HackadayU: Introduction to Antenna Basics - Class 1

This is Class 1 in the HackadayU: Introduction to Antenna Basics course with Karen Rucker.

Introduction to radio frequency engineering for antennas. Topics covered will be, but are not limited to: electromagnetic waves, impedance matching, polarization, gain, and frequency bands.

0:00 - Start
2:06 - What’s an Antenna?
7:02 - Maxwell Equations
9:18 - Electromagnetic Waves
12:48 - Polarization
17:40 - Gain
20:42 - Radiation Patterns
23:19 - VSWR
27:50 - Impedance Matching
31:28 - Frequency Bands

[johnlennon]

I have no idea what people are complaining about, I didn't notice her saying "right" over and over, at all, seemed like a perfect delivery to me. Good tone of voice, patient, walks through the material just fine. I'm hoping to get into the weeds a bit on the next few classes.

[patrickgriffin]

Thank you for your time to put this together and explaining the high level to us. Your audio is just fine.. my focus is the content and being able to understand antenna design more after these 5 classes then I did before. Thanks again!

[mjw-ligc]

OMG thanks for this course, perfect level of detail for makers, people who work with wireless systems, and aspiring HAM's

[Alex-gmbt]

Absolutely brillant : an extremely clear and pedagogic presentation. i finally understood a lot of things thanks to this class. i'll look forward to the rest.

[takundavito]

I personally like how you explain things in simple terms

[BryanGrigsby]

Fantastic, looking forward to Class 2.

[johnnycash]

Really appreciate you guys doing these videos.
Thank you.

[TSRPDA]

Thanks for the course! An omni directional antenna has a gain of 0 dBi. Using dB values in beneficial when calculating link budgets, because you can add and substract instead of multiply and divide.

[howardroth]

I really enjoyed this session and the occasional dry humor. I had just listened to a talk at MIT on antennas put on by their radio club and it was little over my head. This session was more of what I needed to start to get a solid foundation in antenna theory, which has been on my mind for several years now. Thanks.

[NK]

Now I know how I will spend my weekend :) Thanks !

[Bluecollarham]

How am I just now seeing this video? Great presentation!

[williewilson]

There must be something wrong with me but I find antennas totally Thanks for Sharing!!!!

[pdk]

This was excellent and easy to understand! Thank you.

[tomstrum]

Thx for this very Helpful "Ole Boys Club" can't stand it to be outdone by your superior delivery combination of witt & making the student feel very comfortable trying to absorb the very complex engineering

[PatientManBob]

Excellent presentation. Thanks so much, i finally get it 😭

[johnmadsen]

I sometimes get beat with a metal coat hanger. Will it also work as an antenna?

[gartnl]

Returnloss as per shown formula is always positive: since Pref never exceeds Pinc, the result Pref/Pinc is <=1. Any log(n<1) = negative. The minus sign in front of the fromula than makes the result positive.

[Frankey]

What's the imperial unit for frequency, though?

[jacobdavidcunningham]

this is cool, thanks for making this open

[LiveAt_LD]

Thank you for the knowledge. I've never learned electrical theories from a girl/woman before. I was pleasantly surprised! Hopefully more woman see this and get inspired. You make it seem easy, because it is, but not when you're first learning it!. You're a great teacher.I definitely learned (and relearned) every single second of this video, more learning than relearning. Thanks again!