Open RF Prototyping

RF Cabling

SMA, 0.086" Cable Assemblies

Measurements are taken using the "one-port" tiered method using a KC901V network analyzer (see S-Parameter Measurements with the KC901V VNA)

Figure 1 shows a comparison of transmission loss and return loss for the cable assemblies listed in Table 1.

Table 1. Cable assemblies used for Figure 1.

Assembly

Description

4in-minicirc-086

Minicircuits 086-4SM+ cable assembly

5in-crystek-086

Crystek CCSMA-MM-086-5 cable Assembly

10cm-amphenol-086

'Hand' constructed using Amphenol 901-9867-RFX connectors

Carefully constructed cable assemblies using good quality connectors have performance comparable with commercially manufactured assemblies and are suited for applications up to at least 6GHz.

086-sma

Figure 1: S-parameter measurements for 0.086" hand-formable cable with straight SMA connectors. Comparing 'constructed' against manufactured cable assemblies.


Figure 2 shows a comparison of transmission loss and return loss for the cable assemblies listed in Table 2.

Table 2. Cable assemblies used for Figure 2.

Assembly

Description

10cm-superbat-086

'Superbat' low cost cable assembly

10cm-dyadic-086

'Hand' constructed using low cost connectors

10cm-amphenol-086

'Hand' constructed using Amphenol 901-9867-RFX connectors

Low cost cable assemblies (as sourced from Superbat for example) are suited for applications up to about 2GHz. If the cable assemblies are carefully constructed using low cost connectors this can be extended up to about 3GHz. For frequencies above this higher quality connectors are required and carefully constructed cable assemblies are suitable for applications up to at least 6GHz.

086-low-cost-sma

Figure 2: S-parameter measurements for 0.086" hand-formable cable with straight SMA connectors. Comparing 'constructed' against low cost cable assemblies.


Figure 3 shows a comparison of transmission loss and return loss for the cable assemblies listed in Table 3.

Table 3. Cable assemblies used for Figure 3.

Assembly

Description

4in-minicirc-086

Minicircuits 086-4SM+ cable assembly

8in-minicirc-086

Minicircuits 086-8SM+ cable assembly

5in-ra-minicirc-086

Minicircuits 086-5MRSM+ cable assembly
086-ra-sma

Figure 3: S-parameter measurements for 0.086" hand-formable cable with SMA connectors. Comparing straight against RA SMA connectors.

SMA, 0.047" Cable Assemblies

047-sma

Figure 4: S-parameter measurements for 0.047" hand-formable cable with straight SMA connecctors. Low cost cable assembly.

MMCX Cable Assemblies

mmcx

Figure 5: S-parameter measurements for hand-formable cable with MMCX connectors