[Elecraft] New K2 build.

[Ron Fial]

Someone wrote: 

>>It's in no way "excess".  Innocent things like this are why I'd never buy a
>>kit assembled by someone else.

There are some builders with poor skills and I have read about disasters.  But I have purchased a lot of kit-built stuff and have been generally pleased with the build quality and soldering skills.  Kit built stuff has always provided me with the greatest performance/price ratio.  

A K1 4-band unit I purchased on ebay was advertised with a low RF-output problem.  It was beautifully built but during alignment, the trimmer cap for the RF driver tank circuit could not peak the rf because an associated fixed cap was too far off tolerance.  I could see the trimmer was at max when it peaked. I added a few pf across the existing fixed cap and the rf peaked and the Watts output was even way more than the K1 specs!

I felt like a criminal paying so little and getting such a fantastic unit already built.  I added the backlight to the display, changed the internal batteries to 3 lithium cells (came with internal battery pack) and added the resistor to linearize the tuning and enjoyed it ever since.  It even came with the mobile mounting kit!

73,  Ron KO7V