Broadband Soapbox: …And this Week's Answers

At last week’s NCTC Winter Educational Conference, we spent some time with PPC Sales Rep Peter Riley, on board his company’s demo truck, a semi that was parked outside the Hyatt Regency in Albuquerque. The truck showcases the engineering that PPC has put into the kind of connectors that play such a critical role in cable’s challenging last mile. The demands there arise from both the environment and consumer behavior. "You can’t have a loose connector on the back of a TV set, but you can’t use a wrench, as well," Riley said. One answer to that dilemma is an enhanced connector that—according to the test that we took—increases finger-tightened torque by several orders of magnitude. Every year, PPC runs hundreds of techs through what Riley calls a "boot camp" to increase their knowledge of its products and to become better at using them. "If they believe in the product, they’ll do their job better." Which brings us to this week’s soapbox: Vendors obviously play a key role in training cable’s technical workforce. What training out there works? And what doesn’t? Let us know. Answers to this week’s quiz: 1. Impedance 2. 25 feet 3. 70, 120, 190, 260 4. Payload 5. 24 6. AZN Television 7. 10 feet 8. Rose 9. Lack of stability, operator error, violation of OSHA regulations 10. Coaxial cable 11. Farbry Perot and distributed feedback