[Elecraft] K2 s/n 7176 QRV

[Don Wilhelm]

Ron,

The last step in the left column of page 61 directs you to put tape on 
the bottom cover at the L33 location so the resistor leads do not 
contact the cover.  If you did that, your suggestion for covering the 
bare leads of R116 is not necessary.  If you omitted that step, get out 
your electrical tape.

On removing the heatsink - that can be done without losing the PA 
mounting hardware if the K2 is placed on its side so gravity does not 
pull the screws out.  My favorite technique is to place a square of 
electrical tape over the screwheads sticking to the top of the board and 
T4.  Then the screws do not fall out.  Yes, you have to push the screws 
back a bit to remove the heatsink, and if I am going to leave the 
heatsink off for an extended time, I will put the nuts on the screws 
finger-tight.
Conformal coating and other "solutions" can get messy if the PA 
transistors ever have to be replaced.

73,
Don W3FPR

On 8/2/2011 6:57 AM, R Thompson wrote:
>
> Its not in the manual, and others may have a comment on this, but I wish
> that I had done it.  On page 60, the installation of L33 using R116, if
> I could easily do it over again I would take a few millimetres of
> insulation off of the green wire to cover only the parts of the leads of
> R116 that come in contact with the top of L33.  I'm uncomfortable with
> the bare leads of R116 pressing into the very thin insulation of the
> windings on L33.
>
> Some other things I did I won't promote here, especially after being
> told not to do it :-)
>
> The stack of insulators used on the PA amplifier transistors, when I
> took the heatsink off to install the 160M option I took the stack and
> used a bit of conformal coating on the loose insulators to stick them
> together.  The idea was to keep the three insulating pieces (per
> transistor) together as a stack rather than having them fall apart when
> the heat sink is removed to install another option, such as the
> transverter kit which I'm considering doing later.
>