As I’ve reported before, we have been awarded a $10,000 grant by the IEEE for setting up an amateur radio station at the Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum. $3,000 has been allotted for a transceiver. There are a lot of options, so I’m asking for some help.  Here’s some of my thinking so far:
1. Don’t purchase [...]

The U.K.’s Guardian reports on a study by British media regulator Ofcom that eventually everyone will be living in a wire-free world of sensors and high-tech car. The study, “Tomorrow’s Wireless World,” highlights several areas in health and transportation where wireless technology could have a significant impact.
The report suggests, for example, that body-area networks [...]

SAE International’s Aerospace Engineering and Manufacturing website reports that Ecliptek and other companies are now producing oscillators that use microelectromechanical (MEMS) resonators instead of quartz crystals. Last year, more than 10 billion crystal crystals and oscillators were produced, so predicting their demise may be a bit premature.
Even so, the article suggests MEMS resonators will [...]

Brad, AA1IP, writes to the Flying Pigs QRP mailing list:
The November 2007 issue of Popular Mechanics magazine describes “Breakthrough Awards”, one of
which discusses an interesting power source. Picture a taut membrane clamped at both ends, with a small button magnet affixed near each end. When the wind blows, the membrane vibrates, moving the magnets into [...]

This item is more of a reminder for me, but other folks might find this useful as well. James, AD1L, recently posted links to the service manual and schematics on the icom746pro mailing list:

Service Manual
Schematics

The schematics are in a zip file, but the manual is a djvu file. I’d never heard of this file format [...]

Last weekend, I took my laptop to the Hands-On Museum, with the idea of perhaps trying to work some PSK 31. I’d downloaded and installed CocoaModem, a freeware package for the Mac, and I brought along the Buxcom Rascal interface that I purchased several months ago. I didn’t’ have a USB-RS232 adapter, but I guessed [...]

Ralph, KB8ZOY, forwarded this video on how to obtain AA cells cheaply by buying a 6V lantern battery and then cracking open the case. Has anyone ever tried this? How long do the batteries last?

RF DesignLine is running a series of three articles by David Hall and Matt Anderson of National Instruments explaining RF instrument specifications.

Part 1 covers generic RF instrument specifications, such as: instantaneous bandwidth, frequency range, tuning speed, phase noise, and VSWR.
Part 2 covers five specifications that are particularly important to RF signal generators: frequency tolerance, output [...]

One good thing about the Internet is that you can find lots of information and advice on just about anything. The bad thing about the Internet is that you can find lots of information and advice on just about anything. The problem, of course, is that much of the advice you’ll get is contradictory, and [...]

The e-mail newsletter RF DesignLine has a series of articles in the last two issues on digital receiver design:

Part 1
Part 2
Part 3