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While hams aren't expected to be engineers, it can certainly be helpful for advanced amateurs to avail themselves of engineering textbooks, references, and computer programs intended for students and professional engineers. While textbooks are relatively expensive, the education and insight they can provide may be well worth the cost. Often, old editions are perfectly suitable for hams. Similarly, demo programs available for a free download have all the functionality needed for most of the simple engineering tasks undertaken by hams. While they may not be able to fully simulate a design, they can often get close enough to allow easy optimization by trial and error.
Handbook of Filter Synthesis
By Anatol Zverev -- A wealth of charts and tables for designing LC filters without a computer--an excellent starting point for designing filters with a computer. It is now available in paperback form.
Antennas
By John D. Kraus W8JK. -- While too theoretical for the average ham, this is the book for any ham who wants to better understand the theory behind antennas and how they are modeled by computers. The Second edition covers methods of moments, the fundamental concepts behind computer programs like NEC2. The first edition, published in 1950, is too early for computers. It is now on its third edition.
Art of Electronics
By Paul Horowitz and Winfield Hill -- This book is meant to help physics students gain the Electrical Engineering knowledge necessary to be successful in their careers. Well written, with only a little mathematics.
Inductance Calculations
By Frederick W. Grover, PHD. (Dover Phoenix edition) -- This classic, originally published by Van Nostrand Company Inc. in 1946, attempts to allow the calculation of many types of inductors using tables. While intended for low frequency work in which the skin effect can be ignored, it is still useful as a reference or starting point.
Introduction to Radio Frequency Design
By Wes Hayward, W7ZOI.
A thorough treatment of the fundamental methods of radio frequency design using mathematics as needed to develop intuition for RF circuits and systems. You'll find emphasis on applications of simple circuit models whenever possible. Prepares readers to actually design HF, VHF and UHF equipment.
Publishers of Radio Engineering Books
Artech House
SciTECH Publishing Incorporated
http://www.ansoft.com/downloads.cfm
Ansoft offers free student versions of their commercial programs.
http://www.ansoft.com/ansoftdesignersv/
This student program is an excellent choice for RF circuit design using S parameters. 1GHz to 18 GHz S parameter data is often provided by microwave transistor manufacturers.
http://www.egpreston.com/ac.htm
An AC circuit analysis program, complete with source code.
http://www.zerobeat.net/G4FGQ/
Reg Edwards, G4FGQ's Software -- A collection of free engineering/modeling programs.
http://www.cq-amateur-radio.com/HamCalcem.html
A collection of Basic programs written by George Murphy, VE3ERP.
The unofficial Numerical Electromagnetic Code (NEC) Archives
NEC Archives--these programs model antennas using the method of moments technique described in Kraus' Antennas.
http://www.web-ee.com/
The Electrical Engineering Web page. It has free tutorials, schematics, and software downloads.
http://www.eznec.com/demoinfo.htm
A demo program of the popular EZNEC program written by Roy LeWallen, W7EL, for modeling antennas made out wire and tubing.
http://lipas.uwasa.fi/~jpe/voacap/
Information on using VOACAP, a free program from the NTIA/ITS (National Telecommunications and Information Administration/ Institute for Telecommunication Sciences)
ITS High Frequency Propagation Models
The Institute for Telecommunication Sciences Web site's page for downloading high frequency propagation models. The ITS is the research and engineering branch of the National Telecommunications and Information Administration. Description and source code for the Longley Rice Irregular Terrain model.
If you know of another good free engineering program of interest to hams that you think would be useful to have as a link on this page, please send a note to tis@arrl.org.
You can get a photocopy of any ARRL published article for $3 ($5 for nonmembers) for each article requested. Contact the ARRL Technical Department (reprints@arrl.org ), 1-860-594-0390, Noon to 5PM, Tuesday through Friday if you wish to get photocopies.
This information was prepared as a membership service by the American Radio Relay League, Inc., Technical Information Service, 225 Main St., Newington, CT 06111 (860) 594-0214. Email: tis@arrl.org (Internet). ARRL HQ is glad to provide this information on the Web free of charge as a service to League members and affiliated clubs.
If you have any questions concerning the reproduction or distribution of this material, please contact:
