[Amps] Henry 2K-3 amp restore

Bob Darlington rdarlington at gmail.com
Sun Nov 12 23:24:37 EST 2017


Hi all,

After a 3 year wait, I finally have my Henry 2K-3 at home from a seller out
on the east coast.  I have it up and running and producing lots of power as
expected.  Amazingly, the ancient 3-500Z tubes are still humming along.

Having only received it yesterday, I haven't had a whole lot of time with
it yet but I immediately see a couple problems.  Initially the B+ was
showing just over 3kV but dropped down to about 2200 on the front meter.
Tapping/banging on the chassis causes this to fluctuate a bit but it won't
go back up.  My HV probe does show about 3300 at the connections to the
tubes (no tubes present during initial testing).  Does this sound like old
resistors in the metering circuit?  I haven't tested them yet, just taking
a guess and crossing my fingers that it's not a problem with the teardrop
meter.

The next issue is that the forward and reverse positions on the meter
switch result in no output to the meter.  I found an SWR bridge schematic
in another model Henry amp and assume that it's similar in the 2K-3 but
don't know for sure.  Is this the long rectangular box running on the back
right by the small compartment with the rear connections?  Any hints on
where to start troubleshooting this?   I have a pair of Bird meters so this
is less of a concern but it would be nice to get it working again.

And lastly, one of the two bulbs is out behind the front dials.  Do any of
you have a replacement part suggestion?  I'd like to use LED bulbs but I
don't know anything about sizing bayonet base bulbs and would prefer to
swap a bulb rather than a bulb and socket combo.

And word to the wise, if a friend says he'll be driving the 1800 miles out
to visit you in the spring, ask him spring of what year *before* you buy
the boat anchor.

Thank you,
Bob
N3XKB


More information about the Amps mailing list