[Elecraft] New KX2 No Transmit

[Guy Olinger K2AV]

It just sounds, walks and talks like a BNC problem.

Try a small guage wire about 10 foot long directly inserted into the
center pin connector, and retry. See if the SWR comes down to some
degree, if you hear anything on RX. If so, then for whatever reason,
the cable BNC pin is not making contact with the jack's center pin
receptacle.

See if there is a burr on the outside of the BNC jack barrel that
prevents being able to shove the BNC all the way home.

Is the twist motion at the end of hooking up reasonably easy? It
shouldn't be hard if it's shoved all the way home.

See if the center pin receptacle in the BNC jack seems "spread apart".
There have been poor quality BNC plugs with oversized pins which
spread apart the center pin receptacles in BNC jacks and cause
problems later.

Hardware is not always good. I once had to deal with a Type F
connector that lacked threads to grab the threads on the jack's
barrel.

The BNC jack can be bad, or a cold solder joint to the circuit board,
etc, etc. It just sounds like BNC problems.

You wouldn't be using 75 ohm BNC plugs would you? I remember something
about 75 ohm BNC hardware causing problems.

73, Guy K2AV

On Sun, Jul 3, 2016 at 3:06 PM, George King <georgeking at twc.com> wrote:
> Thanks Matt,
>
> I did check both connectors and they are both seated.
>
> 73,   George   W5AGK
>
>
> On 7/3/2016 11:56 AM, Matt Zilmer wrote:
>>
>> Hi George,
>>
>> You should check the two RF cables to make sure they're seated. There is
>> one cable from the ATU to the RF board (two-pin connector at the RF board),
>> and another from the BNC socket to the ATU. Both of these need to be seated
>> in order for the KX2 to work.  The 25.4:1 SWR indication usually means the
>> BNC to ATU cable isn't seated, but I would check both.
>>
>> 73!
>> Matt W6NIA
>>
>>
>> On 07/03/2016 09:51 AM, George King wrote:
>>>
>>> I just received my KX2 and really like it.  I have the ATU and battery
>>> installed.   Receive works fine, but I cannot transmit. When I press PTT I
>>> get several beeps and in some cases the radio shuts off.  Sometimes I get a
>>> Hi CUR message.  Here is some data:
>>>
>>> 7.213 MHz,    Voltage 11.7,   Power set at 8 watts.   When I press ATU to
>>> tune the tuner works hard and displays 25.4 - 1 while trying to tune and
>>> never changes.  Is this telling me the SWR is 25.4:1? The antenna SWR
>>> checked at the BNC connector on the antenna at the radio with an MFJ 259B is
>>> 1.3:1
>>>
>>> 7.285 MHz,  Voltage 11.7,  Power 8 watts,  SWR checked with MFJ 259B is
>>> 2.0:1.  Same result when I press ATU.
>>>
>>> When I bypass the ATU I still get the same result except that I do not
>>> see the 25.4 - 1 display.
>>>
>>> Also, same result on all other bands.  I installed the side panels before
>>> I tried to transmit.  I thought maybe I had a bad antenna connection.  A
>>> check with an ohm meter shows a good connection between the BNC connector
>>> and the antenna connection on the ATU board.
>>>
>>> I checked the connector from the ATU to the RF board and it seems to be
>>> mated properly.  I tried transmitting into a 50 ohm dummy load with the same
>>> result.  I made a jumper cable with a BNC connect on it and connected it to
>>> the ATU bypassing the installed BNC connector - same result.
>>>
>>> SN is 463, just installed firmware 2.66.  Did not try to transmit before
>>> upgrading to 2.66 or installing the side panels.  Seems to me I have a bad
>>> antenna connection somewhere. Does this make sense?
>>>
>>> Any help will be appreciated.
>>>
>>> George King           W5AGK
>>>
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>>
>>
>
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