Category: PCB

Since we are dealing with RF we have to keep it away from all other components and equipment in our shack. The only thing you want to generate or pick-up RF with is your antenna. In our case a magnetic loop antenna.

The purpose of the SWR Bridge, or tandem match, is to measure the difference between the forwarded and reflected power. To do that, we have to place the SWR Bridge between our antenna and our transceiver. Ideally, this should be done as close as possible to the antenna. This, however, is not very practical, as you won’t be able to read the values on the screen.

That’s why its placed inside the automatic magnetic loop controller unit and also why we need to create a shield that will keep the RF inside the SWR Bridge box.

To be able to measure the differences between forward and reflected power, we need to connect the SWR Bridge to the Teensy, pad A10 and A11. If we would just drill two holes in the tinned box and wired the SWR Bridge directly to the Teensy, the RF could still escape and cause trouble in our tuner or even in the shack. By using feed through capacitors, we can connect the SWR Bridge to the Teensy and measure both forward and reflected power, while still keeping the RF in the shielded box.

Let’s zoom in on the electric diagrams, the source code and the PCB design to know how the SWR Bridge must be connected to the Automatic Magnetic Loop Controller PCB’s. This implies both Loftur as mine PCB designs.

From the ML.h file:
// AD inputs for Forward and Reflected Power (SWR measurement)
const int Pfwd = A10;
const int Pref = A11;

Looking at the SWR Bridge, or Sontheimer Bridge, it’s fairly easy to understand. Connect your transceiver to RF In, connect the antenna to RF Out. On the other side of the board, we have FWD (pin 1), GND (pin 2) and REF (pin 3). This is the part where we need to keep attention. On the PCB the pinout position is different for GND and REF.

Connect SWR Bridge pin 1 (FWD) with pin 1 on the PCB, SWR Bridge pin 2 (GND) with pin 3 on the PCB and SWR Bridge pin 3 (REF) with pin 2 on the PCB. After our signals went through some resistors and capacitors, they can be connected via another 3 pin header to the Teensy 3.2 pads A10 and A11. Pin 1 (FWD) is connected to Teensy pad A10, and pin 2 (REF) to Teensy pad A11.

While reading the frequency from the radio, and having the “antenna characteristics” in the tuner’s memory, there is no real need for an SWR bridge to be used.
However, we can add a basic power/SWR-meter and auto-tune function if we do so. For this SWR bridge, Loftur proposed to use a Tandem Match over a Bruene Bridge.

He wrote the following in his Automatic Magnetic Loop Controller BOM and building instructions:

A Tandem Match coupler may be a bit more accurate than a Bruene Bridge, however it is more difficult to achieve very good
isolation between the Forward and Reverse outputs, as this is dependent on how similar the two transformers are. On the other
hand, this is not intended to be a super-precision instrument, the below circuit is certainly as good as the average HAM grade
Power/SWR meter.

The picture here below is a partially finished kit from KitsAndParts.com with the adaptation proposed by Loftur

Modifications to the kit from Kits and Parts:
20 turns wound on the two ferrite cores. This will make the meter suitable for 100W (power dissipation in R1 and R2 is 0.25W max
at 100W), should be able to handle 200W SSB without upgrading the resistors to 1/2W type.
R3 and R4 are shorted, C1 and C2 are exchanged to 4.7nF capacitors (example: Digikey 445-4746-ND) to speed up the response of
the outputs. This is necessary for fast SWR tuning. C3 and C4 are omitted.
Note the different order of the pins at the J1 connec tor, when compared with the VSWR sense connector on the Controller PCB.

Resistor values R15, R16 and R17, R18 on Controller PCB:
For a useful range of 0.5 – 200W, R15 and R16 on the Controller PCB should be 18 kohm 1/4W (example: Digikey 18KQBK-ND) and
R17, R18 should be 22 kohm 1/4W (example: Digikey 22KQBK-ND).

Due to the number of components that needed to be replaced or tossed away, and since there was some interest from other OM’s of our club, I designed an SWR Bridge kit with the correct components and sufficient copper wire for the 20 turns per toroid. Since the calibration resistors are omitted from this design, it’s important to make the toroids as equal as possible. A small deviation is not an issue. The tuner will tune to the lowest SWR point. Even if the reading is a bit off, the antenna will still be tuned to the minimum SWR.

Drop me an email at on5ia@uba.be if you are interested in this SWR kit specially made for the Automatic Magnetic Loop Tuner.

For the Automatic Magnetic Loop Tuner project I needed an SWR Bridge (Standing Wave Ratio) which could handle 200 W. The existing kit of http://www.kitsandparts.com/ could be used if I made some adjustments. Two capacitors and two resistors needed to be thrown away, two capacitors needed to be replaced, and more copper wire was needed then what was provided in the kit. With a price tag of $12 and shipping cost of $15, that’s a waste of money and resources.

Since the design isn’t that complicated, and I’m always interested in learning something new, I decided to make the SWR bridge myself.

The SWR bridge is a tandem match, also known as a Sontheimer bridge. It’s named after it’s inventor, Carl G. Sontheimer.

I started to draw the electrical diagram in Eagle. Eagle, a part of Autodesk, from the creators of AutoCAD amongst other things, can be downloaded here for free. With the free full working version of Eagle you can design PCB’s (Printed Circuit Boards) with a maximum size of 80mm x 100mm and max 2 layers. More than enough for this little project.

When you are finished with the electrical diagram, you can start designing the PCB. It can be a real hassle if you’ve never done it. Fortunately there are a lot of people making tutorials on YouTube, describing how things should be done. I followed the three-part YouTube Eagle tutorial of Jeremy Blum.

Part 1: Schematic Design https://youtu.be/1AXwjZoyNno
Part 2: Printend Circuit Board Layout https://youtu.be/CCTs0mNXY24
Part 3: CAM output and DFM https://youtu.be/oId-h6AeXXE

You’ll need just a little over 90 minutes to watch the three of them. Jeremy explains how you can make your own PCB very well and guided me through the entire process.

Based on the Gerber files that are finally generated by Eagle during the CAM stage, you can ask your PCB manufacturer to produce your PCB. I must say I’m pretty happy with the result.

Now that I have the PCB, I only need to order the other components that need to be placed on it. I can’t wait to test this SWR Bridge and see how it performs.