[Elecraft] My poor K3

Victor Rosenthal 4X6GP k2vco.vic at gmail.com
Fri Feb 4 03:16:16 EST 2022


The guy who said to measure the voltage at the K3 gave you good advice. 
An easy way to do this is to tap the DISP button and turn the VFO B knob 
until it shows the voltage. Then see how much it drops during transmit. 
Since the K3 tries to produce the requested power with whatever voltage 
it gets, low voltage can cause excessive current draw. You should have 
at least 12v, preferably more than 13v when transmitting a steady 
carrier. If it drops more than half a volt when you transmit, there may 
be too much resistance somewhere in the connection to the power supply.

The other thing is that some combinations of resistance and reactance 
seen by the final amplifier produce higher current draw than others. 
Maybe you are seeing a combination of these effects.

73,
Victor, 4X6GP
Rehovot, Israel
Formerly K2VCO
CWops no. 5
http://www.qsl.net/k2vco/
On 03-Feb-2022 23:11, Ronnie Hull wrote:
> I have had my K3 back to Elecraft repair TWICE in less than a year
> Got it back finally yesterday and put it on the air this afternoon
> Running 80w on CW on 20M and getting a high current alarm.
> What the heck? Does it have to go back AGAIN?
> Man I was close to pulling the trigger on a K4 but all thoughts out the window now
> Anyone know what this might be? Using a 50Amp power supply
> Ron W5SUM
> 
> Sent from my iPhone
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