[Elecraft] A repeat of my suggestion.

[Vic Rosenthal]

John McClain wrote:
> 
> On the K2 I am constantly
> stepping through the tuning rates just see what frequency I am really
> on.  If we can't set these digits to zero when they are not displayed,
> maybe we could continue  displaying them even though they won't
> change.  In my opinion either way would be better than what we have
> now.

The problem seems to be that the 10 Hz tuning rate is too slow for comfort, but
increasing it by increasing the step size decreases the resolution -- both the
number of digits displayed and the number of possible settings.

There may be a way to have your cake and eat it.  A K2 owner I know (I don't
want to mention his call w/o permission) has installed an encoder with a greater
number of counts per revolution.  The K2's encoder appears to have 25 counts per
rev, which produces a tuning rate of about 1 KHz per rev with the 10 Hz step
size.  Similar encoders are available with 50, 100, 128, and 200 cpr.

So at the 10 Hz step size you would (theoretically) get

standard encoder  1 KHz/rev
50 cpr encoder    2 KHz/rev
100 "    "        4 KHz/rev
128 "    "        5.12 KHz/rev
200 "    "        8 KHz/rev

I normally use the 20 Hz step size.  Any larger is too coarse for my taste.  If
I replaced my encoder with the 50 cpr version, I could have the same tuning rate
with a 10 Hz step size and two digits on the display.  

I probably would go for the 100 -- that would give me a 4 KHz/rev tuning rate at
the 10 Hz step size.  I think this would be comfortable for fine tuning while
allowing reasonably quick QSY.  The fellow I mentioned who has done it went all
the way to 200 cpr!

Anybody see a downside (other than the fact that these encoders are NOT cheap)?

Vic K2VCO