niconiconi
niconiconi@mk.absturztau.be
“Mom, can we buy a Vector Network Analyzer?”
“No, we have a VNA at home.”
The VNA at home
#electronics
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@niconiconi
As a teenager (quite some decades ago) I used lecher lines to set the frequency of the local oscillator of a 70cm downconverter. Now I have 3 counters on the bench.
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@niconiconi Last year I bought a R&S LMD ("Messleitung") and I actually use it for precise VSWR measurements.
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@arnobert One day I’ll build a microstrip version to show that it’s possible to measure vector impedance manually, even with pencil-and-paper SOL calibration. It will take hours to measure a single data point, but nothing stops you from doing so (besides the small problem that the “S” and “O” needs to be customized to stay close to Z0 rather than a hard open or short, otherwise the VSWR will be out of range).
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James Morris
jmorris
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niconiconi
niconiconi@mk.absturztau.be@jmorris Locally, I can easily find 6 GHz amateur radio VNAs for a few hundred bucks, yet I can’t find even a single slotted line on sale. The Shenzhen electronics market can be strange.
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Arno DL2SSB
arnobert@chaos.social@jmorris @niconiconi Same here. I read about them in a DUBUS magazine from the late 80s I think.
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James Morris
jmorris
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niconiconi
niconiconi@mk.absturztau.be@jmorris That’s probably the reason, meanwhile the local-made ones are likely all locked inside university labs collecting dust - The last time I asked if anyone has used one after failing to find any, the reply was “yes, in a recent college course.” It’s why I said I’ll go for a PCB microstrip version if I ever decide to experiment with it.
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