[Elecraft] Is there a an external signal on the K3 for ANT1/ANT2

[Guy Olinger K2AV]

Questions:

I may be looking for something that's right under my nose, but I've
been digging and can't find it...

***>>> Is there a way in the various outputs to tell whether the radio
is transmitting on ANT1 or ANT2.  This is an need that is developing
out of my very successful use of diversity on 40 through 15 during the
IOTA contest out on North Carolina's Core Banks.  I am in the process
of adding switching to listen in diversity on two transmitting
antennas on 40-10, in addition to the more common diversity on two
different receive antennas on 80 and 160.

During IOTA, the ANT switch put the transmitting antenna of a right
angle pair of identical antennas in the left ear, and it was a very
easy concept to manage, which others in the group picked up instantly.

At home and facing dissimilar antennas and amplifiers I would need the
ANT1/ANT2 state exported to throw switches.

***>>> A second question regards where one might place a BNC jack that
has the "other" ant RX out jack brought out to the back panel instead
of routed directly to the KRX3.  Is there a newer back panel that
would support this?

Explanation:

If one is using diversity for 160 through 10 and has to switch between
diverse RX antennas on low bands to listening diversely on TX
antennas, the switching choice that now is made at kit build time will
have to be made and then unmade as band changes progress during the
contest.

I know, I know, what planet have you been on, but it WORKED very
nicely on Core Banks, particularly on 40 meters.

I'm sure many of you have heard that very fast QSB later in the
evening on 40 meters that can clip dits out characters and change dahs
into dits.  After listening to it all night in the IOTA I am 99%
positive that it is caused by rotating polarization, and the drop is
when the rotation invokes that 30 dB cross-polarization at 90 degrees
off the SINGLE antenna polarization in use at the station. The
rotation was commonly around 10-20 seconds but varied wildly and was
NOT at the same frequency or angle of rotation on different incoming
signals.

Simply toggling out of and into diversity mode would respectively
toggle between:

1) aforementioned deep QSB, particularly bad on weaker signals with
low antennas, and all weak signals in the pileup coming from the
center of the headset.

and

2) hearing the same signal rotate from one ear to another, most of the
time without much of a dip, if the audio in BOTH ears is used for
evaluation. The  rotation effect for weak signals calling in a pileup
(we were a rare mult), would frequently spread out calling signals
left to right in the headset. Different weak signals were not uniform
in their cycle phase or timing.  It was notable that this effect was
missing from LOUD signals from either EU or US, which tended to be in
ONE EAR OR THE OTHER, not both. USA in the SW-NE wire and EU in the
SE-NW wire.

On high angle signals on 20 and 40 the separation would be not so much
direction incoming as polarization in reception.

The antenna was an identical pair of 28' on a side inverted vee
doublets supported in the center on a 40' push up pole, carefully
pulled out at right angles and fed with two 450 lines to a pair of 4:1
voltage baluns right at the K3, and using the internal tuner.  The
obvious mismatch to the KRX3 was worried about but did not seem to
affect reception in any discernable way.  Also the misc power in the
not-transmitting antenna while the other was transmitting never once
operated the COR.  We had taken pains toward this in the erection of
the antenna.  I doubt the low levels would have been true if we had
been operating amps instead of barefoot.

73, Guy