For what it's worth, I am the proud owner of a BC-610F. It has many
fewer safety features than the much higher powered transmitters that
I've worked with professionally. Except for the exciter controls, I
never touch anything inside without shorting whatever it is to
ground. Even the exciter controls are potentially dangerous, because
they rely only on the knob insulation to keep you from hitting the
exciter B+. The set screw has voltage on it, but because of the
style of the knob it's difficult to touch.
Modern high powered transmitters have key lockout systems. All of
the dangerous compartments have locks on them. When the transmitter
is operating, the keys for those locks have to be in a set of
tumblers that are mechanically coupled to a special switch
assembly. That switches connect the primary voltage to the
transmitter and unshort the high voltage bus. Placing the switches
in the operating position requires locking the keys their tumblers.
In order to release the keys, you have to put the switches into their
safe positions. That allows you to remove the keys so that you can
unlock the HV compartments. In addition, opening any HV compartment
operates an interlock switch and closes a HV shorting switch. Even
with all of those safety features, there is still a shorting stick
sitting in an interlocked holder. The HV cannot be energized unless
the stick is where it belongs.
Alan
WA2DZL
On Jun 2, 2006, at 11:11 AM, Mike Dorworth, K4XM wrote:
On a BC-610 using a external VFO, just kill exicitation, ALL METERS
fall to
ZERO, the B plus will go to 4000 VOLTS and if you have bypassed the
interlock and touch the link you will be GONE, Forget the meters!
Trust the
stick! I know!
----- Original Message -----
From: "John E. Coleman (ARS WA5BXO)" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "'Discussion of AM Radio'" <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, June 02, 2006 10:11 AM
Subject: RE: [AMRadio] Shorting stick
If you do things right,
Power Down,
Watch the HV meters fall down,
Then - Apply the shorting stick,
There won't be an arc.
WA5BXO, John
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