[Elecraft] K3 #1037 in IARU contest

[Ed Gray W0SD]

The IARU contest was the first chance to try SN#1037 out in more crowed 
band conditions.  We were multi-op single transmitter so three persons 
used the radio and we were both CW and SSB. It was a serious effort with 
1967 contacts in the 24 hours and over 1,000,000 points.  All the 
operators did not have any trouble adapting to the radio having never 
used a K3 before.

What a joy to have a radio that gets around a multitude of problems most 
radios have such as the FT-1000D 1000MP, TX-950SDX, Mark V, etc. in 
setting up for a contest.  CW with the computer into the key jack and 
paddle in the paddle jack using the internal keyer is Plug and Play.

Heil HC4 was plug and play.  We used the front connector with the 
Kenwood Heil adaptor.  I had read some reports about the connector not 
being sturdy one the front but I certainly find it to be fine.  Since 
the adapter sticks out close to 2 inches there would be some lever arm 
in effect if you banged some thing heavy against it but the mike 
connector is as sturdy as other radios I have.  We may move to the 
connections on the back of the radio.  If you don't have your radio yet 
the manual clearly states for the HC4 and HC5 Heil to have the bias 
turned off.  It plugs into the back or for the front use the Kenwood 
Heil adaptor.

We did not have a lot of time to set up the audio but I will concur with 
what Ed W0YK has said and that is to not set the mic gain to high.  We 
got good audio reports and no bad ones.  Different operators have 
different voices and one needs to get levels set up so the DVR from the 
computer has similar levels on the line in to the microphone.  Our 
settings were good for two of us using the high level input.  We ran the 
mike at 15 and the compression at 20.  I really could not hear much 
change until about 15 on the compression and at 20 I could hear what I 
would call moderate compression.  The third person spoke much softer so 
we had to do some on the fly adjustment whenever he was on SSB which was 
easy to do and after that he could do it himself.

We used some equalization starting with W0YK's suggested setting.  It 
seemed to give the audio a little more highs.  I need to do more testing 
here but it does work.  I will say if you don't have a low pitched voice 
the audio without any equalization changes for contesting or busting 
pileups is A OK.

BTW having just got back from operating TO5E for 10 days the on the air 
audio of 40% of the hams we worked is a VERY, VERY sad commentary on 
operators inability to operate there equipment correctly.  They sounded 
horrible.  On the positive side about 40% were excellent for cutting the 
pile up and were still excellent communication quality.  About 20% had 
good rag chewing audio. The K3 "TEST" mode should make it possible for 
any amateur to make sure there signal sounds OK.  Obviously or lets say 
I assume the 40% that sounded terrible had never listened to themselves. 
   When I say terrible I really mean it!!!

The DVR from the computer into the Line input is plug and play but you 
have to adjusted the level as per the manual. Using DVR from the 
computer worked great.  We had no issues at all.  The VOX/Anti-VOX and 
delay worked extremely well.  This is the best VOX I have ever used.  We 
always have foot switches so if the VOX starts acting up we can shut it 
off and keep on going.  We never had any issues or need for that with 
the K3 in the first contest with it.

The filters were 2.7  5 pole,  1.8 khz   8 pole,  500 hz 5 pole and 200 
hz  5 pole.  Admittedly we have a lot of learning to do in regards to 
shift and lo-hi cut but we used them enough to know they are going to be 
awesome assets and made some qso's possible we could not of made without 
them.  Anyway all the operators were impressed with how easy it was to 
use the width control and used it a lot.  I came away with the definite 
impression that one can do well with less filters as the DSP handles 
things well even when things are crowed with strong signals.  The 1.8 
khz filter is a big time winner for SSB contesting.  For a non contester 
it would not be nearly as big an issue but if you operate 20 meters a 
lot it would be good as it always seems crowded with someone close by 
that is strong.  We have more to learn but we used w0YK's suggested "IF 
shift of -500 hz(FC of 1.10 khz)" which makes the 1.8 khz filter very 
pleasant to listen to. Anyway as a number of people have said it is very 
good advice if you are not a contester to not get a lot of filters until 
you have used the radio.  You may very well find you are totally happy 
with just the DSP filtering.  Possibly you might want an 500hz filter is 
you do CW.

We also have a lot of learning to do in regards to the Noise Blanker. 
Fortunately we don't have much power line noise here but we did use it 
on 10 meters(we had some high wind which bounces the power lines around) 
at a setting I previously had chosen and it worked great. We found no 
issues with the pre-amp on and splatter from nearby stations.

We found no issues with the pre-amp on and adjacent signal problems 
which is a first for me with any radio.  Lots of audio gain on rcv on 10 
meters where I have always been short of in other radios.  The FT-1000D 
is really low on audio on 10 meters.

Used the notch was no problem.  It worked good in auto and manual is 
totally intuitive.

On setting up I thought the VOX-Break delay was a menu setting like VOX 
Gain and Anti-VOX but a quick reading of the manual showed it is the 
hold in position on the speed/Mike knob.  Yes I have read the manual 
several times over the past few months but obviously I read this section 
to fast.  We ended up with .4 which seemed to work out good with our DVR 
and CW keying. We did not seem to have any problem with missing people 
coming back.  This seemed a little long to me but worked fine.

This radio will handle issues with hot switching with such amplifiers as 
the ACOM 1000.  A have an IC-746 and also an FT-897 and they put out a 
pulse at full power even when the power is turned down so they do not 
work well with a lot of amplifiers.  With the TX delay you can handle 
this situation for most amplifiers.  The K3 does not have the pulse of 
power out either.  The normal .08 was fine for my homebrew 8877 or Alpha 99.

We did not have time to set the memories up so just putting a CW band 
frequency in VFO A and SSB in VFO B and changing bands by entering the 
frequency worked fine for us.  No one complained about doing it this 
way.  Ultimately I will make use of the memories.

The RIT was easy to use or you can use split.  It sure is nice to go to 
the slow tuning rate  or quickly to fast depending on what you are doing.

The only operator error is one person got the radio in the test mode 
accidentally and wondered why they suddenly had no output power.  I was 
able to instantly diagnose what happened.

The front stand is perfect for viewing the radio.  For tuning it might 
be a little lower as you have to raise your wrist to tune but certainly 
it did not show up as a factor using it for 24 hours in a row.  It is 
important to learn how to use all the tuning rate controls which 
minimizes how much you need to turn the tuning knob.  Remember we just 
used freq. entry a lot and it is quick.  Much quicker than you would 
think.  Remember for example to get to 14.0000 all you need to do is 
freq. enter (tap) 14 and  tap the enter arrow(AFX button).  It basically 
takes 2 seconds.

We had a low PA temp the whole contest.  We will see what a RTTY contest 
brings but I see no problem at all with an RTTY contest being on the 
whole contest. The on and off between rec. and transmit will cut the 
duty cycle down and on average one probably is going to be around 50-70 
watts out to drive the amplifier so that will keep the PA temperature 
down as well.

One last comment the yellow light coming on with the red light when tbe 
transmit and recieve frequencies or modes are different due to the use 
of split, RIT or XIT is a great idea.  It really helped the new guys 
operating split ssb on 40 meters.

Last but one of my big concerns in the hectic operation in a contest was 
would the small, light K3 not slide around on the table tuning and 
hitting button.  Secondly would the buttons be to small/hard to operate, 
etc.  It did not slide around and the buttons have plenty of room 
between them and are very readable with no glasses for my eyesight at 65 
years years of age. Will the buttons work 10 years from now?  Basically 
each button only has two functions gotten by a tap or hold so one can 
not complain about menus.  VOX gain and anti-vox being a menu item could 
be a problem with different operators in a contest and varying 
background noise but we found it to be a non-issue.  Back to the buttons 
from what I read they are good for a lot of operations.  As long as the 
modules are available a new front panel could be put in if it becomes an 
issue.

If you are setting on the fence wondering if you should buy this radio 
let me assure you the radio is "SOLID" and extremely well thought out 
and with Firmware changes will continue to get better.

IMHO the proof of this is we had three people using the radio and two of 
them with zero time in front of the radio and the only time I had to 
help during the contest is when the one fellow accidentally got into the 
TEST mode.  This was after less than 5 minutes instruction before the 
contest.  The K3 is just intuitive to operate.

Ed W0SD