[Elecraft] Tuning your radio and amplifier to your amtenna

[Jim Brown]

On Wed,8/27/2014 9:22 PM, kd7gc wrote:
> I have never heard of anyone suggesting that tuning
> should begin with anything close to 4 watts.  I generally go thru 3 or 4
> steps, but I start with my transceiver set to about 25 or 30 watts output.

Agreed. My Ten Tec Titans (a pair of triodes) drive with a bit less than 
50W. I have tune settings for each amp for each band on a yellow sticky 
next to the amp, so I set those, then hit it with about 25W, tweak, run 
drive to see close to 1500, and retune for maximum smoke as indicated by 
the SWR/power meter. I tune with dits, so the duty cycle is 50%, less 
stress than full power carrier, but gives me correct tuning for full power.

On the other hand, if you're tuning an auto tuner like the KAT500, you 
want to tune it with drive power only, the amp off.

73, Jim K9YC