[Elecraft] Wall wart for KX3

Ed Picha n9ep at comcast.net
Tue Dec 18 21:17:55 EST 2012


KX3 gurus:

Has anyone found a wall wart they like for the KX3?  Like most hams, I 
have a big box of wall warts, and have tried several different 12 V 
adaptors with the KX3.  They all worked ok for general operation, but I 
noted that when I added the KXBC3 battery charger option to the KX3, I 
really needed an honest 13.8 V or higher to fully charge the internal 
batteries.  Most of the warts I tried had outputs less than 13V, and the 
few that I found that could supply 13.8 V under load had voltages above 
15 V with no load.   I didn't want to take a chance with these by 
exceeding the KX3 upper voltage speceven for the short time that it 
would take for the adaptor voltage to drop.

My KX3 current drain numbers are (all at 13.8 V):

receive, with backlight:  0.190 A
receive while charging batteries: 0.400 A
transmit, 5W: 1.04 A
transmit, 10W: 1.91 A

So, I guess the ideal adaptor would be capable of 2A at 13.8 V to 
support running the radio with no (or fully discharged) batteries at 
full power, and would not exceed 15 V with no load.  While I'm wishing, 
it would also be smalland lightweight.

Any suggestions?

thanks, 73

ed N9EP


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