[Amps] Are Amps Slow on the uptake? Or is it just me?

[Dave Hachadorian]

You say that the first few letters of a call sign are weaker.  That's a long 
period of time, and amplifiers are not that slow. You also imply that this 
happens on a regular basis.  I operate in contests a lot, and do not hear 
that problem.  I think the most likely explanation is that your station is 
slow returning to receive.  It may be as simple as an oxidized relay contact 
in the receive chain.  This is a frequent problem with mechanical relays. 
Try connecting your transceiver directly to the antenna in order to 
eliminate the T/R relay in the amplifier.  Whichever relay is at fault, then 
cleaning the contacts with contact cleaner such as DeoxIT or even a piece of 
paper should fix the problem.  If the relay is sealed, then it may be 
necessary to replace it.

Dave Hachadorian, K6LL
Big Bear Lake, CA

-----Original Message----- 
From: Jeff in Mali: via Amps
Sent: Wednesday, June 26, 2019 9:41 AM
To: amps at contesting.com
Subject: [Amps] Are Amps Slow on the uptake? Or is it just me?

I have been noticing in my pileups that I have a hard time copying the first 
couple of letters of people call signs in pileups on CW..
After listening more carefully, what I seen to find is that the strength of 
the signal as the amps fire up on CW is up to 2 S-units lower than when it 
gets to full power.
Is this the case that amps take a few milliseconds to come up to full power? 
And therefore it may be putting out less than full power on the first few 
letters of a call sign than on latter letters?
73,
Jeff TZ4AM
_______________________________________________
Amps mailing list
Amps at contesting.com
http://lists.contesting.com/mailman/listinfo/amps