Topband: Rig Question

[Steve London]

That's one heck of a ballpark you have there !

The TS-590S is in the $1500 price range.
The K3, assembled, properly filtered, is at least $3000.

73,
Steve, N2IC

On 06/17/2014 01:20 PM, Tim Shoppa wrote:
> On CW, I have used all of the K3 (contest conditions at both supreme and
> cruddy locations), TS-590 (less trying conditions), and Ten-Tec Eagle (same
> receiver as Orion+RX366). All are ballpark same price range.  I own the
> Eagle, and prefer its receiver and user interface, but others might have
> different preferences and choose the competition especially if they want to
> add a lot of options like the K3 can support.
>
> Tim N3QE
>
>
>
> On Tue, Jun 17, 2014 at 1:45 PM, Guy Olinger K2AV<k2av.guy at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> It is interesting to see so many come down to three main players, the K3,
>> the Orion/RX366, the TS590S.
>>
>> When I was getting ready to move off my MP, I listened to some number of
>> Orions before the K3's were out. I always liked what I heard. What swayed
>> me to K3 was W4ZV exchanging his Orion for a K3, the rather large size of
>> Orion (bigger than MP) vs. K3, and the K3's true diversity with identical
>> RX, though there was a wait for the sub RX to get in production.
>>
>> Some people at the time complained about the button/menu system of the K3.
>> I had owned a K2 for a while, so I already had the mind set, and found
>> learning the K3's set easier than learning the Orion. I have used the Orion
>> in a Multi-X contest environment, and after I learned controls found it
>> quite satisfactory. However, it could not match a couple of tricks I
>> learned with the K3. And even now, the Orion RX366 diversity, though
>> considerably improved, does not quite rise to the level of the phase-locked
>> equal circuitry diversity system in the K3.
>>
>> With continuing K3 CW use, I discovered that with the "400" and "250" eight
>> pole roofing filters I could do a couple very useful things for CW. I set
>> those up in the L3 filter configuration as 450 and 350 hz respectively and
>> then carefully adjusted the offsets to align skirts with the DSP skirts at
>> 450 and 350, which maximizes the overall skirt steepness.
>>
>> This created selectivity the equal of the dual Inrad filters in the MP for
>> "500" and "250". So far K3 is the only radio I've listened to that can dupe
>> the MP's super-steep skirt selectivity way down past 100 dB with dual
>> Inrads. That is really hard to measure down there. My fuzzy perception is
>> that the MP still has the K3 in this regard by just a fingernail or two.
>> The K3's "400" and "250" filters are electrically identical to the "500"
>> and "250" Inrad 8 poles used in the 8 MHz IFs in the MP. They differ only
>> in the housing and physical connection configuration.
>>
>> For contesting, the 450 filter as one hears it is an ideal bandwidth for
>> running. Particularly with the steep skirts, if you don't hear up and down
>> with that, you are a polite distance from your adjacent neighbors. Someone,
>> even *very* loud up 500 Hz, just isn't there. If you get squeezed, drop
>> down to 350 width and use the shift a little to preserve your slot. The 350
>> with DSP narrowed to 200 or 150, has been able to dig out everything I've
>> been after in contests search and pounce. But the standard understanding of
>> very steep skirts is only one benefit.
>>
>> The very steep skirts sharpen up key clicks to spikes. The K3's AGC with
>> current firmware is immune to spikes. Using NB (noise BLANKER) with "IF
>> OFF" and dSP t1-7, t2-7, or t3-7, the combination pretty much kills key
>> clicks. The effect of the three NB settings is an increasing softness to
>> the CW signal. Not something I like to listen to casually, but I easily
>> tolerate soft CW in the context of that vs loud key clicks driving down
>> signals with AGC, particularly given the nasty signals that can slide up
>> close to you in a contest. Soft CW does not seem to reduce intelligibility
>> any, just has all the audiophile appeal of cold mush to the palate.
>>
>> The various K3 advantages listed throughout this thread are enormous
>> advantages in a serious contest. Outside of serious DX and contesting?
>> Probably overkill for a great many, and the far less expensive TS590S can
>> carry the freight.
>>
>> I have one frequently travelling acquaintance that had owned both K3 and
>> TS590S and who finally settled on an Elecraft KX3 with the companion 100
>> watt amp which is easily remoted. There is this temptation to not consider
>> the KX3 a serious radio due to the size, but he says the only thing that
>> gets him sometimes is hearing extremely strong signals low pitched on
>> opposite sideband. He says his mind objects to that but it's never kept him
>> from copying anyone.
>>
>> Should note that he uses others' K3's brought to the scene of Multi-X
>> contesting. Since these days it's easy to come by
>> just-in-case-left-in-the-car spare K3's brought by the operator mob, he
>> doesn't have to support the party with a major rig.
>>
>> 73, Guy.
>>
>>
>> On Tue, Jun 17, 2014 at 11:08 AM, Barry N1EU<barry.n1eu at gmail.com>  wrote:
>>
>>> I was an early adopter of the K3 and installed all the hardware audio
>>> updates as they were released.  I'm picky about audio and the K3 ssb rx
>>> audio was quite good.  At http://n1eu.com/K3/K3_notes.htm you can see
>>> before/after audio spectral plots showing the differences the hardware
>>> updates and rx equalization made.  Please ignore much of the other
>> outdated
>>> info on that Web page.
>>>
>>> As others have indicated, K3 tx audio needs more careful setup (as
>> compared
>>> to other radios) in terms of sufficient audio drive and compression in
>>> order to maintain consistent output power level.
>>>
>>> The K3 with subrx does quite a good job of pulling out the weak ones from
>>> the noise on topband, as does the Ten-Tec Orion/RX366.  I'd rate these
>> two
>>> as top of the heap.  The new DDC/DUC SDRs are promising (Flex 6700,
>>> ANAN-100D) but are not quite ready for prime time in terms of diversity
>>> reception and full feature set, GUI, etc.
>>>
>>> 73, Barry N1EU
>>> _________________
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