RF Splitter/Combiner Comprehensive Test - The Results 

Thanks Davis 👍

I'd agree with all of that, thank you for the comment and for watching!

More to come 👍

Thanks BA 👍

Hey BP. Yeah, these are pretty handy for sure. Thanks for the comment 👍

Yeah, the Nano is probably the better tool for the job, I just like showing different ways so folks can use what they have on hand 👍

That's a good point about the coupler. I just got this for a specfic test I want to conduct so I really only need to know loss @ 146.520 👍

Hey Robert. It's a pretty slick little device...

In the menu under DISPLAY I think its called BIG TEXT 👍

Thant's what I thought

Yeah, pretty excited about it 👍

Sorry man, I’ve never messed with LoRa

First, thanks for watching and for the comment Mike. I do have other test equipment but do videos with stuff that is generally available to more hams and is affordable so they can do the same, not everyone has a full bench and can perform these tests. I prefer to make videos showing how people can explore that part of the hobby without being intimidated at the cost of entry... I think we can both agree that folks testing equipment vs not testing is a good thing, I'm not trying to gatekeep and show off. Thanks for the feedback.

@@TheSmokinApe I see your point. Just so people know that the accuracy of such instruments can be questionable at best.

@@mikesradiorepair In my experience, cheap Chinese tat usually turns out to be dissapointingly accurate. I'll NEVER sell my Anritsu / Marconi gear, and I'm glad I have it for verification, but I also have a TinySA and a NanoVNA. They've turned out to be alright for the price.

@@digitalradiohacker I personally don't own any because I don't need them. I did however get to test close to 2 dozen of them at a presentation I did for a local amateur radio club last year. It was a day long class on the proper use of spectrum analyzers, 2 and 4 port vector network analyzers, splitter/combiners, directional couplers, duplexer types/operation/tuning, circulators and proper coax connector use and maintenance. In addition to hardware for the presentation I brought R&S 4 port VNA, SA, communication test set and power meter with frequency selective sensor head. All are current production models and had been calibrated within the last 3 to 4 months. I had told the attendees to bring whatever they had if they liked to compare them against my lab grade equipment and so I could show them how to properly use them. A lot of them did and it quickly turned into a friendly competition to see who's Chinese VNA was the most accurate. My results showed that none of them were accurate over their full frequency range, some better than others with some of them being rather horrible at the top end. One of the tiny VNA's was off by 3dB at it's upper frequency limit. Really, 3dB error... Inject a 0dBm signal and it read fluttering between -2.9 and 3.0 dBm. That's half the signal that was being applied to it! The takeaway for me was that some were not bad at the frequencies most amateur radio operators work at. Most had poor to horrible accuracy at their upper frequency limit and all of them have a dynamic range that greatly limit their practical use. Used as a quick check or as a antenna analyzer they are probably fine.

There's been a decent amount or debate on the through hole component, I guess I need to yank it out an put it on a meter. Thank for watching BD 👍

@@TheSmokinApe what do you think it should be and why?

I expected it to be a 50ohm resistor, that's what I have seen in resistor power splitters in the past. I believe it's used to balance load between the two "output" ports.

@@TheSmokinApe you had a ~20dB of separation between the ports. I wouldn't believe it would be so small of a value connecting those ports.

@@BusDriverRFI I opened it before I did the isolation test, that’s when I expected it to be the 50ohm resistor