Kg3v Ham Radio Blog

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Connecting an IC-7300 to the Elecraft KPA-500 Amp and KAT-500 Tuner

Posted: 14 Mar 2021 06:21 PM PDT
https://kg3v.com/2021/03/14/using-th...kat-500-tuner/



I have been using the Elecraft KPA-500 and KAT-500 with two Icom rigs; the
IC-7600 and the IC-7300. This article details how I have chosen to
interconnect the KAT/KPA-500 with my IC-7300. There are many options for
interconnecting the 7300 with this Elecraft power combo. There also many
opinions on the various wiring approaches. A couple of the main issues that
I have seen discussed include:



Tuning power provided by the IC-7300 Elecraft suggests that the Tuner
behaves best when it gets at least 20 Watts of RF power from the
Transmitter. That would suggest that the use of the TUNE button on the 7300
may not be the best approach. I have found that this works quite well. I
have also seen some test data that shows that there is little difference in
the Tuners behavior when getting 10 Watts or 20 Watts.Need for BAND Data
being sent to the KPA-500 The Elecraft design makes it very easy to
interface with any Radio. It is possible to use just the RF into the Tuner
to get the Tuner and Amp configured properly. I prefer to send the BAND
data from the 7300 to the KPA-500 amplifier. I just feel better knowing
that the Amp knows what is coming, when I key up the Transmitter.



Wiring Interconnections




The following diagram shows my overkill approach for connecting the IC-7300
to the KPA/KAT-500. This allows me to use the 7300 TUNE button or the TUNE
button on the Elecraft KAT-500 Tuner Utility when I want to Tune to a
frequency.



Connection Diagram for using the IC-7300 with the Elecraft KPA-500 and
KAT-500




Details for each of the cables are provided below







Monitoring the Setup While Operating




Elecraft provides two very nice software Utilities for monitoring and
configuring the KAT-500 and the KPA-500. I always keep these open on my PC
desktop when operating. It allows me to hit the TUNE button, change
configurations, or monitor Power and SWR without looking at the front
panels of the equipment. Below is a screenshot of each of the utilities: