[Amps] Heat Measurement in Amps

[Bill, W6WRT]

ORIGINAL MESSAGE:

On Thu, 10 Jun 2010 11:07:37 -0700, Patrick Barthelow
<apolloeme at live.com> wrote:

>
>Has anyone found a decent cheap temperature sensor/guage  (perhaps even at harbor freight, etc) that you could place at a specified location in the exhaust airstream of the tubes, of various amps to see and record what is "normal" temp ranges?  Maybe the brain trust here, could search out a standard, cheap temp measurement sensor  (some DVMs have them) and do some testing and publishing of expected exhaust air temps of various amps in various modes, like Low duty cycle (SSB), medium (CW) or high (RTTY) 

REPLY:

For low cost, it would be hard to beat a cook's meat thermometer,
available at any grocery store. I have one sitting on top of my amp as
I speak. It has a long probe, so I simply drilled a hole through a
small piece of wood and poked the probe through, leaving it sticking
out about two inches. In normal RTTY operation it rarely reads over
about 150 degrees F. Being non-electronic, they are immune to RF.
Works great. 

A related idea, which I never got around to implementing, is to
install a small thermal switch connected to an alarm of some kind.
These are cheap and available in a wide range of temperatures. Also
non-electronic. Pretty sure Mc-Master Carr carries them.

73, Bill W6WRT