[ICOM] PW-1 Problems and a solution

[Tony Visco]

Hello Fellow Hams,

As usual, the learning process continues.  My PW-1 is on its way home from
the Icom Headquarters after being repaired - Power Amp failure.  

First just a little background.  I have been a ham since 1970 building many
earlier pieces of equipment from scratch and later many Heathkit products.
This is a hobby not my line of business.  I'm no dummy, but I was away from
ham radio for about 10 years and came back into the hobby last April trying
to get up to date on all the new technology that is now available.  

My station started slowly and gradually grew with the purchase of a used
PW-1 in September/October to go with my Icom 746pro.  

Now I did suffer a problem with the PA's no longer being in sync.  Therefore
no output.  Sent in to Icom and when I received the estimated cost I
authorized the repair and asked to speak with the Service Department Manager
(Dan).  I really needed to know what would cause this situation since my use
of the PW-1 is very little.  With this failure, I was now considering
selling the PW-1 for something less complex.  

But Dan was quite helpful and renewed my confidence in keeping the PW-1 for
my compact shack.  Now I will admit I never gave it a thought but using both
antenna tuners seems to be the cause for my failure.  I normally work
barefoot most times but when power is needed, I would merely turn on the
PW-1 and keep going.  Most times tuning was no problem.  Now thinking back
there were times when the 746pro and the PW-1 were fighting each other in
trying to tune the antenna.  I might add that I have a Caroling Windom,
Steppir Vertical, and a set of phased verticals on 80m.  Dan says that the
internal fighting of the two tuners could blow diodes in the PW-1 and
causing the eventual PA shutdown.  

His recommendation, use the PW-1 tuner only and not the exciter when the
PW-1 is on.  Duh - go figure.  Makes sense to me, but I am a little
disappointed that there absolutely no information in either manual to
express this feature or caution for proper operation.  Some of you may
consider this a common sense thing, but I bet there is a bunch of you out
there that are doing the same thing.

Anyway, that is my confession for today - I will always admit to my
mistakes. Ham radio is still a fun hobby even if it costs a little for
repairs.

Tony W3EW