[Elecraft] My K3's Very Quiet

[Jan Erik Holm]

Ed,

No offence but what you say below puts everything on the tilt
since you say you have been using a FT-1000D, ifn´t you had
it in IPO all the time you have been using the preamp. There
is no two ways about it.

I do agree that the reel world performance compared to "lab"
performance is two totally different things.
I´m beginning to think we have something here in conjunction
with the K3.

As I did say before, my gut feeling is that there is something
going on but I can´t put my finger on it neither I have the
time available to investigate.


/ Jim SM2EKM
---------------------------
W0SD Ed Gray wrote:
> 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
>