[Elecraft] K2 #1984 now K2/100!

[Mark J. Dulcey]

I finished it yesterday afternoon, after only one misadventure. I broke 
a lead of one of the MJE182 transistors, and had to wait for a 
replacement. It took almost a week to arrive; Elecraft sent it right 
away, so the delay was the fault of the U.S. Snail. So as not to 
completely lose building momentum, I skipped ahead to a later step and 
wound all the toroids, and then opened up the K2 and did the mods I had 
been planning to make - improved crystal filter grounding and the XFIL2 
SSB mod. Still on deck is the KSB2 IMD mod; I didn't have any 47uF caps 
on hand, so that one had to wait until I got around to getting one.

I dragged out the old AEA tuner (there's no KAT100 yet!) and put it on 
the air last night. My first high power contact was with a T9 in 
Sarajevo - not too bad. And I tried it out on SSB this morning; I had a 
nice chat with K1RMC, just a few miles away in Charlestown.

It won't get much of a workout for the next couple of days; too much to 
do to get ready for Field Day. But then comes the trial by fire! We'll 
see how this thing does under real-life conditions then.

Question for the group: I did the KI6WX improved version of the XFIL2 
mod - the one that uses a 5.6K resistor across pins 1 and 2 of U11. 
Because those pins are right next to each other, I figured that the 
easiest way to install that resistor was to use a surface mount part - 
it just fits right between those pins with no fancy placement needed. 
But am I risking the purity and the mojo of my K2 by putting an SMD 
component in it?


---

Mark Dulcey KE1L
K2 #1984
"Big Brother is listening"