[Elecraft] Does the K3(S) need occasional realignment?

[Grant Youngman]

I”d be really surprised if this were a “routine maintenance” item.  There probably aren’t more than a handful of people on the reflector that have the necessary equipment and expertise to do it themselves.   And that would mean that Elecraft would get every K3/s back periodically for routine adjustment.  Doesn’t seem reasonable at all.

Tuning at the “center” will NOT produce a proper shape, guaranteed. And peaking the lower and upper pass frequencies aren’t likely to get it “flat” either.   It’s not exceptionally difficult, but you have to know what you’re doing AND have the proper (good) lab equipment.  Most don’t, on either count.  I suspect putting out instructions for a DIY approach to this would be a disaster waiting to happen, given the typical ham shack penchant for “tightening all the screws”  :-)

Grant NQ5T
K3 #2091, KX3 #8342

> 
> [The K3} has internal
> trimmers on the per ham band HF filter. Is it advisable to occasionally
> touch these up? I have no reason to believe that my oldest K3 (ser#82) is
> out of alignment, but I'd like to be ahead of the game. I am old enough to
> have used tube rigs in my early ham career and they definitely needed
> occasional tune up. The narrow band ham band RF filters in the K3 have
> relatively high Q so the slightest component drift will quickly affect the
> shape of the filter curve.
> 
> If the answer is affirmative, could we get a procedure for doing it
> properly?