[Elecraft] Considering K1 - Have Questions

[Ron D'Eau Claire]

Hi, Duffy!

Without trying to be "flip" I can say that one of the biggest "gotcha's"
in the Elecraft rigs would be using sockets for the IC's! 

Sockets can introduce all manner of problems. And it is really NOT hard
to remove an IC if that should ever be the case. You simply sacrifice
the old IC. They are rather cheap in any case, so you just clip all the
leads on the IC, remove the "body" of the beast, then use a simple
desoldering tool to unsolder and remove the old "pins" from the holes.

But it's very RARELY needed. 

The Elecraft rigs use a couple of large IC's which may be replaced to
update firmware. Those come WITH sockets so you can remove them easily
if you want to "upgrade" your system.

All the others are designed to be soldered directly to the board and
they should be to avoid contact problems, "fit" problems around other
components, unwanted capacitance and inductance problems introduced by
the socket, etc.

The K-rigs are designed for the home builder. All you need is a decent
soldering iron with a grounded tip. A "soldering station" is ideal, but
not essential. I used a 20-watt iron. The danger is in using too much
heat. Remember, the MOST EXPENSIVE PART in the whole kit is the PC
BOARD!  Consider the trouble and cost if you built the kit and did fatal
damage to the board so you had to rebuild the board...

I have a K2, but not a K1, so I'll leave any further comments about the
K1 itself to those who have built them. 

Ron AC7AC
K2 # 1289


Hello folks, 

I... am 
considering the K1 kit as a project.

Can all the IC's be mounted in sockets instead of soldering directly to
the 
board?

>From what I can see on the Elecraft web site, the front panel board 
>seems to
have a large IC on it or is that the back of the display?  If an IC,
again, are 
there big enough sockets for those puppies?

Haven't built any big kits since the Heathkit days and Heathkits were
pretty 
forgiving on the soldering of components.  I much rather use IC sockets
in case 
a bad IC has to be replaced.  Any other "gotcha's" I may need to be
aware of 
when building this kit?

Thanks,

Duffy
www.wb8nut.com


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