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Great Deal on Coaxial
and Twisted Pair Cable

Coaxial and Twisted Pair Cable for Sale - RF Cafe

Spools of various types of communications cables - RG-59 coax and a few kinds of twisted pair cables. Some reels / boxes are full or nearly full, and I guestimate at least 100 feet on others. Photos are shown below. Since I do not have the time or the will to unspool, measure the length of, and re-spool any of it...

Following the Science...Dr. David Martin

Dr. David Martin, at the International COVID Summit | 2003 European Parliament - RF CafeRegardless of your position on the appropriateness of actions taken by world governments and private entities regarding the COVID 19 debacle, if you truly do "believe the science" as we were all admonished to do, then you are obligated to avail yourself of validated, relevant data. Those of us who had researched the issue and arrived at our own conclusions early on were routinely condemned and demonized for daring to buck the official narrative. By all accounts we should have expired long ago from the virus while the believers enjoy practically eternal life from being vaxxed ... and revaxxed ... and revaxxed... Seems the opposite has happened. Sadly, many people still have not exposed themselves to information from other than the perpetrators of the deed. This presentation by Dr. David Martin, at the International COVID Summit | 2023 European Parliament will shock you (~15 minutes) regardless of your beliefs. The level of deception and lying has been epic - with catastrophic results. If you still enthusiastically support the official narrative, fear not, your heroes will not face any penalty. How many weeks will be needed next time to "flatten the curve?"

Simpson Electric Company 260 VOM

Simpson Electric Company Advertisement Model 260 VOM, July 1944 QST - RF CafeI was first introduced to the Simpson 260 volt-ohmmeter (VOM) in the radar shop where I was assigned in the USAF. Here is the modern version of that classic, the Simpson 260-8 VOM; it looks a lot like the original. Here is an advertisement that I scanned out of my copy of the July 1944 QST magazine. It highlights the precision to which its meter movement pivots are manufactured. "While Simpson Electric Company, chartered in 1934, is a firm with a distinguished past, it is just as importantly an organization with a dynamic present and a definite future." There is an entire website dedicated to the history of the Simpson 260. The famous 260 Volt-Ohm-Milliammeter put Simpson on the map and cemented a reputation for quality that still defines Simpson in the marketplace today." You can still buy a brand new Simpson 260 (-8) from Amazon - and it isn't cheap - or grab a vintage Simpson Model 260 on eBay for under $100...

Werbel 2-Way Power Divider 0.5-6 GHz

Werbel Microwave 2-Way Power Divider 500 MHz to 6 GHz - RF CafeWerbel Microwave, a designer and manufacturer of RF and microwave power couplers, dividers, terminations, and DAS equipment, introduces the Model D−2065−N from Werbel Microwave is a 2−way power splitter covering the continuous bandwidth of 500 MHz to 6 GHz. The product features low insertion loss of 0.9 dB, high isolation of 22 dB and excellent return loss performance of 19 dB. Tight phase and amplitude matching between outputs. Aluminum body with stainless steel N(F) connectors. Small size, only 0.75 in thick, allows for dense stacking in tight spaces. Werbel Microwave's catalog of directional couplers and power splitters / combiners are high performance at an affordable price point. Our original design. Click here for the C-9001-8.5 spec sheet. About Werbel Microwave In-House Manufacturing Capability Werbel Microwave started in 2014 humbly working out of a one-car garage. Since then we have grown to occupy a 1300 square foot office and shipped over 10,000 products to date...

Electronics Inventors Quiz

Electronics Inventors Quiz, November 1963 Popular Electronics - RF CafeMost of these matches of the devices and its inventor are pretty easy for people who have been around electronics for any length of time (well, not if the length of time is only a day or two), but there are a couple that just might stump you. This "Electronics Inventors Quiz" appeared in the November 1963 issue of Popular Electronics magazine, so you won't be challenged with knowing the inventors of the LCD or MEMS devices, but neither will you have to know who came up with the abacus or the Archimedes screw :-). I managed to score 100%, but that was admittedly partly luck in deciding between two men for items "B" and "C." The other eight should be a piece of cake for most RF Cafe visitors...

RF & Electronics Symbols for Visio

RF Electronics Wireless Analog Block Diagrams Symbols Shapes for Visio - RF CafeWith 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. The file format is XML so everything plays nicely with Visio 2013 and later...

Many Thanks for Alliance Test Equipment's Support!

Allied Test Equipment Products - RF CafeAlliance Test Equipment sells used / refurbished test equipment and offers short- and long-term rentals. They also offer repair, maintenance and calibration. Prices discounted up to 80% off list price. Agilent/HP, Tektronix, Anritsu, Fluke, R&S and other major brands. A global organization with ability to source hard to find equipment through our network of suppliers. Alliance Test will purchase your excess test equipment in large or small lots. Blog posts offer advice on application and use of a wide range of test equipment. Please visit Allied Test Equipment today to see how they can help your project.

Channel Master Antennas

Channel Master Antennas, October 1960 Electronics World - RF CafeThe decade of the 1960s was probably the heyday of television. Household incomes had been steadily rising since the end of World War II while inflation was relatively low. The Korean War was over and until around 1965 the country was not on a serious war footing. Game shows, soap operas, shows depicting non-dysfunctional families, variety show formats, non-woke cartoons, movies, and newscasts that didn't insult half the country with biased coverage fed the country's appetite for wholesome, useful entertainment. Once violent race riots and hippie anti-establishment protests became a major threat to safety and civic deportment, people monitored radio and television to keep abreast of events. In accord with rapidly improving television sets were advances in antenna technology. Viewers wanted the best possible picture and audio, and were willing to pay dearly for it. Through around the end of the 20th century, after which cable dominated as a transmission medium, over-the-air broadcasts in increasingly crowded RF environments made higher performance antennas even more necessary...

Compliant 3D-Printed Tunable GHz-Range Antenna

Compliant 3D-Printed Tunable GHz-Range Antenna - RF Cafe"Many situations arise in which an antenna needs to dynamically reconfigure its center frequency or beam pattern. In some cases, this can be done with a steerable, multi-element antenna array, but it's often not a viable solution for various reasons. As an alternative, a team of electrical engineers in the Penn State College of Engineering devised an innovative design for a reconfigurable patch antenna dubbed a reconfigurable compliant mechanism antenna (rCMA). The antenna, which leverages the inherent elastic properties of selected material to create a desired motion through controlled deformation, is designed to operate up to 10 GHz. These compliant mechanisms can be made as a planar structure from a single material yet still achieve multi-axis motion. Further, they can be designed as a full structure with minimal or even no assembly, require no lubrication, and their reliability is high, as it's based on the elastic properties of the material..."

War and the Radio Amateur

War and the Radio Amateur, May 1917 The Electrical Experimenter - RF CafeAmateur radio station operators seemed to always be amongst the first to lose their rights in time of war. Governmental power brokers - from unelected local bureaucrats on up to presidents - love to demonstrate their influence over citizens when the opportunity arises. The Radio Act of 1912 revoked the rights of amateur radio stations to operate, and in some cases authorized the confiscation of radio equipment for use by the government. Permission was not restored until 1919, after World War I. Amateurs took it on the chin again in World War II with revocation of licenses. In this 1917 article in The Electrical Experimenter magazine publisher Hugo Gernsback makes the case for permitting "our red-blooded boys be trusted to assist our officials in running down spies." "...we realize how absurd it is to close all privately owned radio stations during the war," says he. It fell on deaf ears, as usual. As the now mayor of Chicago once famously said, "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste..."

Anatech Intros 3 Filter Models

Anatech Electronics Intros 3 Filter Models for May 31st, 2023 - RF CafeAnatech 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 filter models have been introduced - a 1176 MHz / 1575 MHz ceramic duplexer with an 18 MHz minimum bandwidth, a 1616 - 1626.5 MHz cavity bandpass filter with TNC female connectors, and a 4900 MHz bandpass filter with N-type male / N-type female connectors. Custom RF power filter and directional couplers designs can be designed and produced with required connector types when a standard cannot be found, or the requirements are such that a custom approach is necessary...

Electronics and IGY

Electronics and IGY, March 1958 Popular Electronics - RF CafeThe International Geophysical Year (IGY) was an international scientific project that took place from July 1, 1957, to December 31, 1958. It was a collaborative effort involving scientists from around the world to conduct research in various fields of geophysics. The IGY was organized in response to a proposal by the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU) to promote international cooperation in the study of the Earth and its environment. The project aimed to advance our understanding of Earth's physical properties, including its atmosphere, oceans, and solid Earth. During the IGY, scientists conducted research in a wide range of disciplines, such as meteorology, seismology, glaciology, oceanography, and solar physics. They used cutting-edge technologies and established numerous research stations across the globe to gather data. One of the most significant achievements of the IGY was the International Geophysical Year Antarctic Program. Several countries established research bases in Antarctica, leading to significant discoveries about the continent's geology, weather patterns, and wildlife...

RF & Electronics Symbols for Office™

RF & Electronics Schematic & Block Diagram Symbols for Office™ r2 - RF CafeIt 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 or so 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. Check them out!

Many Thanks to Withwave for Long−Time Support!

Withwave RF & Microwave Components - RF CafeWithwave 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.

Mac's Service Shop: Technician or Consulting Engineer?

Mac's Service Shop: Technician or Consulting Engineer?, October 1960 Electronics World - RF CafeAfter reading the first paragraph of this "Mac's Service Shop" technodrama entitled, "Technician of Consulting Engineer?," I expected to be told a story about the seemingly excited customer exiting the shop as he returned from lunch. Had the man made an unreasonable demand on Mac McGregor, the proprietor, and was rebuffed appropriately? It never materialized. In the second paragraph underling technician Barney mentions having seen two men exiting the shop on his way in, not just one. At that point I'm wondering what sort of melee had just occurred. As it turned out, my interpretation of the event was totally incorrect. While explaining the happenings to Barney, he imparts, as he is want to do, a couple clever bits of technical information in the process. This appeared in the October 1960 issue of Electronics World magazine...

Thanks Again for Windfreak Technologies' Continued Support!

Windfreak TechnologiesWindfreak 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.

Moore's Law Getting More Complicated

Moore's Law Getting More Complicated - RF Cafe"There was a time, decades really, when all it took to make a better computer chip were smaller transistors and narrower interconnects. That time's long gone now, and although transistors will continue to get a bit smaller, simply making them so is no longer the point. The only way to keep up the exponential pace of computing now is a scheme called system technology co-optimization, or STCO, argued researchers at ITF World 2023 last week in Antwerp, Belgium. It's the ability to break chips up into their functional components, use the optimal transistor and interconnect technology for each function, and stitch them back together to create a lower-power, better-functioning whole. 'This leads us to a new paradigm for CMOS,' says Imec R&D manager Marie Garcia Bardon. CMOS 2.0, as the Belgium-based nanotech research organization is calling it, is a complicated vision. But it may be the most practical way forward..."

G & G Radio Supply Company

G & G Radio Supply Company Advertisement, October 1953 Radio & Television News - RF CafeIf only eBay had been around at the end of World War II, this surplus equipment would have dominated the electronics and electromechanical gizmo categories. Electronics magazines of the post-WWII era were filled for years with advertisements like this one from G & G Radio Supply Company in a 1953 issue of Radio & Television News magazine. That B-29 bomb sight, like the one used on the Enola Gay, could be purchased brand new for a scant $295, which even in equivalent 2018 dollars of $3,3142,758 (per the BLS), is a steal. This is not the famous Norden bombsight, but it's still a sweet collector's item, which is available on eBay today if you would like to own one. Already have a B-29 bombsight? How about a complete IFF (Identification Friend or Foe) secondary radar system? For a mere $350 you could have owned a complete rack of RC−188−A equipment, including the rack and chassis, a 450 W power supply, a 157-185 MHz transceiver (not in the Ham bands), a 5" CRT display, and a slew of vacuum tubes...

China's Take on U.S. Debt

China's Take on U.S. Debt - RF CafeOne great thing about being a member of the ruling class of a Communist and/or Marxist dictatorship is not being held accountable to the pesky citizens when making laws, spending, military action, social policies, environmental actions, medical actions, etc. You simply spend whatever amount of money deemed necessary to accomplish your desired ends - the people be damned. You would be forgiven if you thought I was referring to modern-day America, but I'm actually addressing China. Here from the South China Morning Post (one of my regular sources for tech headlines) is a story ridiculing the U.S. national debt. SCMP claims the amount of above-ground gold equals a cube 19.2 m per side, whereas the USGS says 23 m per side (50% greater volume). BTW, China's national debt is estimated to be at $14.4T. U.S. national debt is currently at $31.8T.

Electrons and Magnetic Fields

Electrons and Magnetic Fields, November 1968 Radio-Electronics - RF CafeUniversity of Southampton, England, professor James Holbrook suggests in this 1968 Radio-Electronics magazine article an "easy-to-follow substitute for the left- and right-hand rules," but I'm not so sure that the good professor's "Electron Orbit Method" is any better or easier to remember. Admittedly, it is hard to remember whether the use a left-hand rule or a right-hand rule for the various physical laws - motor rotation direction, current induction, torque, vector cross products, etc. Those involving current flow are made even more confounding because you need to know whether the creator of the rule refers to conventional current flow (positive-to-negative) or electron current flow (negative-to-positive). Note in Figure 110 from the Electricity volume of Basic Navy Training Courses how the generator rule is described as a left-hand rule with conventional current flow. However, the modern version for electron current flow uses a right-hand rule...

RF & Electronics Stencils for Visio

RF & Electronics stencils for Visio r4 - RF CafeWith 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 (EIA 19", ETSI 21"), and more. Test equipment and racks are built at a 1:1 scale so that measurements can be made directly using Visio built-in dimensioning objects. Page templates are provided with a preset scale (changeable) for a good presentation that can incorporate all provided symbols...

Thanks to PCB Directory for Continued Support!

PCB  Directory - RF CafeThe leading website for the PCB industry. PCB Directory is the largest directory of Printed Circuit Board (PCB) Manufacturers, Assembly houses, and Design Services on the Internet. We have listed the leading printed circuit board manufacturers around the world and made them searchable by their capabilities - Number of laminates used, Board thicknesses supported, Number of layers supported, Types of substrates (FR-4, Rogers, flexible, rigid), Geographical location (U.S., China), kinds of services (manufacturing, fabrication, assembly, prototype), and more. Fast turn-around on quotations for PCB fabrication and assembly.

World-Wide TV and Phone Calls Via Satellite!

Electronics World - World-Wide TV and Phone Calls Via Satellite!, October 1960 Electronics World - RF CafeLittle did anyone suspect when the Bell Telephone Laboratories' "Sugar Scoop" antenna went online, as reported in this October 1960 issue of Electronics World magazine, that one of the greatest discoveries of the astronomy world would be made with it five years later. Developed originally to facilitate research on radio communications between the Earth and orbiting satellites, physicists Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson measured an unexplained level of background noise in the realm of 2.7 Kelvins that persisted regardless of where in the sky the antenna was pointed. After ruling out the antenna and receiver as the cause, they surmised that the noise must be coming from the cosmos itself, and that the characteristic of it agreed with the theoretical model of the universe at an early stage in Big Bang event. It is now known as the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation (CMB, CMBR)...

Unpopular Electronics

Unpopular Electronics, August 1959 Popular Electronics - RF CafeYou would be hard pressed to find an electronics magazine today that included poetry as part of its typical features. I have published pages from the ARRL's QST magazine from the 1940s that had poems. Of course, the theme of the poems is almost always humor or parody, but poetry was not then an unknown / unpracticed art by the general populace as it appears to be today. Anyway, enjoy the jovial rhymes here from the August 1959 issue of Popular Electronics magazine. Frequent comic contributor Carl Kohler provides the illustrations for the rhymes of Saunder Harris...

Please Welcome Back Werbel Microwave!

Werbel MicrowaveWerbel Microwave is a manufacturer of RF directional and bidirectional couplers (6 dB to 30 dB) and RF power dividers / combiners (2− to 16−way) with select models operating up to 26.5 GHz and 100 W of CW power (3 kW peak). All are RoHS and REACH compliant and are designed and manufactured in our Whippany, NJ, location. Custom products and private label service available. Please take a couple minutes to visit their website and see how Werbel Microwave can help you today.

Home Computers Circa 1981 - AT&T 6300

Home Computers Circa 1981 - AT&T 6300 - RF CafeIn the year 2023, it is easy to forget what the field of personal computers looked like back in the early days of home computing (assuming that you were even alive and a computer user then). My first PC (circa 1983) was a Sinclair ZX-80 model that had a membrane keypad, used a cassette tape deck for storage, and connected to a television display via a video converter. My first program beyond the obligatory "Hello World!" variety was one that plotted a sine wave and cosine wave on the screen. From there, I moved on to a VIC-20, and finally to my first "real" PC, an ATT 6300 (in 1987, while at the University of Vermont, working on my BSEE). The ATT6300 came with two, 5-1/4" floppy disk drives and no hard drive. It was a real step up when I installed a whopping 10 MByte internal HDD, and then even added an 8087 math processor to assist the 8086 processor. Its green monochrome monitor had a really weird resolution that almost NO software was designed for, so it could cause display problems. UVM required all engineering students to buy one from them, at around $3,000, as well as an HP dot matrix printer that cost around $450...

Remember seeing something here and it's gone now? Check the Archives pages.

Exodus Advanced Communications Best in Class RF Amplifier SSPAs - RF Cafe
KR Electronics (RF Filters) - RF Cafe
RF Cascade Workbook 2018 by RF Cafe

Berkeley Nucleonics Vector Signal Generators Radar Simulations - RF Cafe

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About RF Cafe

Kirt Blattenberger - RF Cafe Webmaster

Copyright: 1996 - 2024

Webmaster:

    Kirt Blattenberger,

    BSEE - KB3UON

RF Cafe began life in 1996 as "RF Tools" in an AOL screen name web space totaling 2 MB. Its primary purpose was to provide me with ready access to commonly needed formulas and reference material while performing my work as an RF system and circuit design engineer. The World Wide Web (Internet) was largely an unknown entity at the time and bandwidth was a scarce commodity. Dial-up modems blazed along at 14.4 kbps while tying up your telephone line, and a nice lady's voice announced "You've Got Mail" when a new message arrived...

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