>>but so far no problems in two days of heavy use, with
>>a lot of band-hopping, retuning and 20M transmitting.
>>
>? It likely won't combust without a contest.
Rich,
Why would a contest cause damage when normal heavy use doesn't? Either the
choke is resonant and sucks up power or it doesn't. If it doesn't cause
problems from transmitting once, it won't from transmitting a lot either.
Maybe the choke wires might get hot and melt from a lot of transmitting if they
aren't big enough, but as far as a resonance goes, you should see that
immediately.
The choke on my amp was too close to 15M. All I needed to do was start tuning
up and BANG, the choke blew. I thought it was far enough away but it wasn't.
It didn't wait for me to start in the CQ WPX before doing that.
To the guy asking the original question about if the choke is too close to your
operating band, look at where the choke starts to suck energy from the dip
meter. If the dip is at say 14.8 MHz, where do you notice the suck out start?
If the dip meter isn't getting sucked out at 14.350 MHz even when tightly
coupled, then you should have no problem. If however, you see the dip starting
down there, you could have some potential problems.
My guess is that if it hasn't blown yet, it won't blow.
73,
Jon
KE9NA
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jon Ogden
jono@enteract.com
www.qsl.net/ke9na
"A life lived in fear is a life half lived."
--
FAQ on WWW: http://www.contesting.com/ampfaq.html
Submissions: amps@contesting.com
Administrative requests: amps-REQUEST@contesting.com
Problems: owner-amps@contesting.com
Search: http://www.contesting.com/km9p/search.htm
|