Need Help Identifying Specs on Elecraft K3 Ham Radio Transceiver

Hello,

I bought this Elecraft K3 a few weeks ago and (as I’m not a Ham radio guy) I can’t really tell what the specs are on it. It looks to have a bunch of upgraded bits (per all the PCB photos) but I can’t make heads or tails of them.

If you don’t mind, would you please just give me a brief description of this item, along with the added bits? I would greatly appreciate it!

For example, here’s a description of a K3 on ebay. I don’t know what any of these things mean!

Elecraft K3S/100 High Perf 160-6m Transceiver KPA100 # 10077 100 Watts TUNER
100 watts

Tuner

2.7 SSB Filter

KSYN3A SYN Board
KIO3B USB/Soundcard

KXV3B Preamp I/O

Gold pins

Thank you!

-Henry






paging @Team_Amateur_Radio

I’m not an Elecraft owner, so someone could come along with better info. But here is what I find reasonably easily about the installed options.

The Elecraft K3 amateur radio transceivers are generally popular with amateur operators who participate in contests. Elecraft has a legacy of being a kit radio company, and that still shows to an extent on the K3, in that while no true solder it up yourself version exists as pretty much every board has surface mount components, you could still buy it as a chassis and a set of boards to install. And the features could be fine tuned by which boards you elected to order and install, and what upgrades you put in later. That said, some of these cards might even be in the base spec, and simply on cards to allow later redesign and upgrade, like the KSYN3 card. If you are trying to sort out value, (and if my memory is correct) one if the bigger questions is if it only has the base 10W RF power amplifier, or if it has the 100W RF power amplifier that is pretty standard in all its competitors.

KBPF3 General receive card - this allows the unit to listen to signals outside the amateur radio bands

Filters 2.8kHz, 6kHz, and FM IF filters installed. These allow for different widths of RF signals to be passed to the demodulator, based on what type of signal is being received, and how much adjacent signal you are trying to reject.

KRMXR, is an RF mixer, it looks like it is usually associated with the noise blanker card. These radios are sometimes equipped for Morse code only, so this could be a required upgrade for Single Side Band voice operation, or it might have been in the base spec.

The K3REF appears to be standard crystal frequency, and appears to be part of the base spec.

The KSYN3 rev A is the original frequency synthesizer card. The KSYN3A is a newer one that is more desirable.

1 Like

Thanks so much!
So, how do I go about seeing whether the amplifier has been upgraded? I did buy an external amp, although I know pretty much nothing about it. I’ll attach photos.

That being said, what would a unit like this sell for?
Should I not mention the KSYN3 rev A, or the K3REF, since they are stock units?

Any help at all is appreciated!

-henry





From this manual:

It generally looks like this without the 100W option:

And with the 100 Watt output you will have heat sinks like this:

If you acquired the 30 watt amplifier in the same lot, it seems likely it does not have the 100 Watt amplifier internal.

If it is the 10W unit, here is a completed sale on a K3 with the 10W for just under $1000.

I realized I probably should clarify that a low end Elecraft is still good money. It just isn’t the $1600 it could be with the 100W RF amplifier, or the $3K plus that a very well optioned unit could bring.

Thanks so much!
So I opened it up and got better photos. It looks like it does have the 100W unit, right?
Also, is there anything I’m missing?
If you were going to list this unit, what would you include in the description?
Thank you!
-henry





So yes, that does have the 100 watt RF amplifier. That is often listed as a K3\100. Looking through the completed listings, it does look like a lot of the higher completed prices have more options, but this could be $1200, maybe more to the right buyer. Certainly list the filters that are in it, and I think the KIO3 option as well. Not sure which other ones that you have add value.