[Elecraft] KPA1500 Power Supply Fan Noise
John Langdon
WOYB10051 at outlook.com
Tue Jun 11 05:29:56 EDT 2019
Eric,
My KPA1500 RF deck is mounted on a high shelf, and the power supply is on low shelf below the desk. I have the fan speed on the RF deck set to 2 as a minimum. I almost never notice the PS fans, when I hear noise it is the RF deck. During the ARRL DX CW the fans reached 4 and it was loud enough to need headphones, in most operation it is not. The PS noise you are describing does not seem normal to me. Can you make a video/audio recording and post it on the web somewhere?
73 John N5CQ
-----Original Message-----
From: elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net <elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net> On Behalf Of Eric Norris
Sent: Tuesday, June 11, 2019 3:47 AM
To: Peter Hall <P.Hall at curtin.edu.au>
Cc: elecraft at mailman qth. net <elecraft at mailman.qth.net>
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] KPA1500 Power Supply Fan Noise
Apparently I was not clear enough in my message. It is the PSU fan noise that is deafening, not the RF deck. Like Peter, my PSU sits on the floor underneath a wooden operating desk that holds the rest of the K-line. The noise from the PSU is high-pitched and piercing. The only thing I can liken it to is a four-rotor Mazda prototype IMSA GTP race car from the early 90s. Brain-piercing, tear-your-hair-out, heard-from-every room-in-the-house louder than hell, and has been so since the day it darkened my doorway--with the RF deck at idle.
73 Eric WD6DBM
On Tue, Jun 11, 2019, 12:54 AM Peter Hall <P.Hall at curtin.edu.au> wrote:
> Hello Eric
>
> There's no doubt that a KPA1500 physical installation needs some
> careful attention to the noise aspect. That said, I'm a bit surprised
> by your problem with the PSU fan. I can certainly hear mine but,
> overall, the noise is entirely dominated by the RF deck fans. I've
> located the PSU under my operating desk, which is made of a dense particleboard material.
> The RF deck sits alongside my TS-890S transceiver on the desk. I can hear
> the PSU fan if I put my head below desk level but, even then, I don't
> find the fan to be particularly high-pitched in its acoustic output.
> Could you possibly have a faulty fan (maybe excess nearing noise)?
>
> On the other hand, I do find the RF deck fans test my patience a bit,
> especially since the last round of major firmware updates which start
> the cooling at a lower heatsink temperature. That probably works well
> in a high-output environment, where it no doubt delays the onset of
> heat soaking. But when the amplifier "loafs" in a low power, low duty
> cycle environment as it does in some of my applications. it just
> starts the noise prematurely. It'd be great to see something like an
> "80m rag-chew" option for those times!
>
> 73, Peter (VK6HP).
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net
> <elecraft-bounces at mailman.qth.net>
> On Behalf Of eric norris via Elecraft
> Sent: Tuesday, 11 June 2019 7:57 AM
> To: lists at w2irt.net; lists at w2irt.net; Elecraft Reflector <
> elecraft at mailman.qth.net>
> Subject: [Elecraft] KPA1500 Power Supply Fan Noise
>
> More broadly, has there been any progress on reducing the piercing
> power supply fan noise on the KPA1500 when only using it as a tuner or
> an antenna switch? I complained about this a year ago, and I find it
> completely unacceptable. No set of noise-reducing headphones that I
> have tried works well enough to make the noise tolerable. I've tried
> moving the PS deck around with minimal improvement. This just doesn't
> seem to fit Elecraft's philosophy of a quiet operating environment.
> Why do these fans have to operate at full throttle when there is
> minimal current draw from the rf deck? Why do these fans create such
> a piercing high-pitched note? If there is no response from Elecraft,
> what have other ops done--short of moving the PS into an adjoining room--to mitigate the scream?
> Thanks,
> 73 Eric WD6DBM
>
> Sent from Yahoo Mail on Android
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