[Elecraft] K2 #3212 on the air and keyer auto-detect

[Ed Milcarsky]

Greetings to all,

K2 #3212 is alive.

Also,  I had interesting problem with the 2 diode Keyer auto-detect.
I built the circuit exactly as described in the manual.  I used 1N4148
diodes and made a "Y" jumper for the key and paddles.  The circuit worked
but every few strokes with my Kent straight key would cause the keyer to
alternate dots and dashes as if I had squeezed the paddles.  It occurred in
the VOX set to TEST so I know it wasn't RF causing the problem.  Also,
changing the T-R delay had no effect.

The problem was solved by placing a 0.1 uF capacitor between the terminals
of my key.  I think the key was bouncing and U6 on the control board was
seeing the noise and thought I was using the paddles.  The added capacitance
helps suppress the noise from the key bouncing.  I would think this might
also be solved by replacing the capacitors on the RF board (C1 and C2= 0.001
uF) with larger values.

73 de Ed  KG4ARN