I had the experience that my West Mountain assembled PP cable pulled loose from the crimped connection when I tripped over it (yeah extreme situation). I could not figure out how to extract the pin to repair it. I bought three pre-made cables when I got a specially made power cable for my FT-817 that uses a very tiny power connector that "really" is not tolerant of stressing. One was for connection in the shack and the other in my pickup. The third was used with the K3 until the trip mishap. Its now in the repair bin. I made up a PP cable to replace the broken one using the 15A pins which should be adequate for the K3/10.
The PP that I made up myself I soldered vs.crimping with no failures. I noted the lack of pins and someone told me they slide together and I have found the friction adequate. I'll try the Q-tip "pin", if needed. But there is no stress relief and the connection takes all the mechanical stress on the wires, directly. Jury is out on PP connectors in my mind, but the ham community (ARRL/ARES) seems to really be pushing them for a nation-wide Emcomm standard. Most of my station's control/dc wiring is interconnected using crimp connectors and barrier terminal strips. My new SO2R control panel uses sub-D9 and sub-D25 connectors, with a few RCA-phono connectors for often disconnected lines. (I will post a webpage with diagrams and photos, soon) 73, Ed - KL7UW ------------------------------ Message: 18 Date: Mon, 28 Jun 2010 09:03:31 -0400 (EDT) From: [email protected] Subject: Re: [Elecraft] Anderson Power Poles? To: [email protected] Message-ID: <[email protected]> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" After watching the PP connectors on my K3 wiggle around at Field Day, I have to question again why Elecraft chose these toads-in-a-tuxedo for a connector. PP are way over-rated. The only strain relief they provide is when they come apart - which is often. I suppose we could call that defect an undocumented "feature." A simple molex would have been fine and a whole lot more secure. But not to start a flame war over PPs, I'll stay positive. Anyone have any ideas on how to better secure the PP in the K3? Mine wiggles and I am thinking about some hot glue. Buck k4ia K3 #101 73, Ed - KL7UW, WD2XSH/45 ====================================== BP40IQ 500 KHz - 10-GHz www.kl7uw.com EME: 144-600w, 432-100w, 1296-60w, 3400-fall 2010 DUBUS Magazine USA Rep [email protected] ====================================== ______________________________________________________________ Elecraft mailing list Home: http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft Help: http://mailman.qth.net/mmfaq.htm Post: mailto:[email protected] This list hosted by: http://www.qsl.net Please help support this email list: http://www.qsl.net/donate.html
