[Elecraft] My K3's Very Quiet

[W0SD Ed Gray]

I believe the test results but the reality to me is in the real world it 
does not make any difference on HF below 10 meters.

I don't use the ATU, all resonate antenna's here.  If using the 
amplifier no ATU into the amplifier so that is not an issue here.

The 4 db mentioned with the pre-amp I am sure is accurate but I can not 
hear the difference and I have a nice quiet location. IMHO you can't get 
a quiet rx with a pre-amp as the background is going to increase when 
you turn it on.  It would be fine to get more back ground if the signal 
was better copy.  However for me I can never remember a case where 
turning on the pre-amp made it possible to copy something better than 
without it other than 10 meters and up and I have a quiet location out 
in the country.
My opinion is based on working all DXCC countries, 5Band WAZ, lots of 
contests, operating 160-1296 and higher with about 300,000 qso's in the 
log and being on several Dx-peditions. I just say this to validate I 
have been blessed to be able to do a good deal of operating in the real 
world.

To me there is a limit to the improvement you can get in the real world 
on an antenna when you have atmospheric and man made noise. Again I have 
chased weak signal DX for a long time and I have never found a time the 
pre-amp helps below 10 meters on recent vintage radios.  It may help 
others but it does not help me.  For me it is just tiring to the ears to 
listen to the extra background noise with the pre-amp on.

For me the key point is that you can make legitimate tests that show a 
difference in a test set up with test equipment but in the real world 
listening on an antenna even at a very quiet location it just isn't 
going to show up.

The fact is that probably only 1% or less of hams have very quiet 
locations so they just amplify man made noise when they turn on the 
pre-amp.  To get a benefit you need a very low noise floor and there is 
a limit on HF even at the most quiet location.

I will stick to my "GUNS" and say the pre-amp does not help me any below 
10 meters and only makes it more fatiguing
to listen to ( roughly 3-S units more background on my K3 meter) and I 
am blessed with having a quieter location than I suspect 99% of the hams 
have.  So the bottom line I think for most if you want less noise is to 
turn the pre-amp off. If it does make a difference for you(I does not 
for me) it will be a very small percentage of the time so why not leave 
it off 99.9% of the time if background noise is an issue for you.

I think most of the persons having problems with listening to the K3 are 
because of what I will call "pitch" or put another way what they trouble 
setting it so it is what they like to listen to.  Here is a real world 
example. Operating at TZ6EI this past summer on six meters W7XU was 
having trouble with the K3 "noise" with the six meter pre-amp.  He likes 
to copy a low pitch 300 hz, no more than 400 hz on cw. The background 
noise was driving him "NUTS".  I had him adjust the shift to lower the 
"pitch" of the noise and he was perfectly satisfied and we are talking 
about hours and days of weak signal copying with headphones.

Ed W0SD

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