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How to Test a Coax Cable with a Multimeter (Field Troubleshooting Guide)
An antenna stops working after a storm. The installer has a cheap multimeter and a spare 5 m RG58 jumper. He needs to know in five minutes whether the cable or the radio is dead. A multimeter will answer exactly one question: are the conductors co… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
BNC vs SMA: Choosing Between the Two Most Common RF Connectors
A technician needs to change a sensor lead twenty times during a bench test. Another engineer needs a compact connection inside a 6 GHz radio. Both jobs carry RF, but the best interface is not necessarily the same. Connection speed, port size and v… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
What Is the Power Handling of RG58, RG316 and LMR-400?
A designer connects a 20 W transmitter to a 10 cm RG316 jumper at 2.4 GHz and the PTFE jacket smells hot after an hour. Meanwhile a ham pushes 100 W through RG58 at 14 MHz for years without a problem. Cable power handling is not a single number. It… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
RG174 Cable Guide: When Thin Coax Is the Right Choice
RG174 is a miniature nominal 50 Ω coaxial cable used where a short RF connection needs a small diameter and manageable flexibility. A common construction uses PE insulation and a PVC jacket around a stranded copper-clad steel conductor; exact loss,… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
Strain Relief Done Right: Preventing the #1 Cause of Cable Failure
A radio module on a vibrating test fixture works for 40 hours, then drops its link. The SMA pigtail looks fine. Pull on the cable a little and the signal returns. The center conductor has fatigued and cracked 3 mm behind the connector, exactly wher… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
Do RF Adapters Cause Signal Loss? How Much Each One Adds
A lab chain has four adapters stacked between a signal generator and a device under test: SMA female to female, SMA to N, N to BNC, BNC to SMA. Each one is a small part. Together they can add several tenths of a dB and push VSWR past what the ampli… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
Passive Intermodulation (PIM): Causes in Cables and How to Avoid It
A cellular site passes every VSWR sweep, yet the uplink noise floor is 8 dB higher than predicted. Technicians chase the antenna, the radio and the filters. The fault ends up being one loose, slightly oxidized jumper connector that rectifies the tw… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
Can You Bend Semi-Rigid Coax? Forming Rules and Minimum Radii
A technician bends a 0.141 in semi-rigid cable around a pen, straightens it, and bends it again to fix the angle. The signal still passes, but return loss at 18 GHz has quietly gotten worse. The outer conductor wrinkled or cracked at the second ben… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
Antenna Cable Loss vs Amplifier Gain: When to Add an LNA
Add an LNA when receiver-chain noise and feeder loss limit reception, not simply when an RSSI number looks low. A suitable low-noise amplifier near the receive antenna can reduce the effect of downstream cable loss, but it cannot recover signal-to-… More
Posted on 10/13/2026
N-Type vs SMA: Power, Frequency and Durability Compared
A 100 W transmitter needs an outdoor feeder connection. A microwave module on the same project needs a compact internal interconnect. Choosing one connector family for both jobs can create a bulky enclosure or a mechanically weak feeder transition.… More
Posted on 10/13/2026