[Elecraft] K1-4 4 band version gone?

[Jessie Oberreuter]

      Here's another thought that perhaps one of us could put together: 
give up the internal battery space for a considerably larger filter board 
that could be used to allow room for additional "2 band" style filters 
that don't share components (and, thus, don't need high-tolerance parts). 
No new parts would be needed; the existing 2-band parts kits, and the 
controller from the 4-band board would serve.
      This would also open the door for selecting a completely arbitrary 
set of four bands (eg 15/20/40/80) as the filters would, again, be 
completely independent of each other.
      I'll have to give mine a close look for mechanical feasibility when I 
get home.  -kb7psg



On Thu, 17 Jul 2014, Wayne Burdick wrote:

> The 4-band module requires extremely low-temperature-coefficient trimmer 
> capacitors because of its narrow-band pre-mix and RF band-pass filters. 
> The last source for these exotic trimmers dried up recently. A redesign 
> using higher-TC trimmers might be possible, but the filters would end up 
> being triple-tuned, which would force the use of SMD components 
> throughout, and tuning the filters would then be very difficult without 
> a spectrum analyzer.
>
> Sales volume for the K1 has decreased in recent years due to the KX1 
> (which is smaller and has a DDS VFO), and the KX3 (which covers all 
> bands, all modes, with up to 12 W output and has a much more capable 
> auto tuner, nicer user interface, etc.). So the cost of a redesign 
> wouldn't be recovered.
>
> That said, for the time being we're continuing to offer the two-band 
> version and the other options (KAT1 ATU, KBT1 battery pack, etc.). The 
> K1 is one of our "full" kits, and has a bit of a fan club of its own.
>
> We'll update the website to reflect the change in option availability.
>
> 73,
> Wayne
> N6KR