Keyboard Shortcuts
Likes
Search
Auto tuner update
开云体育Well I learned an important lesson tonight (this is why we prototype and test).? Those T50-1 cores I was using for the auto tuner are not gonna work.? They saturate at 64 watts PEP and then cause side IMD products above that power level.? I’ve moved up to the T80 cores which are good to over 120 watts.? I also found a great source for latching relays…$0.75 each in quantity 100 (cheaper in 500 and 1,000) so can keep this low power!? I built the Discriminator using an AD8302 and it works perfectly for phase and amplitude detection. ? ? This also leads me to wonder how Hans Summer can claim that his LPF’s are good to over 100 watts…? I have a few and will test that theory. ? I’m starting a blog for updates on the design and build so I don’t take up bandwidth here. ? ? Dr. William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton – J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it: Like us on Facebook! ? ? email:? bill@... ? |
||
开云体育Not sure what brought this on but the teaching point of my post for those who would otherwise make current, voltage, saturation calculations for Inductors in RF service and build from them is to prototype first. ?My recollection in relation to Hans Summers LPF kits (nothing to do with my tuner design) is that guys are using them in amplifiers up to 100 watts... and i wonder if they have had the parts on the bench to really see the limitations of the filters. ?More clear?Dr.?William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton - J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it: email:??bill@... ? On Jan 11, 2018, at 8:09 AM, Don Cantrell via Groups.Io <nd6t_6@...> wrote:
|
||
Bill, After Don's comment, I did some googling and came up with the following info. There's so much to learn about this hobby! ? Sent from Yahoo Mail. On Thursday, January 11, 2018 12:05 PM, K9HZ <bill@...> wrote: Not sure what brought this on but the teaching point of my post for those who would otherwise make current, voltage, saturation calculations for Inductors in RF service and build from them is to prototype first. ?My recollection in relation to Hans Summers LPF kits (nothing to do with my tuner design) is that guys are using them in amplifiers up to 100 watts... and i wonder if they have had the parts on the bench to really see the limitations of the filters. ?More clear? Dr.?William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton - J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it: email:??bill@... ? On Jan 11, 2018, at 8:09 AM, Don Cantrell via Groups.Io <nd6t_6@...> wrote:
|
||
开云体育I have and use the qrp-labs LPFs I wouldn't dare go over 10W (and that's pushing it) They are rated for 5w, I don't know where or why anyone would think 100W would be acceptable.
From: [email protected] <[email protected]> on behalf of K9HZ <bill@...>
Sent: Thursday, January 11, 2018 12:05 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [BITX20] Auto tuner update ?
Not sure what brought this on but the teaching point of my post for those who would otherwise make current, voltage, saturation calculations for Inductors in RF service and build from them is to prototype first. ?My recollection in relation
to Hans Summers LPF kits (nothing to do with my tuner design) is that guys are using them in amplifiers up to 100 watts... and i wonder if they have had the parts on the bench to really see the limitations of the filters. ?More clear?
Dr.?William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton - J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it:
email:??bill@... ?
|
||
开云体育While I acknowledge the discussion is regarding choice of toroids for an AMU project.QRP Labs / Hans, Points out that his LPF design is suitable UP TO 5 watts as supplied in his kits. See bottom section of the web page Alan On 11/01/2018 17:05, K9HZ wrote:
Not sure what brought this on but the teaching point of my post for those who would otherwise make current, voltage, saturation calculations for Inductors in RF service and build from them is to prototype first. ?My recollection in relation to Hans Summers LPF kits (nothing to do with my tuner design) is that guys are using them in amplifiers up to 100 watts... and i wonder if they have had the parts on the bench to really see the limitations of the filters. ?More clear? |
||
Perhaps you are thinking of this SWR Bridge?
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
It is apparently good for up to 100W, intermittent use. On Thu, Jan 11, 2018 at 09:05 am, K9HZ wrote: My recollection in relation to Hans Summers LPF kits (nothing to do with my tuner design) is that guys are using them in amplifiers up to 100 watts... |
||
This SWR birdge:
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
? ? On Thu, Jan 11, 2018 at 10:11 am, Jerry Gaffke wrote: Perhaps you are thinking of this SWR Bridge? |
||
开云体育My comment is in regards to discussion in his group.?Dr.?William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton - J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it: email:??bill@... ? On Jan 11, 2018, at 11:31 AM, Alan de G1FXB via Groups.Io <g1fxb@...> wrote:
|
||
开云体育NoIt looks like i need to refrain from posting and just direct you-all to my website now when the kit is complete.? Dr.?William J. Schmidt - K9HZ J68HZ 8P6HK ZF2HZ PJ4/K9HZ VP5/K9HZ PJ2/K9HZ ? Owner - Operator Big Signal Ranch – K9ZC Staunton, Illinois ? Owner – Operator Villa Grand Piton - J68HZ Soufriere, St. Lucia W.I. Rent it: email:??bill@... ? On Jan 11, 2018, at 12:11 PM, Jerry Gaffke via Groups.Io <jgaffke@...> wrote:
|
||
开云体育Thanks' Have you a link to the thread? I'm one of the ones building a PA based on the work of WA2EBY.) AlanOn 11/01/2018 18:16, K9HZ wrote:
My comment is in regards to discussion in his group.? |
||
The QRP Labs kit ordering page says 5W. In fact I believe they are fine for at least 10W and this is noted on the LPF Kit page 10W is well within the specified ratings of the cores according to the original G-QRP club website article (see for PDF of the article). 10W is also well within the voltage ratings of the NP0/C0G low-loss RF capacitors used in the LPF kits. It may be possible to push it beyond 10W. Tolerance of SWR mismatch would be reduced (and eventually disappear). Another factor is component tolerances and winding differences resulting in variation in inductance values. If the filter starts producing attenuation at frequencies lower than it should... i.e. at the transmit frequency - then remember that attenuation means reduction in output power. The reduced power has to go *somewhere* and in fact it is likely to be largely dissipated as heat in the LPF components.? I'm not sure how far beyond 10W would be Ok before generating smoke. Anyone who has these QRP Labs 7-element (3 inductors, 4 capacitors) filters on their tiny 1.5 x 0.5 inches board (37 x 13mm) would intuitively not think it right to put 100W through it. Even if everything measured perfectly I wouldn't want to go anywhere near 100W! A confession... during PA development of the QRP Labs 5W HF PA kit (Class C) , I did put 30W continuous keyed through a QRP Labs LPF kit... No smoke ;-) 73 Hans G0UPL? ? |
||
The auto tuner capacitors have to be rated for the highest voltage at the highest impedance. This is an extreme requirement. To illustrate, a 10 watt RF signal will put out a peak 30v across a 50 ohms load. However, an end-fed half wave will exhibit about 3000 ohms impedance. At 10 watts, this amounts to a voltahe peak of 250 v. You have to choose the capacitors for 250v rating even for a QRP power level. - f On 12 Jan 2018 12:32 am, "Hans Summers" <hans.summers@...> wrote:
|
||
开云体育Han's, Thanks for a definitive statement.
A selection of filters and a nice relay switch double sided daughter board would have being nice and I wasn't expecting to be able to use yours for circa 40 watts. I'll plagiarise another design and make do with vero... :-[ Alan On 11/01/2018 19:01, Hans Summers
wrote:
|
||
You are correct, the LFP caps see half of the peak-to-peak voltage, since that RF is centered on ground.
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
In Farhan's example of 3000 ohms at 10W: Vrms*Vrms/Ohms = Watts? ? so? ? Vrms = sqrt(Watts * Ohms) = sqrt(3000*10) = 173.2 Volts RMS across the cap The peak voltage is sqrt(2)=1.414 time the RMS voltage (assuming this is a sine wave halfway through the filter), so 173.2*1.414 = 245 Volts peak to ground. Hans, on a completely different note, you may find this interesting, It takes the three si5351 msynth register values for p1, p2, p3 as reported by Clockbuilderpro and back computes values for a, b, c Just got it to work this morning, seems right but may yet have issues. I assume a,b,c must all be integers. However, a and b could take on fractional values in increments of 1/128 and still yield integer values for p1,p2,p3. I wonder if that's legal, though not seeing that out of Clockbuilderpro. Clockbuilderpro seems to do a massive search for the lowest possible integer values of a,b,c in both PLL and output msynth's when I ask for one output of a particular frequency, often leaving both msynths in fractional mode. So low integer values are likely the primary way to reduce phase noise. This is a considerably different approach than all the C code for the si5351 I find out there on the interwebs Regardless, my guess is that the si5351 has less phase noise in all cases than the typical LC vfo. #include <stdio.h> #include <stdlib.h> int main(int argc, char** argv) { int floorg, floorc, ax128, bx128, a, b, c, p1, p2, p3; if (argc==4) { p1 = atoi(argv[1]); p2 = atoi(argv[2]); p3 = atoi(argv[3]); } else { printf("Usage: Takes 3 int args for si5351 msynth reg values p1,p2,p3\n"); printf("reports int values for a,b,c where a+b/c is the divide ratio\n"); exit(1); } printf(" p1:%d p2:%d p3:%d \n", p1, p2, p3); c = p3; // Given an si5351 msynth divide of (a + b/c): // p1 = 128*a + Floor(128*b/c) - 512 // p2 = 128*b - c*Floor(128*b/c) // p3 = c // All from Silabs AN619 // Since b<c, Floor(128*b/c) has a value between 0 and 127 inclusive // We compute a and b for each of those values, determine which is legal for (floorg=0; floorg<128; floorg++) { // Guess value of Floor(128*b/c) ax128 = p1 + 512 - floorg; // Where ax128 is a*128 bx128 = p2 + c*floorg; // and bx128 is b*128 floorc = bx128/c; // Compute value Floor(128*b/c) a = ax128/128; b=bx128/128; // Report result if value of Floor(128*b/c) is consistent with guess, // and if the computed values for a and b are integers, and b<c. if (floorc==floorg && ax128%128==0 && bx128%128==0 && b<c) printf(" a:%d b:%d c:%d \n", a, b, c); } exit(0); } Jerry, KE7ER On Thu, Jan 11, 2018 at 12:39 pm, Hans Summers wrote:
|
||
Hans, My calculations were for an L network that matches high impedance loads, not for LPFs that have low impedance on both sides (like the qrp labs LPFs). Btw, folks, the qrp labs labs use very high Q capacitors. These are a must of low loss. -f On 12 Jan 2018 2:33 am, "Jerry Gaffke via Groups.Io" <jgaffke=[email protected]> wrote: You are correct, the LFP caps see half of the peak-to-peak voltage, since that RF is centered on ground. |
||
If the LPF is presented a high impedance load (such as a broken antenna connector) the voltages will go up.
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
Though not as high as the 3000 ohm example suggested, the IRF510 cannot send 10 Watts into 3000 ohms. On Thu, Jan 11, 2018 at 06:44 pm, Ashhar Farhan wrote:
Hans, |
||
OK, it increases, but not by much.
toggle quoted message
Show quoted text
I ran an LTSpice simulation of the Bitx40 final, see a 50% rise in peak voltages when the antenna goes open circuit. Not something I had ever though much about. On Thu, Jan 11, 2018 at 06:51 pm, Jerry Gaffke wrote:
If the LPF is presented a high impedance load (such as a broken antenna connector) the voltages will go up. |