Homepage Archive - August 2024 (page 2)

Friday the 16th

Thursday the 15th

Wednesday the 14th

Tuesday the 13th

Monday the 12th

Friday the 9th

Traffic Jam Ahead on Short Waves

Prior to the advent of wireless communications and distributed electric power distribution networks, the phenomenon of sunspot activity was mostly a curiosity of nature. The average eleven-year cycle of sunspot minimums and maximums had been known since the eighteenth century when astronomers began making recordings of the quantity of observable sunspots. I specify observable because those on the sun's far side cannot be seen until they rotate with the sun to a place where we can see them. The sun's rotational period varies from about 25 days at the equator to 34 days at the poles. Viewed from above the ecliptic plane, the sun rotates CCW, as does Earth's revolution path around the sun...

Anatech Intros 3 New Filters for August

Anatech Electronics offers the industry's largest portfolio of high-performance standard and customized RF and microwave filters and filter-related products for military, commercial, aerospace and defense, and industrial applications up to 40 GHz. Three new ceramic bandpass filters have been announced for August 2024 - a 867.5 MHz filter with a bandwidth of 15 MHz, a1200 MHz filter with a bandwidth of 100 MHz, and a 1280 MHz filter with a bandwidth of 5 MHz. All have an insertion loss of no more than 4 dB...

The Dit-Dah Makers

A lot of innovation went into perfecting telegraph keys. The earliest keys were the familiar "straight key" tapping type where the operator uses a single finger to close a set of contacts that "keyed" the transmitter for a burst of RF energy. The length of each "dit" or "dah" was determined by the operator's dwell time. It didn't take long for someone to improve on the scheme by designing keys that assured an adjustable, constant length for a dit or a dah. Poor quality transmitters with lousy rising and falling edge signatures at the beginning and end, respectively, of a CW (continuous wave) pulse made matters worse...

Everything in This Photo Is Now in Your Pocket

This meme photo showed up online. I couldn't locate its source. That thing in your pocket is of course your smartphone. At some point between the 1970s and 2000, I owned some version of all those items - VCR player, handheld calculator, portable "boom box" type combo AM/FM/shortwave radio / cassette tape player, Walkman tape player, 8-track tape player, cassette video camera, CD player, bulky stereo headset. I still own some version of all of them. Plenty of others are around showing dial phones with corded handsets, car windows with roll-up handles, CRT televisions, kids riding bikes without helmets or kneepads, "dumb" kitchen appliances, kids in the back of pickup trucks, etc. We of the era survived it all. Yes, modern devices and methods are usually as good or better than the older equipment, but I would gladly trade today's world for the way it was 40 years ago, even with the bulkier, single function devices. It's an old guy thing.

Electronic Crosswords

This "Electronics Crosswords" puzzle appeared in the May 1963 edition of Electronics World magazine. If you happen to be an avid cruciverbalist, then you might want to try a few of the RF and microwave engineering themed crosswords that I have been publishing weekly for a decade. Unlike the crosswords I create that use only science- and technology-related words and clues, this one does contain a few common words for fill-ins. Donald Moffatt create many such crosswords...

Engineering & Tech Headlines <Archives>

? FCC Mobile Phone Unlocking Requirement

? Hexagonal Boron Nitride Based RF Switch up to 120 GHz

? Amateur Radio in World's Largest Naval Exercise

? Canada Bolsters NY Semiconductor Corridor

? Huawei Global R&D Center Completed

RF & Electronics Symbols for Office™

It was a lot of work, but I finally finished a version of the "RF & Electronics Schematic & Block Diagram Symbols"" that works well with Microsoft Office? programs Word?, Excel?, and Power Point?. This is an equivalent of the extensive set of amplifier, mixer, filter, switch, connector, waveguide, digital, analog, antenna, and other commonly used symbols for system block diagrams and schematics created for Visio?. Each of the 1,000+ symbols was exported individually from Visio in the EMF file format, then imported into Word on a Drawing Canvas. The EMF format allows an image to be scaled up or down without becoming pixelated, so all the shapes can be resized in a document and still look good. The imported symbols can also be UnGrouped into their original constituent parts for editing...

Thursday the 8th

Live Wire with a Loot Locator

Cark Kohler's indefatigable and unflappable electronics do-it-yourselfer, the lesser half of Friend Wife, is at it again in this "Live Wire with a Loot Locator" technodrama in a 1969 issue of Popular Electronics magazine. His latest junk box endeavor is the Kohler Loot Locator, which, per his ambitious claims, will unearth - literally - endless treasures buried in the sandy beaches surrounding their humble abode. Of course the missus is typically dubious of his success, given past brainchildren and displays of electromechanical prowess. This time proved different, for a reason you will discover upon reading the story. That Sonalert mentioned being part of the Loot Locator is an audible alarm product still manufactured by...

Things They Do Not Teach You in Engineering School

"Engineering colleges and universities generally do a good job of teaching the fundamentals. On the other hand they are often lagging in the latest technologies and practices. It is hard for colleges to keep up with what is happening in the mainstream but most do eventually get around to updating their courses and curriculum. However, there are some things they never seem to teach. Here is my short list of topics I always thought they should include but perpetually do not. Troubleshooting - If you are a real hands-on engineer you do troubleshooting. It may involve your current project or trying to fix something designed by another. It may be at the component level or at the systems..."

Communications on the Moon

"Almost simultaneously as they are flashed before the NASA officials, the signals bearing in minute detail the progress of Apollo 11 will be broadcast internationally, allowing the entire world to share in the drama of the manned lunar landing." Such a statement meant something much different in 1969 than it does today when this article appeared in Electronics World magazine. Back then, it meant news and government organizations with the required equipment would be able to receive the information and then disseminate it via secondary media sources like TV, radio, magazine, and newspaper. Today it means a real-time feed is available on the Internet for anyone with a network connection to access. This article was written in a forward-looking tone since the August issue would...

Blog: Meters and Probes Evaluate EM Fields

Transcat | Axiom Test Equipment, an electronic test equipment rental company has published a new blog post that features the Wavecontrol SMP3 Portable EM Field Meter. Learn about the different features and capabilities that this unit offers when detecting and measuring electromagnetic fields. Depending upon the field probe attached, the SMP3 can make frequency-selective or broadband measurements of electric (E) field, magnetic (H) field and EM fields as high as 90 GHz in frequency. The SMP3 EM field meter is a multifunction unit, capable of broadband EM field measurements, static field measurements, and even low-frequency Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) spectrum analysis from 1 Hz to 10 MHz...

Decibels Without Logs

Experienced RF engineers, technicians, and hobbyists employ decibels in their writings and speech with the fluidity and familiarity of chemists discussing pH levels, geneticists recommending DNA sequencing enzymes, astrophysicists calculating gravitational lensing constants for massive galaxies, or vintage car motorheads calling out ignition timing in reference to TDC (top-dead-center). This 1969 Electronics World magazine article by William Miller takes yet another shot at helping those uninitiated in the realm of decibels to be effectively functional until an eventual - and necessary - firm grasp of the concept is obtained. The real solution, of course, is to just hunker...

Espresso Engineering Workbook? for Excel

The newest release of RF Cafe's spreadsheet (Excel) based engineering and science calculator is now available - Espresso Engineering Workbook?. Among other additions, it now has a Butterworth Bandpass Calculator, and a Highpass Filter Calculator that does not just gain, but also phase and group delay! Since 2002, the original Calculator Workbook has been available as a free download. Continuing the tradition, RF Cafe Espresso Engineering Workbook? is also provided at no cost, compliments of my generous sponsors. The original calculators are included, but with a vastly expanded and improved user interface. Error-trapped user input cells help prevent entry of invalid values. An extensive use of Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) functions now do most of the heavy lifting with calculations, and facilitates a wide user-selectable choice of units for voltage, frequency, speed, temperature, power, wavelength, weight, etc. In fact, a full page of units conversion calculators is included. A particularly handy feature is the ability to specify the the number of significant digits to display. Drop-down menus are provided for convenience...

 

 

 

 

Coin-Sized 3D Printer Photonic Chip Laser-Steering

"It's well known that additive manufacturing (AM) of various distinct types and using a range of materials, often collectively referred to as '3D printing' in popular terminology, has dramatically changed if not revolutionized prototyping, model building, repair and maintenance, and even some production-scale manufacturing lines. AM has also enabled fabrication of objects that would be difficult or impossible to create using traditional forming, molding, casting, etching, or machining operations. While the size of these 3D printers varies, they’re typically tabletop size measuring a few feet..."

X-Ray Sees Transistors in 3D

"An upgraded X-ray imaging technique can provide crisp, 3D images of the inner workings of chips, revealing their designs and their flaws. The method has a resolution of 4 nanometers, providing images clear enough to map a chip's wiring paths and reveal tiny transistor features without destroying the chip. A team of scientists at Paul Scherrer Institute, including Tomas Aidukas and Mirko Holler, developed the improved imaging technique along with University of Southern California's Tony Levi and ETH Zürich's Gabriel Aeppli. It builds on an earlier method developed by largely the same team, called ptychographic X-ray laminography (PyXL)..."

Designing for EMP Resilience

"Every aspect of life today is encompassed by some sort of microprocessor-based electronic device intended to simplify tasks, reduce processing times, increase efficiency, and improve accuracy. Electronics are used to communicate with loved ones, manage finances, fly aircraft, autonomously drive us to work, and even save lives. As we achieve further advances in technology, electronics will continue to lead the way in adapting these technologies into new critical systems and processes. However, there is a significant drawback as the implementation of sensitive electronic circuitry continues to increase our vulnerability to the effects of electromagnetic threats such as an EMP attack. An electromagnetic pulse (EMP) is defined..."

Spin Qubits Go Trampolining with Germanium

This is a dumb graphic. "Researchers at QuTech developed somersaulting spin qubits for universal quantum logic. This achievement may enable efficient control of large semiconductor qubit arrays. Over twenty years after Loss and DiVincenzo's proposal for quantum computation with quantum dots, QuTech researchers have realized these concepts using germanium to facilitate spin control. This approach simplifies the electronics needed for quantum computing, demonstrating effective control over extended quantum dot arrays. Quantum Dot Qubits In 1998, Loss and DiVincenzo published the seminal work..."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Promote Your Company on RF Cafe

Banner Ads are rotated in all locations on the page! RF Cafe typically receives 8,000-15,000 visits each weekday. RF Cafe is a favorite of engineers, technicians, hobbyists, and students all over the world. With more than 17,000 pages in the Google search index, RF Cafe returns in favorable positions on many types of key searches, both for text and images. Your Banner Ads are displayed on average0,000 times per year! 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. If you need your company news to be seen, RF Cafe is the place to be...

RF Cascade Workbook

RF Cascade Workbook 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 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...

RF & Electronics Stencils for Visio

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 stencil symbol has been built to fit proportionally on the included A-, B-, and C-size drawing page templates (or use your own page if preferred). Components are provided for system block diagrams, conceptual drawings, schematics, test equipment, racks, and more. Page templates are provided with a preset scale (changeable) for a good presentation that can incorporate all provided symbols...

RF & Electronics Symbols for Office™

It was a lot of work, but I finally finished a version of the "RF & Electronics Schematic & Block Diagram Symbols"" that works well with Microsoft Office? programs Word?, Excel?, and Power Point?. This is an equivalent of the extensive set of amplifier, mixer, filter, switch, connector, waveguide, digital, analog, antenna, and other commonly used symbols for system block diagrams and schematics created for Visio?. Each of the 1,000+ symbols was exported individually from Visio in the EMF file format, then imported into Word on a Drawing Canvas. The EMF format allows an image to be scaled up or down without becoming pixelated, so all the shapes can be resized in a document and still look good. The imported symbols can also be UnGrouped into their original constituent parts for editing...

RF & Electronics Symbols for Visio

With more than 1000 custom-built symbols, this has got to be the most comprehensive set of Visio Symbols 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). Symbols 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...

Get Your Custom-Designed RF Cafe Gear!

This assortment of custom-designed themes by RF Cafe includes T-Shirts, Mouse Pads, Clocks, Tote Bags, Coffee Mugs and Steins, Purses, Sweatshirts, Baseball Caps, and more, all sporting my amazingly clever "RF Engineers - We Are the World's Matchmakers" Smith chart design. These would make excellent gifts for husbands, wives, kids, significant others, and for handing out at company events or as rewards for excellent service. My graphic has been ripped off by other people and used on their products, so please be sure to purchase only official RF Cafe gear. I only make a couple bucks on each sale - the rest goes to Cafe Press. It's a great way to help support RF Cafe. Thanks...

Espresso Engineering Workbook? for Excel

The newest release of RF Cafe's spreadsheet (Excel) based engineering and science calculator is now available - Espresso Engineering Workbook?. Among other additions, it now has a Butterworth Bandpass Calculator, and a Highpass Filter Calculator that does not just gain, but also phase and group delay! Since 2002, the original Calculator Workbook has been available as a free download. Continuing the tradition, RF Cafe Espresso Engineering Workbook? is also provided at no cost, compliments of my generous sponsors. The original calculators are included, but with a vastly expanded and improved user interface. Error-trapped user input cells help prevent entry of invalid values. An extensive use of Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) functions now do most of the heavy lifting with calculations, and facilitates a wide user-selectable choice of units for voltage, frequency, speed, temperature, power, wavelength, weight, etc. In fact, a full page of units conversion calculators is included. A particularly handy feature is the ability to specify the the number of significant digits to display. Drop-down menus are provided for convenience...

How to Target RFCafe.com for Your Google Ads

One aspect of advertising on the RF Cafe website I have not covered is using Google AdSense. The reason is that I never took the time to explore how - or even whether it is possible - to target a specific website for displaying your banner ads. A couple display opportunities have always been provided for Google Ads to display, but the vast majority of advertising on RF Cafe is done via private advertisers. That is, companies deal with me directly and I handle inserting their banner ads into the html page code that randomly selects and displays them. My advertising scheme is what the industry refers to as a "Tenancy Campaign," whereby a flat price per month is paid regardless of number of impressions or clicks. It is the simplest format and has seemed to work well for many companies. With nearly 4 million pageviews per year for RFCafe.com, the average impression rate per banner ad is about0k per year (in eight locations on each page, with >17k pages)...

New Articles

5/31/2024 Radio-Electronics June 1968 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

5/27/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1962 "What's Your EQ?"

5/27/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

5/27/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1962 "Telstar - Giant Step into the Future"

5/27/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1962 "News Briefs"

5/27/2024 Radio-Electronics June 1967 "R-E Puzzler"

5/24/2024 Radio-Electronics June 1967 "News Briefs"

5/24/2024 Radio-Electronics June 1967 "Our Electronic Future"

5/24/2024 36 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "Comsat: Communication in the Space Age"

5/23/2024 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "What's Your EQ?"

5/23/2024 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "World's Toughest R/C Job - Guidance in Outer Space"

5/22/2024 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "News Briefs"

5/22/2024 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "R-E Puzzler"

5/22/2024 Radio-Electronics May 1967 "Imaginary Numbers Are a Cinch - Part 1"

5/20/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1968 "Imaginary Numbers Are a Cinch - Part 2"

5/20/2024 Radio-Electronics December 1967 & January 1968 "Comics"

5/20/2024 Radio-Electronics December 1967 "Rotary Stepping Switches - They're Everywhere"

5/16/2024 Radio-Electronics November 1967 "What You Should Know About X-Ray Radiation in TV Sets"

5/7/2024 Radio-Electronics November 1967 "Rotary Stepping Switches - They're Everywhere"

5/7/2024 Radio-Electronics November 1967 "Hugo Gernsback Obituary"

5/7/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1962 "Our Patent Problem - A Proposed Solution"

5/3/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

5/3/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1962 "Mallory - Tips for Technicians" Ready 5/3/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1962 "News Briefs"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1962 "What's Your EQ?"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics July1962 "Handling the Metric Prefixes"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1962 "Bell Telephone Laboratories---"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1962 "News Briefs---"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1962 "Can You Name These Strange Electronic Effects?"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1962 "Electronic Navigation in Flight"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

5/1/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/30/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "Amphenol Polyfoam? Coaxial Cable"

4/30/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "---News Briefs"

4/30/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "Seeing is Believing in Cathode Research"

4/30/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "Electronic Cooling & Heating"

4/29/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "Future of Service Industry"

4/26/2024 Radio-Electronics January 1962 "What's Your EQ?"

4/26/2024 Radio-Electronics February 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/25/2024 Radio-Electronics February 1962 "News Briefs"

4/25/2024 Radio-Electronics February 1962 "Bell Telephone Laboratories Ad"

4/25/2024 Radio-Electronics February 1962 "FM Antennas for Better Listening"

4/25/2024 Radio-Electronics February 1962 "What's Your EQ?"

4/17/2024 Radio-Electronics March 1962 "What's Your EQ?"

4/17/2024 Radio-Electronics March 1962 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/17/2024 Radio-Electronics March 1962 "News Briefs"

4/17/2024 Radio-Electronics March 1962 "Electronic Careers in the Navy"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics March 1962 "Unexplored Electron Gap"

4/16/2024 Additional Text for Radio-Electronics June 1961 "What's Your EQ?"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "News Briefs-"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "RCA Electron Gun"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "Comics"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "Clear Road for FM Stereo"

4/16/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "Radio Power"

4/15/2024 Radio-Electronics July 1961 "What's Your EQ?"

4/15/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1961 "News Briefs"

4/12/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1961 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/12/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "Howard W. Sams & Co. Photofact Ad"

4/9/2024 Radio-Electronics August 1961 "What's Your EQ?"

4/9/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/9/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "News Briefs"

4/9/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "What Did de Forest Really Invent?"

4/9/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "D. Van Nostrand Company International Dictionary of Physics and Electronics"

4/5/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1961 "What's Your EQ?"

4/4/2024 Radio-Electronics October 1961 "Electronics-Themed Comics"

4/3/2024 Radio-Electronics October 1961 "News Briefs"

4/3/2024 Radio-Electronics November 1961 "Howard W. Sams Photofact Ad"

3/28/2024 Radio-Electronics September 1960 "Electronics-Themed Comics"