Welcome
Welcome! This blog will focus on my interests in electronics, RF Engineering, RV’s, equipment reviews and anything else I find interesting.
Ultimaker S5 – 4 Year Review
Introduction After looking around for a semi-professional 3D printer for six months, and then agonizing over the price for another six months I finally purchased a Ultimaker S5 Pro bundle in January 2022. Why I Bought It I bought my first 3D printer for rapid prototyping in 2020-2021. I started off with a JGAurora A5 […]
Lifting our EPro 19FD
One of the things that I really disliked about our 19FD was the low ground clearance. The sewer cleanout and the stabilizer jacks have been a constant source of worry for me. We have also had issues trying to fill our sewer tote on some sites as the sewer cleanout was below the top of […]
2020 – EPro 19FD Review
Introduction We purchased our EPro 19FD in August of 2019. The unit is a 2020 model year. I should point out that we still love this trailer, as you could be forgiven for thinking this trailer has had its share of issues, which I would argue that it has. If you have never owned a […]
SP0256-AL2 Speech Synthesis from the 1980’s
So back in the mid-1980’s, I came across the SP0256 Narrator Speech Processor from Radio Shack. The chip was manufactured by General Instruments or more specifically General Instruments Microelectronics. The company had a number of 8-bit and 16-bit microcontrollers, along with some ROM, EAROM (electrically alterable ROM), and telecommunications chips that were spun into a division called Microchip. […]
USB 2.4GHz ISM Spectrum Analyzer
Introduction As with most of my projects this one has been on the drawing board for a while. Well over two years in fact. This project is looking to scratch a very specific itch, specifically to augment Wi-Fi measurements with noise measurements. If along the way we happen to add additional features that extend the […]
RF Power Meter – Part 5 (Mobile Application)
Mobile Power Meter Application So in this article, we’re going to switch from the power meter itself to the mobile application that serves as the remote display. The power meter application is a cross-platform application for Android, IOS, MacOS, and Windows. The application starts up by searching for any and all power meters that are […]
RF Power Meter – Part 4 (Calibration)
Background Welcome to Part 4 in the RF Power meter series. Today it’s all about calibration. In the original design of the RF Power Meter, I had planned on using slope and intercept values from the datasheet to calculate the displayed RF level. The approach was simple to implement, however, the slope of the graph tended […]
RF Power Meter – Part 3 (BLE Contamination)
Bluetooth LE Measurement Contamination I know what you’re thinking… is it a really a good idea to have a Bluetooth LE module paired with an RF power meter? Wouldn’t the integrity of the RF measurement be compromised by the Bluetooth LE module? It turns out the answer is no, well no in the sense […]
RF Power Meter – Part 2 (Hardware)
Hardware Description and Schematics The RF Power meter is made up of the Linear Technologies LT5538 Power Detector and the Nordic Semiconductor nRF51822 Bluetooth SOC module. Linear Technologies LT5538 The Nordic Semiconductor nRF51822 SOC module or more affectionately the RFduino RFD22301 is used as the microcontroller and Bluetooth LE module. The RF power detector module […]
RF Power Meter- Part 1 (Introduction)
Introduction This is a multi-part series on the RF power meter I developed for insertion loss testing. While this series will get into the details this article starts with the why. In future articles, we’ll cover the hardware, schematics, battery options, Bluetooth contamination of measurements, calibration and mobile software. The What and Why Insertion loss […]
- 1
- 2