Kit Re-assurance

kit means that it must be assembled by the customer

From time to time I get emails from customers or prospective customers about a kit.  Usually it's something along the lines of: "will this kit work with my rig ?"

And I usually try to answer promptly with an informative email.  First a disclaimer is included if I have no first hand experience with the equipment in question.  For example, I've never used an amplifier on HF so I'll mention this when fielding a tube amp / rig compatibility question for the Keyall HV.
 

I recently heard from a buyer of the original Keyall.  I wasn't sure if he had already been using the Keyall but he wanted to know if it would work with a solid state Kenwood rig and a Yaesu FL2100b amplifier.  I downloaded the manual for the Yaesu and saw that it used grid-block keying - the two amplifier tube grids were biased with a negative voltage which appeared to be less than the absolute value of -25 volts since that was the rating on the capacitors in the bias supply.  Of course my pet peeve with virtually all commercial tube rigs/amps or even published magazine rigs is that the keying voltage / current is NEVER specified.  So the current was unknown but generally with grid block the keying current is low (well below 100 mA).  Now with cathode keying the voltage and current can be pretty high (and frankly: potentially dangerous).

So I emailed back and after mentioning that I hadn't used that gear myself I then said that the original Keyall should work fine.

I think that modern hams are a little afraid to try things on their own.  They want assurance that they aren't about to do (or buy) something foolish.  I'm happy to do this but often these are Extra class hams who *seem* reluctant to try something simple like measuring key-up voltage or key-down current.  I don't expect an Extra to be an engineer but they should be "technical" - they aren't Novices.
 

Now people have expensive equipment and limited time to use it so they don't want to waste either letting smoke out !  But many of these Extra class hams are Novices in the true sense of that word.

Best Regards,
Chuck, WB9KZY
http://wb9kzy.com/ham.htm