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K3 Burn In

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Brett Howard

K3 Burn In

Has anyone done a burn in on their radios to test? They rate to 100W
100% duty cycle for 10 minutes. I'm sure there is quite a bit of
headroom in that too. Has anyone tested to that? Do any of the
Elecraft guys object to that type of testing?

I had a strange failure at FD this year and worry that unless I do a
burn in like that once it gets back that my normal amount of operation
will take quite a while to emulate what the rig saw during field day.

I'm assuming that the PA won't let you go till things are too hot and it
will protect if things get a little too hot under the collar. Is there
any sort of permanent damage that can occur by doing this type of
testing? I just want to be sure that I end up with a radio that I can
spend some time with and get ALL the options into over time.

Other than my K1 this will be the first HF rig I've personally owned.
I'd really like it to last me a long time. During the week I owned it I
REALLY loved the thing! Now going back to the K1 I really miss the
K3! :) Don't get me wrong I LOVE my K1 but its no K3! :)

If there are any tests I should do other than trying to measure MDS with
my XG2 and trying to do some key down tests to try and prove out that I
have no issues please let me know.

~Brett (KC7OTG)

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Julian, G4ILO

Re: K3 Burn In

Brett Howard wrote

Has anyone done a burn in on their radios to test? They rate to 100W
100% duty cycle for 10 minutes. I'm sure there is quite a bit of
headroom in that too. Has anyone tested to that? Do any of the
Elecraft guys object to that type of testing?

I had a strange failure at FD this year and worry that unless I do a
burn in like that once it gets back that my normal amount of operation
will take quite a while to emulate what the rig saw during field day.

I'm assuming that the PA won't let you go till things are too hot and it
will protect if things get a little too hot under the collar. Is there
any sort of permanent damage that can occur by doing this type of
testing? I just want to be sure that I end up with a radio that I can
spend some time with and get ALL the options into over time.

Other than my K1 this will be the first HF rig I've personally owned.
I'd really like it to last me a long time. During the week I owned it I
REALLY loved the thing! Now going back to the K1 I really miss the
K3! :) Don't get me wrong I LOVE my K1 but its no K3! :)

If there are any tests I should do other than trying to measure MDS with
my XG2 and trying to do some key down tests to try and prove out that I
have no issues please let me know.

Hmm. When you buy a new car, do you drive it into a wall to test the airbags work?

Even if the K3 survives the test, you will have subjected it to more stress than if you hadn't done the test. That is more likely to make failure occur sooner rather than later.

Julian, G4ILO. K2 #392 K3 #222 KX3 #110
* G4ILO's Shack - http://www.g4ilo.com
* KComm - http://www.g4ilo.com/kcomm.html
* KTune - http://www.g4ilo.com/ktune.html

John King-10

RE: K3 Burn In

In reply to this post by Brett Howard

Disclaimer - the following test method is not approved or
sanctioned by Elecraft. Conduct any testing at your own risk.

I work in Quality Assurance in my day job (30 years and counting.)

Long before FD I performed a 24 hour endurance test on my K3
to approximate worst-case FD conditions. I recorded a CQ FD message
similar to the actual message we would be using at FD into one of
the K3's message memories, then set the message repeat time to
minimum. The K3's output power was set to 120 Watts and the rig
was connected to a 50 ohm dummy load with a Bird thruline wattmeter
in line. The DC input voltage was set to 13.5 volts. The test was
performed at ambient room temp, about 24 degrees C. The K3 sent
the continuous message loop for a 24 hour period without incident.

The actual environmental conditions at our FD were a bit more
severe than the test conditions above. The K3 was operated in a
4-man dome tent exposed to full sun with an outside air temp
approaching 90 degrees. We didn't measure the actual temperature
inside the tent, but my informal assessment was "hot as hell."
Of course, the transmit duty cycle in actual FD use was less
demanding than the test duty cycle. I had high confidence that
the K3 would be up to the task, and it was.

I'm sorry to hear about your failure at FD. I have heard no other
reports of FD failures, and to my knowledge the VP6DX crew had
no failures during their operation earlier this year. It may be
of small comfort to you, but I regard your failure as an anomaly
- stuff happens. Overall, the K3 is establishing a reputation as
a very reliable field rig.

73,
john WA1ABI

>
> Has anyone done a burn in on their radios to test? They rate to 100W
> 100% duty cycle for 10 minutes. I'm sure there is quite a bit of
> headroom in that too. Has anyone tested to that? Do any of the
> Elecraft guys object to that type of testing?
>
> I had a strange failure at FD this year and worry that unless I do a
> burn in like that once it gets back that my normal amount of operation
> will take quite a while to emulate what the rig saw during field day.
>

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Don Wilhelm-4

Re: K3 Burn In

Folks,

John was quite correct to term his test an 'Endurance Test'. I have
worked as an Assurrance Engineer for the latter part of my career and
would like to offer the following:

The purpose of any 'burn-in' tests for complete electronic assemblies I
have encountered is *not* to stress the DUT to its limits, but simply to
catch any early life failures that may be lurking. Burn-in testing of
individual devices is different than any burn-in of a complete
assembly. Simply running the assembly continuously under normal
conditions for a period of time is normally sufficient.

Early life failures can and do occur, but they are not common.

If one would want to do a 'burn-in' for the K3, I would advocate that
alternate receive and transmit cycles be done over a period of a
several days (half max power level should be sufficient) or so (you get
to pick the time frame that *you* define as 'early life').

Other than catching early life failures, a burn-in period for electronic
packages such as the K3 serve no purpose at all. The continuous
operation just makes a lurking early failure happen sooner than it would
normally. If you are expecting anything more from such a test, it just
"ain't gonna happen".

Of course, one can always just operate it as normal for the first 30 to
90 days and regard any failure that occurs as an early life failure -
that works just as well as continuous operation.

We did hear of one K3 that failed during Field Day, but there are over
1000 K3s out there, and an early life failure rate of less than 0.1% is
very good, even though it is quite disconcerting to find oneself in that
small percentage region.

73,
Don W3FPR

John King wrote:

Brett Howard

RE: K3 Burn In

In reply to this post by John King-10

I agree that sounds like a pretty good test.....

The K3 is a PHENOMENAL radio and I'm very familiar with things breaking
in their infancy. I'm just hoping that the kinks are very well buried
when it comes back. Appreciate the tips on what you did....

On Fri, 2008-07-04 at 09:25 -0400, John King wrote:

> Disclaimer - the following test method is not approved or
> sanctioned by Elecraft. Conduct any testing at your own risk.
>
> I work in Quality Assurance in my day job (30 years and counting.)
>
> Long before FD I performed a 24 hour endurance test on my K3
> to approximate worst-case FD conditions. I recorded a CQ FD message
> similar to the actual message we would be using at FD into one of
> the K3's message memories, then set the message repeat time to
> minimum. The K3's output power was set to 120 Watts and the rig
> was connected to a 50 ohm dummy load with a Bird thruline wattmeter
> in line. The DC input voltage was set to 13.5 volts. The test was
> performed at ambient room temp, about 24 degrees C. The K3 sent
> the continuous message loop for a 24 hour period without incident.
>
> The actual environmental conditions at our FD were a bit more
> severe than the test conditions above. The K3 was operated in a
> 4-man dome tent exposed to full sun with an outside air temp
> approaching 90 degrees. We didn't measure the actual temperature
> inside the tent, but my informal assessment was "hot as hell."
> Of course, the transmit duty cycle in actual FD use was less
> demanding than the test duty cycle. I had high confidence that
> the K3 would be up to the task, and it was.
>
> I'm sorry to hear about your failure at FD. I have heard no other
> reports of FD failures, and to my knowledge the VP6DX crew had
> no failures during their operation earlier this year. It may be
> of small comfort to you, but I regard your failure as an anomaly
> - stuff happens. Overall, the K3 is establishing a reputation as
> a very reliable field rig.
>
>
> 73,
> john WA1ABI
>
>
>
>
>
>
> >
> > Has anyone done a burn in on their radios to test? They rate to 100W
> > 100% duty cycle for 10 minutes. I'm sure there is quite a bit of
> > headroom in that too. Has anyone tested to that? Do any of the
> > Elecraft guys object to that type of testing?
> >
> > I had a strange failure at FD this year and worry that unless I do a
> > burn in like that once it gets back that my normal amount of operation
> > will take quite a while to emulate what the rig saw during field day.
> >
>
> _______________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> 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

Brett Howard

Re: K3 Burn In

In reply to this post by Don Wilhelm-4

Totally agree. I was somewhat appreciative that FD helped me find the
problem as soon as possible and was wondering if solid type TX would be
a good way to do an accelerated test. From what I'm hearing now and I
agree a FD simulation w/ full QSK running is probably more real world.

You are correct in that all I really want to do is find any underlying
problems quickly so that I can be assured that I'm out of the 0.1%.

>From reading the list I know that the K3 is a brute and they just flat
out don't die! I just wanna make sure that after getting one that did
that I've chased out all the demons... :)

~Brett

On Fri, 2008-07-04 at 10:08 -0400, Don Wilhelm wrote:

> Folks,
>
> John was quite correct to term his test an 'Endurance Test'. I have
> worked as an Assurrance Engineer for the latter part of my career and
> would like to offer the following:
>
> The purpose of any 'burn-in' tests for complete electronic assemblies I
> have encountered is *not* to stress the DUT to its limits, but simply to
> catch any early life failures that may be lurking. Burn-in testing of
> individual devices is different than any burn-in of a complete
> assembly. Simply running the assembly continuously under normal
> conditions for a period of time is normally sufficient.
>
> Early life failures can and do occur, but they are not common.
>
> If one would want to do a 'burn-in' for the K3, I would advocate that
> alternate receive and transmit cycles be done over a period of a
> several days (half max power level should be sufficient) or so (you get
> to pick the time frame that *you* define as 'early life').
>
> Other than catching early life failures, a burn-in period for electronic
> packages such as the K3 serve no purpose at all. The continuous
> operation just makes a lurking early failure happen sooner than it would
> normally. If you are expecting anything more from such a test, it just
> "ain't gonna happen".
>
> Of course, one can always just operate it as normal for the first 30 to
> 90 days and regard any failure that occurs as an early life failure -
> that works just as well as continuous operation.
>
> We did hear of one K3 that failed during Field Day, but there are over
> 1000 K3s out there, and an early life failure rate of less than 0.1% is
> very good, even though it is quite disconcerting to find oneself in that
> small percentage region.
>
> 73,
> Don W3FPR
>
> John King wrote:
> > Disclaimer - the following test method is not approved or
> > sanctioned by Elecraft. Conduct any testing at your own risk.
> >
> > I work in Quality Assurance in my day job (30 years and counting.)
> >
> > Long before FD I performed a 24 hour endurance test on my K3
> > to approximate worst-case FD conditions. I recorded a CQ FD message
> > similar to the actual message we would be using at FD into one of
> > the K3's message memories, then set the message repeat time to
> > minimum. The K3's output power was set to 120 Watts and the rig
> > was connected to a 50 ohm dummy load with a Bird thruline wattmeter
> > in line. The DC input voltage was set to 13.5 volts. The test was
> > performed at ambient room temp, about 24 degrees C. The K3 sent
> > the continuous message loop for a 24 hour period without incident.
> >
> > The actual environmental conditions at our FD were a bit more
> > severe than the test conditions above. The K3 was operated in a
> > 4-man dome tent exposed to full sun with an outside air temp
> > approaching 90 degrees. We didn't measure the actual temperature
> > inside the tent, but my informal assessment was "hot as hell."
> > Of course, the transmit duty cycle in actual FD use was less
> > demanding than the test duty cycle. I had high confidence that
> > the K3 would be up to the task, and it was.
> >
> > I'm sorry to hear about your failure at FD. I have heard no other
> > reports of FD failures, and to my knowledge the VP6DX crew had
> > no failures during their operation earlier this year. It may be
> > of small comfort to you, but I regard your failure as an anomaly
> > - stuff happens. Overall, the K3 is establishing a reputation as
> > a very reliable field rig.
> >
> >
> >
> _______________________________________________
> Elecraft mailing list
> 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

Don Wilhelm-4

Re: K3 Burn In

Brett,

If it was working before the failure, one should always assume a single
failure. Multiple failures are quite rare and are normally induced by
some outside force (incorrect power, lightning surge, etc.)

There are instances where one failed component will take out another
one, but that is rare too if the designer did his job right.

In any case, it is all a matter of probability, but no matter how low
the probability of a failure is, remember that is calculated on a large
sample size. If you have only a single unit, the probability of failure
for that one unit is either zero percent or it is 100 percent - there is
just no other way to calculate for a sample size of 1.

73,
Don W3FPR

Brett Howard wrote:

> Totally agree. I was somewhat appreciative that FD helped me find the
> problem as soon as possible and was wondering if solid type TX would be
> a good way to do an accelerated test. From what I'm hearing now and I
> agree a FD simulation w/ full QSK running is probably more real world.
>
> You are correct in that all I really want to do is find any underlying
> problems quickly so that I can be assured that I'm out of the 0.1%.
>
> >From reading the list I know that the K3 is a brute and they just flat
> out don't die! I just wanna make sure that after getting one that did
> that I've chased out all the demons... :)
>
> ~Brett
>
>