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How does K2 NB work?

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Fred (FL)

How does K2 NB work?

Hi -

Thinking of building my 2nd K2. I wondered what
the consensus is on HOW WELL DOES THE NB WORK?
in a K2?

In my spring #5422 K2 - I never could see much
improvement in "noise" elimination. I had
experienced a situation where we had major
trucks near our house (cement job) - and the
ignition or engine electrical noise was major.
The NB, in either setting - semmed to do nothing
noticeable to remove this type of noise.

The repetitive "popcorn" hissing noise - sort
of regular brownian white noise one hears on
40 and 20 - wasn't improved on either.

I even built a 2nd NB kit from Elecraft -
that didn't improve the noise operation
either. The K2 itself appeared 100% in
spec, filters all aligned with Spectrogram,
and the rig passed every construction test
and specification with flying colors. And
it had 100% toroid guy toroids throughout.

Maybe these are 2 cases of the type of noise
that the NB doesn't deal with - what noise
does it eliminate? I know on previous Icom
and Kenwood rigs - NB did remove or at least
diminish noises of these types? Is DSP the
better way to go?

Thanks,
Fred
N3CSY

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Don Wilhelm-3

RE: How does K2 NB work?

Fred,

The KNB2 does a good job on impulse noise - those noise pulses with a fast
rise time such as ignition noise. I can't explain why it did not attack the
ignition noise from the cement trucks.

For the more constant background types of noise - 'popcorn' noise as you
described it, the KNB2 does not trigger on them at all because the level is
not strong enough and there are no pulses above the threshold. The most
effective solution to these background noises is the noise reduction
algorithms of the KDSP2.

73,
Don W3FPR

> -----Original Message-----
>
> Thinking of building my 2nd K2. I wondered what
> the consensus is on HOW WELL DOES THE NB WORK?
> in a K2?
>
> In my spring #5422 K2 - I never could see much
> improvement in "noise" elimination. I had
> experienced a situation where we had major
> trucks near our house (cement job) - and the
> ignition or engine electrical noise was major.
> The NB, in either setting - semmed to do nothing
> noticeable to remove this type of noise.
>
> The repetitive "popcorn" hissing noise - sort
> of regular brownian white noise one hears on
> 40 and 20 - wasn't improved on either.
>
>

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David Toepfer

Re: How does K2 NB work?

--- "Fred (FL)" <[hidden email]> wrote:
> I had experienced a situation where we had major trucks near our house
> (cement job) - and the ignition or engine electrical noise was major.
> The NB, in either setting - semmed to do nothing noticeable to remove
> this type of noise.

--- Don Wilhelm <[hidden email]> wrote:
> The KNB2 does a good job on impulse noise - those noise pulses with a fast
> rise time such as ignition noise. I can't explain why it did not attack the
> ignition noise from the cement trucks.

This is probably because it was not ignition noise. Cement trucks typically
use diesel engines (no spark ignition system). If the cement trucks had
generators (as opposed to alternators) in them (older electrical system or DC
welder on-board) in them or if they had on-board DC motor pumps/mixers then
what you probably heard was motor noise made by brush arcing.

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Chris Hurlbut

Re: How does K2 NB work?

In reply to this post by Fred (FL)

Fred,
I just installed the NB in my K2/100 a week ago or so. I live in an
apartment and while at home I have a (very) poor antenna, but the
powerline noise is out of control. The NB solves it 100%. In fact, I
have yet to hear any distorted CW signals with it on low threshold, on
either NB1 or NB2. I was very impressed. I don't really listen to SSB,
so I can't comment on the NB quality vs signal distortion. Why ruin a
perfectly good radio with the SSB board? :)

This is only on powerline noise though, of course it does nothing on
"normal" noise. I haven't tried it mobile yet, but I would guess it
will do a FB job on real ignition noise.

-Chris KL9A

Fred (FL) wrote:

> Hi -
>
> Thinking of building my 2nd K2. I wondered what
> the consensus is on HOW WELL DOES THE NB WORK?
> in a K2?
>
> In my spring #5422 K2 - I never could see much
> improvement in "noise" elimination. I had
> experienced a situation where we had major
> trucks near our house (cement job) - and the
> ignition or engine electrical noise was major.
> The NB, in either setting - semmed to do nothing
> noticeable to remove this type of noise.
>
> The repetitive "popcorn" hissing noise - sort
> of regular brownian white noise one hears on
> 40 and 20 - wasn't improved on either.
>
> I even built a 2nd NB kit from Elecraft -
> that didn't improve the noise operation
> either. The K2 itself appeared 100% in
> spec, filters all aligned with Spectrogram,
> and the rig passed every construction test
> and specification with flying colors. And
> it had 100% toroid guy toroids throughout.
>
> Maybe these are 2 cases of the type of noise
> that the NB doesn't deal with - what noise
> does it eliminate? I know on previous Icom
> and Kenwood rigs - NB did remove or at least
> diminish noises of these types? Is DSP the
> better way to go?
>
> Thanks,
> Fred
> N3CSY
>
>
>
> __________________________________________________
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> Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
> http://mail.yahoo.com
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> Post to: [hidden email]
> You must be a subscriber to post to the list.
> Subscriber Info (Addr. Change, sub, unsub etc.):
> http://mailman.qth.net/mailman/listinfo/elecraft
>
> Help: http://mailman.qth.net/subscribers.htm
> Elecraft web page: http://www.elecraft.com
>
>