I refuse to get into the plus/minus arguments about Powerpoles, but I do have a warning about a particular product I bought a few years ago. It is a plastic frame designed to hold a bank of powerpoles, which I installed on a little battery pack/charger storage case I built. It contains 4 pairs of powerpoles in the following configuration (B = black, R = red):
R B R B R B R B It allows one to plug in 4 different powerpole accessories at once. Unfortunately, it turns out that it is possible to get the polarity wrong when using this bank of powerpoles. While groping around one Field Day, trying to plug in a K2 without adequate light to see what I was doing, I accidentally plugged it into the center two connectors, thus getting the polarity wrong (B R instead of R B). Fortunately, being a K2, there is a trusty little reverse polarity protection diode which prevents any damage from occurring. After correcting the mistake, the K2 came to life. I know the battery voltage indication on the K2 is low because of this diode, but that's a small price to pay for this "Murphy-proofing" feature. Thanks, Elecraft. 73's, John AA0VE ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
