RF Communications

My journey with Communications Technology began with a “Communications System Engineering” course at university. It carried on with wired communications while working with a team of people designing distributed process control systems in the 1970s.

In 1986 the journey took a sharp turn to wireless when the folks at General Motors with whom I had been working on the standardization of the IEEE 802.4 Token Bus Protocol that formed the backbone of something called MAP, Manufacturing Automation Protocol, came to me and said, “We are starting a project to figure out how to allow the automatic guided vehicles on our new manufacturing line to communicate wirelessly, are you interested in helping?”

The answer was “Yes” and that started a long journey with RF communications that led through numerous conference rooms full of “experts” defending their prefered technical solutions for a global standard, to the tunnels and towers of New York City making sure First Responders could communicate, to the digital and HF communications techniques that make “Ham Radio” an enduring part of the technical world.

This section of this site will expanding on some of the “Lessons Learned” on this journey.