Archive for February 7th, 2011
FEBRUARY MEETING
Police radar and laser detectors – state of the art
DATE: Thursday, February 24, 2011
PLACE : Raffel’s – 10160 Reading Road (see below for directions)
TIME : 5:30 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. - Social Time
6:00 p.m. to 7:00 p.m. - Dinner
7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. - Presentation
COST: $12- $15, See information in Reservations
MENU SELECTIONS: Beef Stroganoff, Chicken Breast with Ham & Cheese, Scalloped Potatoes, Seasoned Green Beans, Tossed Salad, Dinner Rolls and Butter. There is also a bar available for the purchase of alcoholic drinks.
LOCATION: Raffel’s is located at 10160 Reading Road, south of Glendale-Milford Road on the east side of Reading. Take I-75 to the Glendale-Milford Rd. Exit, go east on Glendale-Milford Road approximately ¾ of a mile to Reading Rd. and turn right on Reading.
RESERVATIONS: (Please note New Procedure) We are changing to an on-line reservation system. Please make reservations for each meeting by going to: http://www.ieeecincinnati.org/meetings/. Please click on the appropriate link and complete the reservation. Beginning with the March 2011 meeting, you will be able to pay on-line. We encourage you to use the on-line system. It is a convenience not only to you, but also to our volunteers. For a limited time, we will be offering a price break for using the on-line system. $12 On-line reservations for IEEE member and $15 for Guests, Email, Voice Mail, or at the door.
** If you are having dinner you must use the Menu Selection drop down box to select “Buffet – $12”**
If for some reason you cannot use the on-line reservation system, you may register by emailing your Name, IEEE Member Number (if you wish to receive the IEEE rate), a daytime telephone number, and whether or not you will be having dinner to reservations@ieeecincinnati.org . For email reservations, you will pay at the door by check or cash (exact change appreciated).
All Reservations must be made by Noon, Tuesday, February 22, 2011 if you plan to attend.
Voice Mail reservations will be eliminated at the end of February 2011. Voice Mail at 513-629-9380.
PE CREDITS: Depending on the subject matter, attendance at IEEE Cincinnati Section Meetings now qualifies the attendee for Professional Development Hours towards renewal of Professional Engineers Licenses. Required documentation will be available following the meeting! The Section Meetings also provide a great opportunity to network with fellow engineers in the area.
ABOUT THE MEETING:
Ever since speed measurement devices were introduced in the late 1960s using microwave (radar) frequencies, devices to detect these transmitters have been sold to the public. As detectors become more and more capable, police radar and laser guns manufacturers introduce features, and sometimes new frequencies, to make them less detectable and more efficient. This contest continues today with the widespread use of laser guns, as well as the introduction of ultra-short duration radar pulse guns, referred to as “POP” in the industry.
This talk will cover the various technical aspects of this cat-and-mouse game and will review the present state of the art in radar and laser speed measurement and its countermeasures.
ABOUT THE PRESENTER:
Marwan Nusair is from Amman, Jordan receiving his BA(Hons) and MA(Hons) from Cambridge University in Natural Sciences (experimental physics), and his M.Sc. from the American University of Beirut (theoretical physics). He went on to receive a Ph.D. in theoretical physics from the University of Cincinnati, and, more importantly, met his wife there.
He spent two years as a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of Toronto Physics Department, followed by two years as an instructor. He then started a business in Cincinnati, designing antennas and feedhorns for home satellite use, and later commercial satellite systems. The business was sold in 1985. He has been a consultant since 1987, doing design work for RF and microwave projects, with the majority being in the police radar detector industry. He is currently busy with radar detector design work. He has published 4 papers in peer-reviewed physics journals and has 7 patents in microwave design and 3 currently pending. He was also a visiting professor of physics at the University of Cincinnati in 1987-88. He is also proud of the fact that an antenna system of his design is in use in a U.S. military project known as “Spider”.
He has served as IEEE Cincinnati Section Secretary and is now Treasurer, and looks forward to helping the Section continue its success, whether as a member or officer.
February 7th, 2011
MEMBERSHIP NEWS
If you are interested in upgrading your membership to Senior Member, please contact any member of the Executive Committee.
NEW MEMBERS
The following individuals are IEEE members who are new to our Section:
Daniel Amundson
Joshua Biltz
Ralph Campbell
Waylon Chambless
Eric Cochran
Keith Frikken
John Gebhardt
Greg Harrington
Herman Harrison
Nathan Kincade
Joe Koetters
Robert Maertz
Dean Oliver
Rodney Phillips
Jim Ramler
Michael Shannon
Antar Vasi
Timothy Waters
Dalric Webb
We wish to welcome these members to the Cincinnati Section!!!
February 7th, 2011
Scanning the Past: A History of Electrical Engineering from the Past
Submitted by Marc Bell, Editor
Copyright 1997 IEEE. Reprinted with permission from the IEEE publication, “Scanning the Past” which covers a reprint of an article appearing in the Proceedings of the IEEE Vol. 85, No. 1, January 1997.
Harold A. Wheeler: A Pioneer in Radio and Television
Fifty-five years ago this month, the PROCEEDINGS OF THE RADIO ENGINEERS (IRE) included a paper on interference between frequency-modulated signals by Harold A. Wheeler (see Fig. 1). Remembered as the inventor of a much used automatic volume control (AVC) circuit and numerous other technical contributions to communi¬cations engineering, he was a frequent contributor to the PROCEEDINGS during a professional career that spanned much of the 20th century. He served many years as a member of the IRE Board of Editors and was awarded the IEEE Medal of Honor in 1964.
Wheeler was born in 1905 in Minnesota where his father was an agricultural teacher. The family soon moved to South Dakota where his father taught for four years at South Dakota State College in Brookings. From 1907 to 1916, the Wheeler family lived in Mitchell, SD, where his father worked as manager of a seed company. Wheeler remembered Mitchell as having been “a small town with Hazeltine, inventor of the neutrodyne radio receiver and a professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology. Wheeler worked for Hazeltine during the summer of 1923 and came to regard Hazeltine as his principal mentor. Wheeler continued his formal education at Johns Hopkins University from 1925 to 1928 while continuing to work part time for the Hazeltine Company, founded in 1924 to manage patents and assist licensees. While at Johns Hopkins, Wheeler assisted Gregory Breit and Merle Tuve in the design and construction of apparatus which they used to position in the U.S. Department of Agriculture. By that time, Wheeler had developed an interest in radio, and he used a homemade receiver to listen to Navy radio signals during World War I. His enthusiasm for radio served as a stimulus to his father who initiated a radio news service for farmers in 1920 (Fig. 2).
Wheeler received the B.S. degree in physics at George Washington University in 1925. While still an undergrad¬uate, he worked two summers at the Radio Laboratory of the National Bureau of Standards where he learned of the latest developments in radio engineering. In the summer of “1922, he met Alan Hazeltine, inventor of the neutrodyne radio receiver and a professor at the Stevens Institute of Technology. Wheeler worked for Hazeltine during the summer of 1923 and came to regard Hazeltine as his principal mentor. Wheeler continued his formal education at Johns Hopkins University from 1925 to 1928 while continuing to work part time for the Hazeltine Company, founded in 1924 to manage patents and assist licensees. While at Johns Hopkins, Wheeler assisted Gregory Breit and Merle Tuve in the design and construction of apparatus which they used to determine the height of the ionosphere by means of reflected radio-frequency pulses.
In 1925, Wheeler invented an AVC circuit (see original notebook schematics in Fig. 3) for radio receivers which utilized a vacuum-tube diode in a circuit designed to vary the gain of the receiver in response to changes in signal level (Fig. 4 shows a receiver equipped with AVC). He explained the circuit in his first IRE paper published in January 1928. The innovation was introduced commercially in receivers manufactured by the Philco Company in 1929. Wheeler’s patent on the circuit became a major asset of the Hazeltine Company during the 1930′s. He became a full time employee of Hazeltine in 1928 and contributed to various improvements in receivers and test instruments, many of which were protected by patents. During the 1930′s, he studied the design of wide-band amplifiers suitable for use in television receivers and published a Proceedings paper on this topic in July 1939. In the paper he introduced the “bandwidth index” as a way to calculate the maximum bandwidth capability of a given type of vacuum tube. He received the Morris N. Liebmann Award of the IRE in 1940 as recognition of the importance of this work.
During World War II, Wheeler directed a project to develop a device to locate buried antitank mines and the resulting production model was designated as the SCR-625. He also worked on the design of antennas suitable for identification friend or foe (IFF) systems. In 1947, he left Hazeltine and founded Wheeler Laboratories which grew to employ approximately 100 engineers by 1959. Wheeler Laboratories became a subcontractor for the Nike missile project and the lab also worked on a Navy project involving very low frequency communication with submarines. Dur¬ing this period, Wheeler developed an interest in phased array antennas and strip transmission lines and published several technical papers on these topics.
In 1959 the Hazeltine Company acquired Wheeler Lab¬oratories although it retained considerable autonomy under the parent company and Wheeler continued as president of the Laboratories until 1968. He served as chairman of the Hazeltine Board of Directors from 1965 to 1977 and continued as chief scientist of the company working full time until 1983 and three days a week until 1987. He received approximately 180 U.S. patents during his career and was elected to the National Academy of Engineering. He received the Armstrong Medal of the Radio Club of America in 1964 and the Microwave Career Award of the Microwave Theory and Techniques Society in 1975. He developed a strong interest in the history of com¬munication engineering and served on the IEEE History Committee during the 1970′s. Among his publications was the book The Early Days of Wheeler and Hazeltine Corporation-Profiles in Radio and Electronics published by the Hazeltine Company in 1982. He died in April 1996 at age 91.
James E. Brittain
February 7th, 2011
IEEE NEWS
NEWS from IEEE-USA
2001 L Street, N.W., Suite 700
Washington, DC 20036-4910
A Million Electric Vehicles on the Road by 2015? Austin Workshop to Examine the Challenges and Opportunities
WASHINGTON (26 January 2011) — In last night’s State of the Union address, President Barack Obama called for the United States to “… become the first country to have a million electric vehicles on the road by 2015.”
The IEEE-USA Electric Vehicles & Personal Transportation Workshop will explore the challenges and opportunities to make that vision a reality. The all-day event, at the Renaissance Austin (Texas) Hotel on Friday 4 March, will feature eight panels and more than 20 technology, industry, academic and policy experts.
Workshop focus areas include the electric vehicle market; charging infrastructure; plug-in electric vehicles (PEVs) and the electricity business; customer acceptance; managing PEV loads; electric vehicle policy issues; PEVs and the electric grid; and personal electric transportation.
The keynote speakers are David Strickland, administrator, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the federal agency charged with electric vehicle implementation; and Karl Rabago, vice president for distributed energy services at Austin Energy.
Dr. John Goodenough, a professor in the Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the University of Texas, will lead a panel of battery researchers. He developed the cathode materials for the lithium-ion batteries that are used in electric and hybrid-electric vehicles.
Goodenough will be joined by Joe Redfield, manager of the Advanced Vehicle Technology Section in the Engine, Emissions and Vehicle Research Division at Southwest Research Institute; and Dr. Don Hillebrand, director of the Center for Transportation Research at Argonne National Laboratory.
Argonne is the nation’s lead research center “for the simulation, validation and laboratory evaluation” of PEVs and “the advanced technologies required for these vehicles.”
The new Chevy Volt is scheduled to be at the event, along with personal transportation devices such as electric scooters and bicycles.
The cost for the workshop, which includes a buffet breakfast, lunch, coffee breaks and a post-event reception, is $150 for IEEE members and $175 for nonmembers. For more information and to register, see http://www.ieeeusa.org/calendar/workshops/EVPT/default.asp.
Exhibit and sponsorship opportunities are available by contacting Colonel Mason at colonel@prfirm1.com or 214-329-4949. You can follow previews of the workshop on the ScienceNews Radio Network (http://www.promiseoftomorrow.biz/).
IEEE-USA advances the public good and promotes the careers and public policy interests of more than 210,000 engineering, computing and technology professionals who are U.S. members of IEEE. http://www.ieeeusa.org
February 7th, 2011
