[Elecraft] KX3 Reception issue and VFO noise

[Clint]

Last week I  finished building my KX3, SN 1926. Wow, what a little powerhouse.

I am not a contester but this past weekend the California QSO party was on so I jumped in a few times just to see how my little guy was doing. I noticed a few not so good things.

First there was lots of VFO noise. VFO NR helped but did not kill it.

Second I had a loose/bad connection somewhere. I could bump the radio and reception would change drastically. Bummer!

Yesterday I jumped back into the radio. I noticed the bare area with no paint on the side panels had a stripe of paint on the bottom (outer) edge. This SHOULD have cleared the main chassis but I suspected it did not completely clear. As this was the area that responded the most to my bumping exercise I removed the strip of paint. I also checked the Mic jack as it has a ground connection. It was OK. I also cleaned (again) the bare aluminum areas and applied a light coat of Deoxit Gold.

Well, this has fixed the reception problem. No more goofy reception, and I suspect transmission too, and the VFO noise is reduced. I did reseat the filter board, the flex connector and the auto tuner. I also applied (again) a light coat of Deoxit Gold (mine is cut 50% with IPA) but I found no issues with any of the connections and I had applied Deoxit during assembly, as a preventive measure.

So there you have it, for what it is worth. 

Clint

KI6SSN