[Elecraft] KXPA100- How impactful to making contacts?

[Drew AF2Z]

I owned my K3/10 for a couple of years before installing the KPA3 
internal 100w amplifier. Prior to that I'd never had a ham rig that put 
out more than 30 watts. I found the 100 watt upgrade to be quite 
worthwhile and I've never regretted it.

I've used 100 watts for a couple of years now, operating mostly CW. I'd 
estimate the number of increased contacts to be quite a bit more than 
the 45% figure someone else mentioned. This is based upon my multi year 
participation in monthly club sprints at 10 watts and 100. Also, I did a 
comprehensive power output comparison over the course of several 
thousands of WSPRnet "contacts" (at 1, 5 and 20 watts). I believe you 
can make 2x or 3x the number of contacts by going from 10 to 100 watts, 
everything else being equal.

My antennas are fairly compromised: an indoor cobweb antenna for 10 thru 
20 and a relatively low endfed wire for the lower bands. If you can 
improve your antenna dramatically certainly do that first. But whatever 
antenna you use, assuming it works at all, 100 watts will be a great 
improvement over 10 in my opinion.

73,
Drew
AF2Z


On 06/21/16 13:08, Road Runner wrote:
> Have had my KX3 for a couple of weeks and love it. Biggest issue I have is even at 15 watts, unless conditions are right, I am having issues making DX contacts. The KX3 is connected to an Alpha Delta 80-6 meter fan dipole. I have been thinking about getting the KXPA 100 but wonder whether it will be enough of a bang for the buck. I use this at a summer cottage, at home I started with a Kenwood Ts-590SG and eventually upgraded the rig with an Ameritron 811H to get more punch. I have no problems getting picked out of pileup so now...
> So my question is for those of you that have gone the upgrade path to KXPA100... Did you get enough punch or are you wishing you had gone with more power? I am not really too crazy about going all the way to the KPA500...
>
>