[Elecraft] Key Clicks? Maybe, Maybe not.

[Gary Smith]

I have an interesting thing to figure out...

I have a K3 and my amp is a TenTec Titan 425.

I was CQing DX on 160 CW today using semi break-in and a fellow came 
by and said I was generating key clicks. He came back and asked me to 
QSY to SSB and I looked for him but didn't find him.

I went up in the band a bit to a local net with strong signals and 
asked if they'd listen to my signal for clicks. I sent CW and the 
answer came back my signal was fine, no issues. A KP4 said I had no 
clicks. 

So I went to the DX cluster to see what was on & there was a note 
from the fellow who asked me to QSY telling me where to meet him 
posted 20 minutes earlier. Not reaching him I sent him an email and 
he returned with a nice note saying the following when I said I don't 
have any key clicks:

********
"Hi Gary yes you do but it may be that you don't have enough delay in 
the amp there are a number of guys on the TB chat the heard it ..it 
only occurs on the  dashes  but at least 5 others heard in including 
a couple very knowledgeable guys that where the delay idea came 
from".
********

I called Elecraft tech for suggestions and the only thing we came up 
with was to change the Tx delay from 008 to something higher..

Before I do that, I wonder if there's any other ideas from the group 
as to what might be an issue. To recap and expand: I was using semi 
break in and sending around 22WPM using the memory keyer in the K3. 
As the it was semi-break-in, there was no relay on the amp that was 
being switched on or off in-between characters or even in-between 
words.

The Titan amp is a QSK amp so it has no issue with fast relay turn-
around times. When I transmit there are no apparent issues with 
feedback getting into the K3, no relay sounds from overload etc. I 
was transmitting with 45W into the Titan. The fellow said it was on 
the dashes that there are the clicks.

Ideas?

Thanks,
Gary
KA1J