Foundations Of Amateur Radio

Foundations of Amateur Radio If you've ever used a spray can of WD-40, you might have wondered what the name means. It stands for "Water Displacement, 40th formula". In my time as a radio amateur I'd never stopped to think what the RG in RG-58 stood for. Turns out that it too has a meaning, "Radio Guide", though I have found some interesting alternative descriptions where the G stood for Government. This radio guide, really a transmission line, gets a signal from point A to point B. Depending on how you construct that transmission line determines what you'll get at the other end. Coaxial cable or coax is a length of cable made from several components. There's the outer layer or jacket, that protects the cable from electrical shorting, U/V deterioration and water ingress which causes all manner of problems. Inside that is an electrically conductive shield that forms one half of the transmission line, inside that is a dielectric, essentially a separator or insulator between the shield and the inner most, or