[Elecraft] Re: Elecraft Digest, Vol 13, Issue 27 Balanced Automatic Tuners

[Wa6bfh at aol.com]

Balanced Line Tuners
 
I don’t think you really want an Automatic tuner from Elecraft -- unless  
they perhaps decide to venture into a new nitch in terms of a superb KW tuner  
that works well with their and other radios.
 
First the reason that I say KW TransMatch is that you have to think in  terms 
of at least 100 Watt power levels of the K2100 and most other transmitters  
of our day. If you are going to tune out what may well be a 10:1 or even 
greater  reactance at 100 Watts, that could be thousands of volts. The tuner design 
must  accommodate this.
 
I would welcome seeing Elecraft or any manufacturer produce a software  
driven ‘truly balanced tuner’. Nothing like this now exists on the market. There  
are and have been some such unbalanced tuners that will match an antenna in 
the  middle hundreds of Ohms. Even these won’t go beyond 600 or 800 Ohms, and 
that is  simply not enough for a well engineered station.
 
A software {or firmware} driven TransMatch that would tune from about one  
half Ohm, to about 2000 Ohms, and handle the reactive voltages that may be  
imposed at considerably higher power levels would be quite intriguing!
 
73! de John WA6BFH