sodium potassium tartrate are used in

           phonograph cartridges.

Posted October 20, 2020
(updated from original post on 3/12/2013)