Milestek-Blog

At Milestek, we provide custom-cabling, harness, and interconnect solutions for military, aerospace, telecommunications, and transportation applications. In other words — high-performance, high-demand industries that insist upon mission-critical reliability, unwavering accuracy for provided specifications, and an innovative, customizing spirit.

The custom military cables and connectors we deliver are thoroughly tested over and over again, and arrive 100 percent guaranteed to perform as expected. And we do it for coaxial, twinaxial, triaxial, serial, SCSI, 1553-B, multi-conductor, fiber optic, and D38999 cable assemblies.

Here’s how we do it:

In-house innovation and design

At our manufacturing headquarters in Denton, Texas, our in-house design and engineering staff simply live, eat, and breathe interconnectivity solutions. The keys are customization and optimization. Our custom cable designs can meet the demands of unusual, mission-specific applications, as we can also revise your existing designs to become more cost-effective.

In practice, the advantages of working with us include:

• An unmatched connector and cable inventory.
• Detailed drawing proofs
• CAD design expertise
• Prototype design and development
• Build-to-print capabilities
• ISO 9001:2008 and AS9100 certification

Standards and testing

Once the harnesses and interconnect solutions are designed, if we’re not fully confident in their functionality, we won’t sell them. With this in mind, thorough, determined standards and testing are key. For example, our testing capabilities include:

• Signature Touch 1 cable analyzers and 1000RX cable analyzers
• CAMI Research CableEye PC-based cable test systems
• Oscilloscopes
• Hipot testing
• RMS bench-top multi-meters
• Shimpo HTC 100 pull test units
• VSWR testing using a network analyzer 3 GHz

Our products are manufactured per IPC J-STD-001D and IPC-WHMA-A 620 standards for soldering, and an in-house J-STD-001D certified trainer oversees on-going training of assembly technicians.

Experience, and a reputation you can trust

Take custom, mission-specific applications, for example. To get them right, engineers need to both understand the long, intricate history of cabling solutions, and possess the flexibility and innovative spirit needed to produce new, unprecedented solutions. Thanks in big part to our nearly 30 years of experience in the custom military interconnect solutions industry, our engineers have the experience and the foresight to do both.

Ever since our founding in 1981, we’ve been grateful to have played a role in the development of the most robust military and aerospace industries in the world. In fact, here at Milestek, we’re an approved vendor for Tier I and Tier II Defense and Aerospace companies like Raytheon, Lockheed Martin, Rockwell Collins, Honeywell, L3 Communications, GE, Northrop Grumman, and General Dynamics.

In 2008, this obsession with solutions earned Milestek the Silver Boeing Performance Excellence Award.

Contact one of our military harness and interconnect solutions specialists for more information.

You learn a lot in 30 years. And ever since our founding in 1981, we’ve been more than a little bit obsessed with pioneering new DS3 telecom solutions that make life easier for professionals—especially central office solutions for the telecommunications industry.

Add it all up, and our 30 years of experience and expertise leads the industry, and makes it easy for us to help central office engineers come up with applications for their connectivity problems. In other words, we understand the demands of CO engineers, and we’re eager to provide high-quality, 100-percent tested interconnect products and accessories that get job done, even in the most critical situations.

In fact, we’re an approved supplier to some of leading telecommunications companies around, including Verizon, AT&T, Time Warner, Cox Communications, Qwest, Telect, Fujitsu, and more. And, as we mentioned last week, we even offer advanced, professional DS3 training at our home office as well.

Let’s take a look at what we can provide:

DS3 Connectors for 735A and 734A: BNC and Mini BNC connectors engineered specifically for DS3 central office applications, and 734A and 735A coaxial cables. The connectors are top of the line because they’re made from machined brass with nickel-plating (not inferior die-cast), and include a beryllium-copper wave washer for improved shielding and boosted flexibility and durability over mating cycles.

Bulk Cable: All the most common cables used for DS3 central office applications, including a broad variety of lengths (up to 450 feet for 734-type cable, and 225 feet for 735-tybe cable).

Tools and DS3 Test Kits: All the crimp tools, test kits, and strippers needed to meet the demands facing DS3 installers and technicians.

Custom Cable Assemblies: On-demand, fully customizable combinations of connector types and cables designed by our in-house engineering staff. Our teams can both meet your exact application requirements, and help you improve your current designs to become more cost-effective.

DS3 Adapters: 75 Ohm DS3 adapters that eliminate distortion and transmission errors. Inside is an Adapter Wizard, which makes it simple to find exactly what your application needs.

Panel Assemblies and Racks: Sleek, steel 16 AWG thick BNC distribution panels—featuring .505-inch diameter “D” holes, rolled edges for rigidity, and 10-03538 75 Ω DS3 BNC bulkhead jacks—plus steel and aluminum racks available in both 19” and 23” widths.

Contact our DS3 central office solutions specialists for more information.

As we mentioned last week, if technology isn’t implemented correctly, you won’t get any of these extraordinary benefits from the assembly you install. At best, your conference room, lecture hall, or trade show demonstration audience will be starting at a series of blank TV screens. At worst, you can damage some of the equipment being misused.

That’s why we’re so eager to break down these systems piece by piece here at the Miles Tek blog, and make sure our readers and customers are fully equipped to build the best possible system for their needs.

But with certain technologies, a little bit of further, face-to-face instruction can make a big difference. For example, if our posts explaining DS3 BNC connectors still left you a little bit unsatisfied, you might want to check out the DS3 training we host at our central office in Denton.

We’ve been manufacturing industry-leading DS3 Telecom products for more than 25 years, so we’re eager to share everything we’ve learned over that time.

Our BNC training course makes it easy to do just that—providing both a fundamental understanding of BNC basics, plus advanced, customized instruction depending on the individual needs of each student. We’ll teach you all the essential information you need about terminating cable assemblies, and outline the fundamental features of our BNC design and tooling. This includes basic, step-by-step instruction that leads to dependable installations. And the course includes flexible, customized instruction that ensures we can provide solutions specific to the demands of your job, including knowledge of cable impedance matching, preparation procedures, and understanding of the proper tools needed for each job.

And after you’ve completed the course, you’ll leave with a certificate of completion—in addition to all the training materials needed to cement a sustained, thorough understanding of BNC connectivity solutions.

Come learn from the best! Contact us for more information.

Over the past month, we’ve discussed a couple the unique advantages of using our CAT5E and CAT6 extender devices as a way to improve an AV system.

The benefits are simple: using CAT5E and CAT6 cables can your make your AV system less expensive, and much, much more flexible, without sacrificing high quality. Our HDMI Over Single CAT5E/CAT6 Splitters and Receivers make it easy to extend the HDMI signal up to 164 feet to as many as eight separate HDTV displays—say, for example, in a corporate training environment. Our VGA over CAT5 multiport transmitter and receiver system similarly maximize viewing potential, and improve demonstrations and presentations—say, for example, in a tradeshow demonstration setting. It works because the CAT5E/CAT6 cables themselves are cheaper and more capable of maintaining high quality over a long distance than HDMI or VGA cables—if you have the right equipment to make them adaptable (which, happily, we sell).

But there’s an important technical rule users should understand before trying to implement one of these AV system:

Our HDMI, VGA, and other CAT5E/CAT6 extender devices are designed and tested to work directly from the original source device (for example: Blu-Ray players, standard DVD players, cable/satellite receivers, laptops, or game consoles) to the display (for example: an HDTV, projector, or monitor). They should NOT be used in conjunction with adapters, converters, signal processors or receivers, switchers or splitters between the original source and display devices.

The problem is one of picture quality—interrupting that direct connection can result in no picture, or inconsistent picture over a period of time. In many cases, the receiver end of HDMI balun/wall plate will actually short out, thanks to the the extra burden of voltage it takes on from the additional equipment connected.

If you need to extend your signal a fair distance, but also split or switch it, we suggest purchasing an “Over CAT5E/CAT6” specific splitter or switcher system. At MilesTek, we offer several of these products:

• HDMI over CAT5E/CAT6 1×2, 1×4 and 1×8 splitter/extender with receivers sets
• HDMI over CAT5E/CAT6 4×4 matrix switcher with remote control
• VGA over CAT5E/CAT6 1×2 and 1×8 splitter/extenders with receivers sold separately.