The K2 is an great radio.  Don't be intimidated by the complexity of the construction because, as you've noticed, the instructions are excellent.  Also, the help available on the official Elecraft e-mail reflector and from Elecraft tech-support is tops.

Building a rig of your own is extremely satisfying, and the Elecraft K2 gives you the opportunity without forcing you to sacrifice quality and features for home building (ARRL tests indicated that the K2's receiver is easily on par with radios costing thousands of dollars).  Plus, you'll be able to repair the radio yourself should the need arise in the future, and you can make modifications yourself if you desire (the official site has several modifications that are very easy to implement).

Just a few hints, though:

If you've never tackled a project before, or don't have much practice soldering, get yourself a cheap kit from Ten-Tec or MFJ and hone your skills on that.  Practice making quick, clean solder joints (a good iron helps tremendously in this area).  The K2 features quality, plated-through holes, so the goal is not to create a mound of solder but to add just enough solder to fill in the hole.  If all else fails, get yourself some PC boards and bits of wire from Radio Shack and practice on that.  Also, practice desoldering.  The goal is to remove the part without damaging the board and leaving as little solder as possible on the obard.

When you get your kit, catalog all parts to make sure that they're all there.

Read the instructions carefully, examine the part placement carefully, and verify that you have installed the correct part in the correct position before AND after soldering!  A magnifying glass will be a big aid in identifying parts with small markings.  After soldering and before cutting the component leads, inspect your soldering job to ensure that it is sound.  I used a jewlers magnifying glass and closely inspected all my work.

Don't rush.  I'll repeat that since it's important.  Don't rush.  If you start getting tired then it's time to pack it up for the night.  You can make some amazingly stupid mistakes when you're tired.

It is more than possible for a newbie to successfully build the K2.  Keep in mind, though, that it is a complex project involving hundreds of parts.  Just take your time, do a careful job, and you'll end up with a top-notch rig that will serve your for years to come.

Good luck!

I'm pretty much in the same boat as you, but there is a danger of "nickle and diming" yourself to death trying to make hairbrained antenna schemes work.  I've tried one or two and each time the results have been disappointing.

That said, there is an article in the January 2001 QST on how to build a portable antenna for 10 through 40 meters.  It's a well written article and the antenna design seems sound (it uses an innovative ground system) so you may want to look into that.  One caveate about a portable antennna: unless you're planning on leaving it "permanently" mounted you will spend quite a bit of time setting it up and tearing it down every time you want to operate.  This can really take the enjoyment out of ham radio and makes casual operating a pain in the neck.  There's nothing like the convience of being able to sit down, switch on the rig, and start playing radio.

Another idea for a more permanent solution is something called a Droopy Loop (another QST antenna article, but I can't remember what issue).  Basically, it's a loop antenna that sort of droops over the roof of your house.  You secure the antenna at the corners of your roof and run some twinlead into your shack.  Its low profile makes it virtually invisible and will not raise the ire of deed-restriction conscious neighbors.  Of course, you'll have to run conservative power if you don't want to cook your family.

If all else fails, get yourself a good mobile antenna and mount it to your car.  Then whenever you want to operate just pull your car out to the driveway and run some coax to your shack.  The neighbors would be none the wiser and nobody is going to complain about an antenna on your car!

Whatever you do, make sure your idea is sound before investing time and money into something that will either not work or will not work to your satisfaction.

You mounted a glass mount antenna OVER your rear-window defogging wires?  That alone is what increased your SWR since some of your RF was getting coupled into the wires.  You're fortunate to not have smoked your car's electrical system!  I guess you realize that by scraping off a protion of the grid you have effectively "broken" your rear-window defogger, unless of course it didn't work in the first place then never mind.

I've read that cellular phone shops can check auto glass with an ohm meter to see if it is suitable for a glass mounted antenna.  I was wondering if home equipment could be pressed into service for such a test.  For example, is it possible to use a common digital multimeter, with some modifications perhaps, to check the resistance through auto glass?

I just spent the weekend installing a Yaesu FT-1500 in my 2000 Toyota Echo, so I'll just relate some of my experiences and maybe that will help you.

1) When locating the radio in the cabin I chose a mounting location that was out of site of a casual observer.  I'd hate for my radio to be an invintation for someone to break into my car.  That's one of the reasons I stayed away from mounting it on top of the dash board.  The other reason is that I didn't want the radio to get cooked to death on a hot summer day.  My location of choice was below the dash board just to the left of the steering wheel.  

If you choose a similiar location be sure to check for levers or fuse box doors before mounting your rig.  I wasn't so mindful and I found that I had left only milimeters to spare for my trunk release lever.  I had left just barely enough room for the lever to move so I don't have to relocate my radio so I was lucky, but a bit more room would be nice.

2) Getting power to your rig could be one of the toughest parts of mobile installation.  First of all, a direct connect to the battery is the very best source of power you can find.  Cigarette lighters make poor choices as they often do not have adequate grounding and generally can not support the current demands of a 50 watt mobile radio.  A direct connection to the battery will also protect your radio from voltage fluctions.

Be sure to fuse both power leads at the battery to protect your car and your radio.  My Yaesu FT-1500 has 15 amp fast-blow fuses in both the power leads and an additional fuse on the positive lead at the radio.  Make sure the voltage of your electrical system does not exceed the specifications of your radio.  A quick check with a voltmeter while revving the engine is in order.  My car puts out 14 volts and so is below the rated 15.2 volt limit for the radio.

When running leads you have two choices: use an existing hole or drill a new one.  If you're lucky then there will a spare hole or two in the firewall behind the dashboard.  I've read that running the power leads through the same hole as the car's main wiring harness is not a good idea because stray RF can get into your vehicle's electrical system.  However, this was my only choice as there were no spare holes and drilling a new hole was simply impractical (there was barely enough room behind my dash for my arm let alone a drill!)  I can report that I have had no problems with engine noise in the receiver and my car's electrical system is unaffected even when I'm transmitting 50 watts.  However, your mileage may vary.

3) I'm using an MFJ quarter-wave mini-mag mount as my antenna right now, but I plan to purchase a Larsen glass-mount sometime in the coming year.  While I've read that a permanent threaded mount offers the best performance and convience I am trying to avoide drilling holes in my car.  However, if that is the route I chose I'd have it professionally done since I would not want to risk screwing up that job.

Incidentally, there is part one of an artile in the January 2001 QST about mobile installations in the "Radios To Go" column.  Best of luck!

73, KL0PE

It certainly does!  Thank you for your comments.

Thanks for the reply!  Once the weather clears up (spring?) I'll start making plans to get an antenna up.  I would like some clarifications on a few things, though:

"...either by grounding the center tap of a balun transformer or connecting each side to ground with a 10K ohm power resistor."

Could you go into a bit more detail on this please?  And when you say DC ground, I assume that doesn't mean the center prong in a three prong wall socket.

Thanks,
KL0PE

O.K., here's my situation:  I live in a basement apartment at the bottom of a three story building.  I have an Elecraft K2 QRP transceiver with an internal antenna tuner.  I have tried various hairbrained schemes of constructing indoor antennas (latest venture was about 8 feet of drier hose hung above the windows as a shortened coil antenna; the XYL does not approve of the asthetics) but ultimately my results have been disappointing.

Encouraged by the wife to get the antenna out of the house (she's wary of RF radiation despite my insurances that QRP levels are perfectly safe at HF) I have started toying with the idea of constructing some sort of exterior antenna that could be installed at the top of the three story apartment building.

While there are some trees available outside of my building, I am hesitant to install anything that could be easily visible to the other tenants (my St. Louis Verticle got some very strange looks the one time I tried it!)  Two ideas I've considered (the roof of my building is flat): 1) A loop of wire encircling the perimeter of the roof.  This would give me a loop of about 40' square; 2) A dipole of some kind laid across the roof, either along one of the edges or perhaps laid diagnolly from corner to corner or even "folded" around the roof perimeter.  Which of these would offer the most acceptable results given my circumstances, or is there another alternative that I haven't considered?

As for feeding a roof top antenna, I plan on using either open ladder line or 300 Ohm TV twinlead.  However, my only concern is routing the feedline over the aluminum gutter.  Will this cause any problems using unshielded cable?

Another concern is lightning safety.  While I am familiar with the basics of using ground rods and copper braided strap as a lightning shunt, I'm not sure how exactly to ground antennas like the ones I've described.  I'm guessing that I just hook the feedline up to the copper strap while the radio is not in use, but I'm really not sure.

If there's anybody that can answer some or all of my questions I would be extremely grateful.

73, KL0PE

You can get both these items, the cable and the software, from Yaesu for what I consider a reasonable price.

Now getting a schematic of the cable may be easier to come by unless Yaesu considers it proprietary information.  As for the software, you can get it without the cable from RT Systems (the software designers) for a discounted price

Or were just expecting someone to illegally "give" you a copy of the software?  Not to be a jerk, but that is stealing.