Topband: Need for capacitor
daraymond at iowatelecom.net
daraymond at iowatelecom.net
Fri Dec 28 16:16:08 EST 2018
Greetings topbanders. . .
While CQing early this morning I began noticing a faint but troubling smell in the shack. It smelled like over heated wiring or electrical components. It continued to get stronger as I realized the odor was coming from the Alpha 99 amp. Indeed, a few moments later it tripped out. I dug into it this afternoon and discovered a leaky 75 pF/6 kV cap which is one of five such caps in a parallel bank that is pulled in on the band switch to achieve tank resonance only on 160m. I have removed the bad cap making the amp operational once again with the air variable tuning cap making up the lost C (and there’s still a little C to spare on the air-variable). After some searching I cannot find a 75 pF/6 kV cap. Mouser does not have anything even close in terms of the high voltage rating (hopefully I didn’t something). The closet thing Newark has is 47 pF which I have ordered. I’m guessing the 47 pF is probably OK but how important is equal current distribution across the five caps? Maybe I don’t need to be concerned about it? If I really do need the correct 75 pF/6 kV cap does anyone have ideas of a source? Replying privately is fine. See you all in the Stew. 73. . .Dave, W0FLS
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