[Elecraft] K3 Lightning near miss

[Julius Fazekas n2wn]

Had a bunch of stuff zapped during the recent super cell event that wreaked
so much havoc, including one of my K3s... First, hope anyone in the affected
area is safe and sound.

My K3 appears to be mostly OK, as far as I have been able to test it. The
exception being the PA. I can get almost 20 Watts out max. The SWR/Power
indication on the K3 does not appear to be functioning correctly. This leads
me to think the issue is related to the diodes in that circuit. This
happened several times with my K2s. Any thoughts?

I happened to see the strike, as I was outside on the balcony observing the
storm. It appears to have been a near miss, versus a hard core strike. 

My 160m Tee had the coffee can housing for the matching network blown apart
and the coil and some wiring was melted/vaporized. The antenna, as some may
recall, is within 25 feet of the operating position. Two blown breakers in
the house, two UPSes tripped (one looks to be permanently dead), at least a
blown video card on the shack computer and the K3 problem(s). The antennas
were disconnected from the rig and grounded.

Considering the other damage in the area, I feel I was pretty lucky overall.

Thanks in advance,
Julius
-----Julius Fazekas
N2WN

Tennessee Contest Group
http://www.k4ro.net/tcg/index.html

Tennessee QSO Party
http://www.tnqp.org/

Elecraft K2        #4455
Elecraft K3/100 #366
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