Well the K2 was completed on Sunday afternoon virtually one month to the day from first receiving it in the post.
By Sunday evening I’d had my first QSO with a French station F3MB (Jean in Bordeaux) who gave me a good 589 report.
The building of the transmitter went a lot easier than the receiver but I still had a few issues along the way. Sunday morning on the first power test I thought I might have a serious problem as it was only pushing out half a watt no matter what power output I was selecting, something was not quite right.
A quick search on the Elecraft K2 forum and I had the information for a basic power trace of the problem and within the first couple of power checks with the DMM I found a cold solder joint on one of the transistors. A quick touch of solder and a few more checks which produced no further issues I put the K2 back together and hit the tune button, all was well and I was getting good power out in to the dummy load.
My only concern is that I'm having to use a manual ATU which is a bit of a pain when trying to remember each tune and load settings for the different bands. So its either invest in the K2 auto ATU or buy myself something like an LDG auto ATU, well see what happens.
Now I’ve got the two other options to build; the 100 watt PA and the audio filter which hopefully won’t take me too long. I’ve also got the chance to buy the SSB, 20 watt ATU, and 160 meter option from my fellow K2 builder down the road from me. The SSB and 160 might suit but the 20w ATU wont be much use.
I'll see, I may well be "elecraft'd" out by the time I've built the PA and filter!
By Sunday evening I’d had my first QSO with a French station F3MB (Jean in Bordeaux) who gave me a good 589 report.
Safely positioned in the Shack!
A quick search on the Elecraft K2 forum and I had the information for a basic power trace of the problem and within the first couple of power checks with the DMM I found a cold solder joint on one of the transistors. A quick touch of solder and a few more checks which produced no further issues I put the K2 back together and hit the tune button, all was well and I was getting good power out in to the dummy load.
My only concern is that I'm having to use a manual ATU which is a bit of a pain when trying to remember each tune and load settings for the different bands. So its either invest in the K2 auto ATU or buy myself something like an LDG auto ATU, well see what happens.
Looking good next to the old OHR 100A
Now I’ve got the two other options to build; the 100 watt PA and the audio filter which hopefully won’t take me too long. I’ve also got the chance to buy the SSB, 20 watt ATU, and 160 meter option from my fellow K2 builder down the road from me. The SSB and 160 might suit but the 20w ATU wont be much use.
I'll see, I may well be "elecraft'd" out by the time I've built the PA and filter!
No comments:
Post a Comment