Satellite use was the major impetus for producing multi-mode multi-band VHF/UHF radios in the 1990's. The cost for launching ham satellites has rendered putting up anything but small "FM repeater" sats beyond reach (>$10M), so the demand has dropped.
When the FT-847 came out in time for Oscar-40 (AO-40) many eme'rs jumped to the FT-847 (as did I), but now I am switching to a superb HF radio (the K3) combined with the best transverters I can afford (and that is not German-made). Like power supplies, USB converters, and a lot of other items it may not pay Elecraft to get into. The only new HF/VHF/UHF rig to come out lately is the new IC9100 (>$4K) and time will tell if that was a smart marketing decision. I will have about the same investment with my dual-Rx K3/10 plus 144 and 432 transverters. I would not bet on the IC9100 coming even close. I am convinced that SDR will take over the ham market in time. So direct-conversion 144 and 432 SDR may come along (several 144 SDR are under development at this time). I would say the K3 with transverters is a find approach (except maybe in a mobile/portable situation). You can have your K3V/U: just install a K3 with 144 and 432 xvtrs in a big box! Actually, the XV144 and XV432 are not very big so one should be able to make a common "rack" or "container" that is not much larger than the K3. So you already have the means to make a K3V/U for those that want it. To me this is smarter marketing (modular approach). Look at the architecture of many multi-band radios and you will see that they use a common IF with transverters, internally. Keeping RF and IF leakage down is a major problem designing such "animals"! 73, Ed ------------------------------ Message: 3 Date: Sat, 09 Apr 2011 10:29:48 -0500 From: "R. Kevin Stover" <rksto...@mchsi.com> Subject: Re: [Elecraft] K3V - another new product speculation To: Dale Parfitt <pari...@frontier.com> Cc: Elecraft@mailman.qth.net Message-ID: <4da07b6c.6020...@mchsi.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 On 4/9/2011 9:37 AM, Dale Parfitt wrote: > That is an extremely small market. There is a reason the rigs you > mentioned are no longer around. Serious ops go the transverter route. > > Dale W4OP Satellite users don't and I'm sure if some of the "serious" microwave ops had a choice of using 2m or 70cm in a K3V/U as an IF rather than 10m or daisy chained tranverters, they'd jump in a heartbeat. I also think there's a certain amount of transverter snobbery with the "serious" ops. "Those V/UHF rigs can't be nearly as good as my $1400 German transverter". Back 20 years ago that may have been true. A K3V/U might win that argument today. - -- R. Kevin Stover 73, Ed - KL7UW, WD2XSH/45 ====================================== BP40IQ 500 KHz - 10-GHz www.kl7uw.com EME: 144-1.4kw, 432-100w, 1296-testing*, 3400-winter? DUBUS Magazine USA Rep dubus...@hotmail.com ====================================== ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:Elecraft@mailman.qth.net This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
