"gareth" wrote in news:lv91j4$gv9$1@dont-
email.me:

how difficult
it is to manufacture our own plugs and sockets, despite that BNC and N have
been around for 70 years, with SMC some time later!


Why do you want to do that? Some wheels are definitely best not reinvented.
BNC's can be had on eBay as easily as used matchsticks used to be seen on a
street, it's not like we have to make do without. N connectors are expensive,
but there are likely good reasons for that, partly bulk size, precision
requirements, and a lower size of market (by far) than for BNC.

Unless you wanted a bespoke connector at great expense to either do something
really new, or to freeze out an easy chance of anyone connecting to your
stuff, there is no point, the costs are extreme.

The last two big plug innovations I thought about much were the digital ones,
USB and FireWire. USB went for royalty-free manufacture, knowing that the
vast market would make it indispensible so they could get their money made on
sales to that vast market. FireWire was closer to the RF market in being
smaller, more demanding in quality and precision and power capability, and
went for royalties on the grounds that the smaller market tended to have
deeper pockets. Both methods worked, nether connector 'beat' the other.

As far as I know, the only connector easy to make cheaply as DIY is the 4mm
plug, and then only if you can do VERY tight tolerances for good fit, to
avoid having to make complicated springs and such.

The sim[plest, most common things, are often the most difficult and
expensive. How much does a transistor cost? 10 million bucks, until you made
more of them than you can ever count. It's not to bad with plugs but the
logic is similar.