[Elecraft] V63ZM & KH2/G3ZEM

[Bob Henderson]

Just a short note of thanks to all of my friends at Elecraft.  A few days
ago I completed 13 days of essentially CW operation from KH2/G3ZEM and
V63ZM.  This was a "man in a suitcase" dx-pedition with everything carried
with me from my home in Cyprus.  The relevance to this list is that my
equipment was 100% Elecraft with a K3, KPA500 & KAT500 combo.  My antenna
was a Butternut HF9V with 160m add-on which on Weno was mounted on the
hotel roof.  I made QSOs on all 9 bands from 160 - 10m from both
locations.  Tally for KH2 was around 3,500 and from V6 9,500.

My Elecraft equipment performed impeccably.  The KPA500 produced 600W
output on all bands without the slightest drama.  Occasional overdrive, bad
SWR or power glitch would cause the amp to trip but it was
always immediately reset.  Once the KAT500 had learnt the characteristics
of the antenna, band hopping was easy and immediate.  Overall I have no
complaints though I do have one observation........

When operating from DX locations I always aim to keep the bandwidth
occupied by the pile-up as small as possible.  I see no reason for a big
stage on which to perform and I see no reason to unnecessarily mess up the
band for other users.  However this approach places huge demands upon
receiver dynamic performance due to the number of stations present within
receive passband at any point in time.

I experimented with all AGC settings but failed to find any
providing adequate signal separation with such high station density.
Rather than spread the pile to lighten the load I opted for operation with
AGC off and bandwidth set to 1kHz.  Riding the RF gain control, as we all
used to do in the (g)olden days provided the best results by far.  My K3
has the current firmware incorporating the AGC improvements.  I have no
idea whether any other transceiver AGC system would fair better in similar
circumstances.

73

Bob, 5B4AGN
DU1SVA, KH2/G3ZEM, V63ZM