[Elecraft] [K3] Key Clicks or just Key Click Artifacts ?

Phil Hystad phystad at mac.com
Sun Jul 4 19:18:37 EDT 2010


I was hunting around for some action today on the 20 meter band with CW.  Did not find anything but I discovered an unusual key click which I am not sure if it is a real key click or not or maybe just some artifact of the sidetone monitor.

Since I was looking for stations, I was playing with the RF control a little bit and I noticed that if the RF control is advanced much past 12 oclock or maybe 1 oclock that key clicks were generated.  As you advance the RF control, the key clicks get stronger and bolder (whatever I mean by that).  At the time, my filter was fairly wide at about 1000 Hz so I started closing it down and about 350 Hz or so the key clicks disappeared.  These values though change depending on how far my RF is advanced versus the filter width.  With the filter down to 250 Hz or so, I can have the RF advanced almost all the way and the monitored signal is clean.  By the way, my smallest roofing filter is 400 Hz 8-pole.

Now, those are the symptoms.  I am guessing that I am filtering out the key clicks by tightening it up with a smaller width.  These clicks occur whether in TX or in TEST mode and exactly the same symptoms.  I did about 20 minutes of testing and playing around with all kinds of adjustments in TEST mode.

So, does anyone else see these clicks.  Are they a generated artifact of the sidetone monitor or are these clocks actually TX'd and sent out.  No, I am not setup to listen to my own signal over the air and besides, given the interaction with the RF control, I really think they are not part of my TX signal.

Does anyone else see these?

I am still not an expert on a correct setting for the RF control versus the AF level.  I have a tendency to play between the two to get the best signal but without too much noise.  By the way, I very rarely use noise reduction (NR) -- it is almost always off on my K3 because I have not yet learned how to use it.  Most of the time, the noise is not an issue and NR does not really seem to be needed.

Thanks for any comments or help.  If someone could confirm that this is normal and generated internally only (not TX'd) then I am fine (sort of) --- when TXing I can always back off the RX control anyway to remove the clicks.

73, phil, K7PEH



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