Tax Refund

My wife and I don't get an income tax refund every year. On the years that we do, we generally have it earmarked for something that we've been needing or try to pay off any outstanding debts we might have. This year, though, we decided to each take an amount and "treat" ourselves to something we've each been wanting and then place the rest in savings.

She's still deciding what she's going to buy but I took my part (plus a little extra, heh-heh) and treated myself to two things that I've been considering for a while now. One thing was to have my K2 professionally calibrated by an expert. The other was to buy and build the matching KAT100 antenna tuner.

So, since I live in North Carolina, I contacted Don, W3FPR, and inquired about his schedule and whether or not he entertains such requests. I was delighted to learn that he does calibrate Elecraft gear for those of us who are just a little unsure of themselves. By coincidence, my KAT100 had arrived just prior to sending Don my K2. The build wasn't difficult, but on the initial powerup everything was dead. I did some rudimentary troubleshooting and discovered that I didn't have 5 VDC coming from the voltage regulator. I replaced it, but no go. My eyes couldn't spot a solder bridge across one of the capacitors (frankly, I was surprised that Don only discovered one!), but he found it. Moreover, he discovered that one of the EEPROM's were bad, something that I would have not concluded, I'm sure. So while he tuned up my K2, he also replaced the EEPROM and calibrated my tuner at the same time.

I must say, his rates are very, very reasonable and I'm quite pleased with how everything turned out. I can recommend him with the utmost confidence.

As good as my K2 was before, unless I have a really short memory I have to say that it really seems to have come to life now. The antenna tuner is really a joy to use, but I was a bit taken aback by how noisy it is when it tunes. Fortunately that's a short-lived cycle and since it remembers settings by band and antenna, you don't have to retune very often at all. Compared to my LDG Z-100, which is a fine tuner as well, I have noted that it gets better matches on a few bands, but not so much better that I'd knock the LDG. The Z-100 will now become my portable tuner, if I ever get the urge to carry my FT-857D with me on trips again.