In the RTTTY contest I noticed the fans changing speed now and then which is expected.
"A slip of the foot you may soon recover, but a slip of the tongue you may never get over." Ben Franklin -----Original Message----- From: elecraft-boun...@mailman.qth.net [mailto:elecraft-boun...@mailman.qth.net] On Behalf Of Bill W4ZV Sent: Wednesday, March 11, 2009 3:45 PM To: elecraft@mailman.qth.net Subject: Re: [Elecraft] K3: Do you "Juice" your K3? Ed Muns, W0YK wrote: > >> During the NAQP RTTY, at one point I was calling a solid stream of >> CQ's at 100 watts output on RTTY and not getting any replies. I was >> watching the PA Temp, and it climbed up to 65C and looked like it >> wanted to keep rising pretty quickly. >> I think hi temp shutdown is at 84C. I backed off on my CQ's and used >> the other radio for a while. I had the fan speed locked on step 4. >> All of this was at 13.8VDC. With any kind of heavy duty usage, I >> don't think cranking up the voltage is a good idea. A better idea is >> to buy an AL-1500 or similar low drive amp, which will give you 1500 >> watts out with 50 watts of drive. NOW, we are talking "juice." ;) > > This is interesting. I run 100 watts output on RTTY, CQing and > working stations at a continual flow, and the fans hardly run at all. > The PA temperature stays down. I wonder if there is something unique > going on with your K3(s)? One user found a fan wire impeding the > blades of one of his fans and even on CW, he had the same experience > described above. > That user would be me! :-) I strongly suspect Dave has the same problem I did. The longer fan wire (from the left fan viewed from the rear) was binding the right fan. I believe this happened when I did the 12V sense mod. I dropped the rear fan assembly as the directions indicated and then replaced the assembly. When doing this it's possible for the longer fan wire to block the right fan and you cannot tell unless you take the top cover off to physically inspect or test the fans to make sure both are turning. It's a credit to Elecraft's conservative design that heavy operation in the ARRL DX CW with only one fan turning was not sufficient to damage my KPA3. Now PA TEMP seldom climbs much above 40C whereas it was resetting at ~80C with only one fan running. Be sure to visually check that BOTH fans are turning. I was fooled because it felt to my wet finger held to the rear panel that both were turning when actually only one was. Use the PA FN1-4 tests in the menu and make sure both are actually turning. 73, Bill -- View this message in context: http://n2.nabble.com/K3%3A--Do-you-%22Juice%22-your-K3--tp2462764p2464010.ht ml Sent from the Elecraft mailing list archive at Nabble.com. ______________________________________________________________ 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 ______________________________________________________________ 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
