Roger,

congrats on VK-land getting the new ham band; we are still waiting on action from the FCC in the USA. Of course there are many of us with experimental licenses operating these frequencies. I am a member of the ARRL 600 meter Experimental Group:
http://www.500kc.com/

I am cross-posting this to our 600m reflector. You might be interested in signing up for that. It is a moderated list so only those with active interest in 600m should apply:
http://www.500kc.com/Maillists.htm

Unfortunately, for use with the K3 it will only work down to 490-KHz. My understanding it is a hardware limitation so no firmware change will change this. I use my K3 on 495-510 KHz using the TEST mode to drive with 0.1mw my converted NDB transmitter to 100w into a 43x122 foot base-loaded inverted-L (ERP=4.15w).
http://www.kl7uw.com/600m.htm

It is also unfortunate that the KX3 will not be able to work down at 472-478 KHz. There will be a lot of equipment ventures once more countries allow ham use down there.

For those of us with K3 or KX3 it will require a transverter. A logical conversion is from 80m to 600m. Since the K3 can transmit in TEST on any freq. up to 30-MHz, using an LO of 10-MHz is a natural as one can use one of the super accurate OCXO freq. reference oscillators ($25 on e-bay) as an LO to a simple mixer and amps. One would tune 10.472-10.478 MHz in TEST mode:
http://www.kl7uw.com/600m_XVTR.jpg

Building a simple 10mw transverter is not too difficult. Adding amplifiers to 25w would be a good goal in my opinion. RF output limitations of either 1w or 5w EIRP is likely with the new band. For most realistic antennas this implies efficiencies of about 1%. A dipole is only 1860 feet long and a 1/4 wave vertical 930-feet high!

73, Ed - KL7UW, WD2XSH/45
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Subject: [Elecraft] The K3 and the 630 meter band
Message-ID: <5CE61C885690499C98CCE5F5DB077720@ROGERN>
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In Australia we have a new band. The 630 meter band. It covers 472 to 478 KHz.
They tell me there is a lot of interesting activity going on there.
I tried to tune there with my K3 but alas it would only go down to 490 KHz.
With RIT at -10 KHz and set to LSB, I could just start to hear signals at the top end of the band.
How annoying! So close! but so far!
Please Elecraft can you write us some software to extend coverage down to 472 KHz.
Being able to transmit there would be even better!

73
Roger, VK4YB


73, Ed - KL7UW
http://www.kl7uw.com
dubus...@gmail.com
"Kits made by KL7UW"
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