[TenTec] QSK or not?

[Gary Smith]

That was a good breakdown, those are fun to do & read.

I look at it this way; I've been hamming 35 years and I ran QSK for 
the last 33 years. I've never worn out a relay in an exciter. I had 
the Corsair II since it was new & made the backup rig in 09.

In amps... The original SB220 had two that needed replaced. I put QSK 
in it and that was good for several years using a RJ1A. I bought an 
old Alpha several years ago and I had the amp less than a month & 
needed to replace the HC-1A in it, no knowing the history of the 
relay I can't speak for why it failed. I opted to replace it with one 
of the RJ1A silicone encapsulated ones which was extracted from a 
defibrillator unit I believe. It has had no trouble. I have a spare 
in case it fails again but I'm not holding my breath. :)

Also, I have a remote QSK unit containing two RJ-1A's within which is 
inserted in the line and offers bias control. I used that with an 
Ameritron AL-1500 for several years to give me QSK, I've never had 
any trouble with it and I bought it used. 



73,

Gary
KA1J

> I operate QSK and have the past thirty years using TenTec equipment.
> 
> One reason given by others for not running QSK is that the relays wear out sooner in the transceiver and amplifier.
> 
> from http://www.ad5x.com/images/Presentations/QSKals500als600RevA.pdf 
> 
> How Long will the Relays Last? 
> What kind of life can you expect from the relays? The relay life is specified at 100 
> million operations minimum at 36,000 operations/hour. The service life increases as the 
> operations/hour decreases. So let´s use the standard PARIS text that is used for 
> determining code speed. 
> 
> PARIS has 10 dits and 4 dahs = 14 relay operations/minute at 1 WPM. 
> 
> Assuming an average of 25WPM code speed, you would have 360 relay operations per 
> minute. So, 100 million operations = 4630 hours. Now you normally operate 50% 
> transmitting and 50% receiving during a QSO, so your relay operating time should 
> double to 9260 hours. There are 8760 hours/year, which means you could operate 1.057 
> years at 25 WPM before the relays exceeded their lifetime spec - IF you operate 24 
> hours/day! But when you operate, you are probably listening more like 75% of the time 
> and in a QSO 25% of the time. So this says that your relay operating life will be over 4-
> years if you operate 24 hours/day. So what do you normally average in operating 
> time/day? I bet it is not more than about an hour/day. But let´s say you average 4-
> hours/day of operation (i.e. you are not married and have no kids, you don´t shop or eat
> or sleep much, and you don´t hold a full-time job). So the relay life will extend to about 
> 25 years! The bottom line - Don´t worry about wearing out the relays anytime soon.
> 
> 73 ES DX,
> Gary - AB9M    -...-.-
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