final result CQ160CW lowpower
After CQ160 contest at 80M
RI1ANT at 3510 very weak CW had mni WSPR decodes at 80 from the Rusian Antarctic base.
EP6T 3503kHz real! 599 but like most DXpeditions hopeless to get trough low QSO rate many callers as if they have S9 QRM
Dxpeditions better restrict TX power to 100W to get TX/RX in balance thats what I think then.
CQ160CW :Sunday early evening some more JA's heard in QSO with Rusian hams.
Sunday early morning 04 local propagation better then expected.
Nice DX workable with 100W ( drops to 80W sometimes )
ZF2DX real strong said up but worked simplex
zf2dx_160.mp3
audio level overdriven
Some playing with audio record level bar suddenly device level could be adjusted to 0dB
Hope that future recordings have less distortion
KV4FZ =KP2 to my surprise responded direct to my 100W real good ears !
The Beverage seems good for west if called from west by G switch to Beverage and signal gets clear S9 first time better reception of W/VE in compare with K9AY
heard PJ2T but too weak in the end 8x W and VE in the log K1LZ heard early Sunday evening as first TA signal just before end of contest the strongest W the evening greyline peak to USA.
QSO now 375+ btw can't get Realtime score reporting working in N1MM plus
Saturday evening hear well JR5JAQ the first JA heard since long time on topband
Friday early Saturday only Europe in the log I did not stay up for the morning grayline to west
I thought to hear one time K1LZ around 0 UTC
EA8DBM RY9C that was the best DX to work.
The CQ160CW is good to do a real field test with the IC765
Late start it took me a while to sort out the cable Spaghetti that I had produced.
And still unsolved the 160m EMC problem with the Motorola VIP1853 cable tuner that is extreme sensitive for 1.8 MHz signals. Only 160 is giving problem with the Motorola bad luck with the CQ160CW
I estimate that only a few percent of all electronic devices is EMC HAM grade.
Radio amateurs should present a list of HAM Grade Equipment! the HGE standard
To be able to watch TV when active at 160m we use the satellite receiver the 160 vertical almost touches the LNB but no TVI .
A new received satellite receiver M7 AT801 from Canaldigital is has a S/PDF coaxial audio that does not match with my Toslink system.
The Sharp AQUOS TV has a "fake" S/PDF optical audio connection.
It was never meant to work for copyright reason? you will not find that important information in the folders of course. Neither does Sharp give any support.
So now with the antique Scart connection with basic video quality.
To shut down the internal speakers only a blind 3.5mm plug works. There is no control for that.
Setting up the IC765 to run with the Rx antenna K9AY and a second LAPtop X60
There is no front switch to select external antenna input like on the K3I estimate that only a few percent of all electronic devices is EMC HAM grade.
Radio amateurs should present a list of HAM Grade Equipment! the HGE standard
To be able to watch TV when active at 160m we use the satellite receiver the 160 vertical almost touches the LNB but no TVI .
A new received satellite receiver M7 AT801 from Canaldigital is has a S/PDF coaxial audio that does not match with my Toslink system.
The Sharp AQUOS TV has a "fake" S/PDF optical audio connection.
It was never meant to work for copyright reason? you will not find that important information in the folders of course. Neither does Sharp give any support.
So now with the antique Scart connection with basic video quality.
To shut down the internal speakers only a blind 3.5mm plug works. There is no control for that.
Setting up the IC765 to run with the Rx antenna K9AY and a second LAPtop X60
A separate receive antenna has to be switched external removing the RCA cable bridge that separates the TX antenna from the receiver.
The new home brew CV-I interface worked fine R/T and CW with the simplified
open collector SMD transistors. Only a 4k7 base drive resistor is okay.
Glad that the com problem in the other Dell D420 was fixed.
No issues with N1MM and CAT.
2 PC's in the network.
It took me some time to get the bandmap filled on the 2nd PC that I made master.
possible checking the Telnet check format for dxspider cluster did the trick.
Glad I did the experiment , now I know again I am spoiled with the K3 in CW!
After some hours running with the IC765 it became rather hot at the back cooling frame. I placed a fan.
I expected a generous 100Watts out from this size of rig, it did 100W not more it even dropped below some times.
I could not hear a fan running.
The CW T/R is not as smooth and silent as the K3.
And there was a bit hum on the monitor tone.
The internal keyer of the IC765 is good.
This hum came same time the Display started blinking a bit.
Monitoring the 13.6V showed that the voltage dropped .
Guess this power issue can be solved in the IC765 I was surprised for such classy rig.
Sunday evening I wanted to show that problem to the owner of the IC765.
The TX on a dummy still the Voltage dropped in CW using the internal keyer.
Suddenly keying stopped working TX did not come up, keyer was good.
Then I rebooted the IC765 and all was okay! no more Voltage drops no hum on sidetone.
Beats me what caused this. RFI over the keyer?
I went back to the K3 did not trust to go on with the voltage drops.
It is a real pleasure running CW with my K3 I am spoiled.
Although the K3 also has its weak spots
KPA3 issues. The power drops after some time at 160M to 80W
It did drop now also but not more than the IC765.
Later low in the band 1813.5 I had the full 100Watts again strange.
I had the impression that this 1.8MHz power drop happened more below 1825kHz
Something seems to heat up and makes the power drop also the DC input drops.
It is hard to check the KPA3 during operation since it is mounted components down in the K3
One time after I tested at 160m key down and then when the power drop happened I removed the KPA3 as quick as possible and found that the output transformer was rather hot.
The KPA3 should be able to have a safe 100-150 Watt out with 2x 2SC2782
At 16A 13V 110W it can TX keydown continuous without overheating. The fan's step up a bit after minutes but the KPA3 temperature stays about 50C
The display can show temp among Voltage Ampere and more great!
It draws 16-22 Amp over 4 pins headers type in parallel. I aded 2 more free pins
Already replaced those connectors. The K3 engineering is great but this should have been a more rugged type connector.
Had Hi-current issues and 2 times replaced a broken driver FET.
This time the K3 worked flawless some hours at 100W
Possible the K3 was aware of the IC765 in the shack...
With 2 low noise variable speed fan's the K3 never got hot except that one time the KPA3 was damaged. The 13.6V on the KPA3 is not switched off it only has a fuse.
I stopped after 210 QSO with EU calls in the log the propagation did not allow to go outside that.
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