Updates and Changes: Difference between revisions

From Collins 30S-1 HF Amplifier
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<gallery caption="Thermal and Pressure switches to replace Collins Overtemp K102" widths="400px" heights="400px" perrow="2">
<gallery caption="Thermal and Pressure switches to replace Collins Overtemp K102" widths="400px" heights="400px" perrow="2">
File:rear_view_pressure_temp_sensors.jpeg|Rear View of the RF Compartment, Showing New Thermal-Safety
File:rear_view_pressure_temp_sensors.jpeg|Rear View of the RF Compartment, Showing New Thermal-Safety
File:top_view_pressure_temp_sensors.jpeg|Top View of the RF Compartment, Again Showing Thermal-Safety
File:Top_view_pressure_temp_sensors.jpeg|Top View of the RF Compartment, Again Showing Thermal-Safety
</gallery>
</gallery>

Revision as of 17:13, 1 June 2020

Raising CW Plate- and Screen-Voltages

Collins' reduction in High Voltage and Screen Voltage when using CW mode held back the 4CX1500B gain, and total-power. I was almost at the point of using the SSB setting for CW (as many do), when Chet VE3CFK pointed out...

That feeding both the primary wires from the front-panel-switch to the SSB connections on the transformer would give me a constant 3kV plate-voltage, and the elevated screen-voltage, no matter the mode. In fact, doing this means the only difference between SSB and CW is the negative grid-bias, and the resulting Class of operation.

The realization of Chet's suggestion: simply moving the CW-primary-power wire from Term #1 to Term #2, and similarly moving Term #6 to Term #5:

HV screen always at SSB.jpeg

Now I have good gain and total power! Thanks, Chet! Here's a view of comfortable operating conditions now, for CW:

Cw operation boosted HV screen.jpeg

Thermal Overload Switch K102

My thermal sensor kicked my amp offline a couple of times, at only modest power-levels. Perhaps decades of time have taken their toll on the sensor; perhaps tube-changes have un-calibrated it; certainly my blower-motor-change will have altered it's response. The purpose of the thermal sensor: to open the HV-enable 12V circuit and K203 (primary AC power) if the tube gets too hot. The tube can get too hot with either excess dissipation, or lack of cooling-airflow.

How and Why I Changed It