[Amps] Time for New Power Meter

Bill Turner dezrat at outlook.com
Sat May 2 12:46:38 EDT 2015


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On Sat, 02 May 2015 07:47:20 -0500, NI0K wrote:

>Measuring RF power accurately is very difficult. Have you ever seen a 
>wattmeter that has been certified calibrated to any standard? No, 
>because it is impossible.

REPLY:

There is a way, but it is a bit of work. If you are really serious
about it, you can measure the heat rise  in a dummy load using first
RF and again using DC. Simply adjust the DC power to make the heat
rise the same as the RF and there's your answer. 

Since DC is easy to measure accurately, if you can measure the
temperature rise accurately and keep out external influences, your
results will be of equal accuracy. 

Of course, a high power variable DC supply won't be cheap. You could
substitute a Variac running from the AC line, but AC is a little more
difficult to measure accurately, but it can be done. 

73, Bill W6WRT


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