Joe, You results seem to be erratic.
Loose PL-259s can cause symptoms like that. Finger tight for PL-259s is not good enough, the connectors must be seated in the notches, and after finger-tightening, must be torqued a bit more with pliers to obtain a secure connection. The connection to the coax shell depends on having them tight. Also check to be certain all PL-259s have good soldering to the braid. That is the cause of many problems that work well one time, but fail the next time it is tried. A bad connection to the shield can (and will) produce a HIGH SWR indication. I am not saying you have exactly the problems I have indicated, but something similar may be present. 73, Don W3FPR On 11/1/2011 9:24 PM, Joe Ford wrote: > Guy, Don > > I don't get the emails just the digest show your emails to me. > > I agree the antenna should be the first place and in fact I did look > at it hanging in the air but I have not lowered it to give it a closer > inspection. Unfortunately my antenna analyzer is one MFJ's first and > only gives SWR and Resistance. It did not really show anything > helpful. Since it is an 88' long dipole it isn't resonant any any of > the bands. > > Here is what is strange about this. I have only had the K3 a few > weeks. I did not have a problem tuning on 30m. The first time the > problem occurred was when I went SPLIT then turned on the SUB rx. > Immediately it gave the HIGH SWR warning. Then I tried tune and got > the strange tuning behavior. So I began to trouble shoot the problem. > I tried different combinations of settings, etc. The antenna comes in > to an antenna switch with one position on the K3 and the other on the > K2. I wanted to eliminate the switch and connect directly to the coax > coming from the balun. To get to where I could make that connection I > had to completely disconnect everything from the back of the K3 and > move close enough to reach that coax, thus bypassing the switch. So I > did that and when I tried a tune I got the same result, it tuned to > the same spot and stopped. No difference. Then I redid all the cables > to the rear of the K3. And guess what. This time when I hit tune it > went right to 1:1.2 without hardly any relay action. So did some > tests, retuning and so forth. It continued to work okay. I even had a > qso with a good rst. > > That was last Saturday. On Sunday afternoon, I came in and tuning on > 30m found a dx station working pileup. That is when I went A>B, SPLIT > and then turned on SUB. As soon as I hit the paddle and it went to > transmit, the HIGH SWR message appeared and when I tried ANT TUNE it > tuned just like it had before. SWR shows max and RF out shows min > while relays are working, then it SWR drops to 1:1.8 to 2 and power > out shows 100w (what it is set for). I don't know why the problem > went away when it did, I have not been able to duplicate again. d > > I'll take down the ant and inspect it.But it works fine on all the > other bands. Tunes with no problems all other bands. The KAT100 tunes > but the KAT3 doesn't? > > Thanks, guys, for your suggestions. > > Joe > k4nvj ______________________________________________________________ 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
