[Elecraft] Are K3 serial numbers sequential?

[Don Wilhelm]

  Andy,

Because Elecraft offers upgrade kits that can be installed, any K3 (or 
K2 for that matter) can be brought up to the current level.  Your effort 
may not reveal true information about the level of any K3.

What that means is that the ship date and serial number is not as 
important as it is in other radios that do not provide that type of 
updating.  When buying a used K3, if you have assurances from the owner 
that all the updates have been installed, even the first K3s shipped can 
be just as current as a K3 that ships today.

If you do not have the documentation for the mods installed, one can do 
a physical inspection to determine which mods have been installed on any 
particular K3.  Look at the K3 along with the mod instructions to see if 
it has been installed.

The listing of mods on the Elecraft website has approximate serial 
numbers and dates for the cut-into production.  I would use that rather 
than any list provided voluntarily by users.

As an example, my K3 SN 00020 has all the upgrades installed, except for 
the DSP board which I chose to install the low pass filter instead of 
swapping for the upgraded DSP board.  Except for the extended audio low 
frequency response offered by the board swap, my K3 is the same as one 
with equal options shipping today.

We can thank Elecraft for providing those mod kits to allow customers to 
upgrade their K2s and K3s.  Not many other manufacturers do that.

73,
Don W3FPR

On 6/16/2011 11:07 AM, KD3RF wrote:
> Great start and I'll enter my K3 S/N.
>
> What I was actually hoping to find out however, was two things:
>
> 1)  How many K3s have been shipped to date?
>
> and...
>
> 2) To have a ready reference when someone posts one for sale as to its date
> of manufacture?
>
> S/N tracking seems to be an issue with just about every manufacturer, going
> back to the original Collins S-Line and KWM2 series where it was impossible
> to tell exactly when a particular rig was manufactured.
>
>