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write your own review of the Ameritron AL-811.
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K0ZN
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Rating: 4/5
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Jun 17, 2009 23:31
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A good basic amplifier
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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This is an initial review of the AL-811. I will do a follow up in 6 months or so. I purchased this amplifier as a back up to a legal limit amp I have which has indirectly heated cathodes with the attendant time delay when you turn it on. For casual operation, I wanted an amp that was essentially instant on, which this amp is with the 811A tubes. I also did not want to fire up an expensive pair of air cooled cermaic tubes just to rag chew for fun. I work mostly CW and have found that 300 to 400 watts output is usually more than plenty for casual operation. Initial casual DX chasing has proven that the 350 watt level where I run the amp is very effective; if I can hear them, I can work them and that does NOT always happen at 100 W.
The Good news:
So far, after about one month, the operation of the little AL-811 has been flawless. It is easy to tune and takes less drive than I expected. i.e. it has pretty decent gain for an 811A amp. It is surprisingly quiet... you almost wonder if the fan is big enough. I have made a couple of careless mistakes with the exciter settings (which I caught immediately, fortunately) and the AL-811 seems to have handled the mistakes OK. The fit and finish on the unit and front panel are very good for this price class. The cover comes off easily and reinstalls easily; the screw holes all lined up well. I thought it was well packed and they had reasonable packing around the tubes.
Operationally, >> SO FAR << I am quite happy with it. I do not push it hard and have no intention of doing so; there is no point in flogging it at this power level. If a station can't hear you at 300 W they certainly won't hear you at 400!! 811A's have a plate dissipation of about 65 watts, so 100 W output per tube (assuming 65% efficiency, which is typical) is about as hard as you really want to run them on CW if you want to stay on the conservative side. SSB is a lower duty cycle, so you can go a little harder. The owner's manual seems to be basic but adequate. I understand the 3 tube amp uses the same power supply as the 4 tube, so that is a bit of "reserve" for the 3 holes I would think.
The BAD news.
Based on what I have seen with other MFJ/Ameritron producsts, you
ABSOLUTELY >> MUST << go through any new unit with a fine tooth comb and do a "Quality Control check". Ameritron designs a decent product in the price range, but it is utterly beyond me why their management can't comprehend that they are shooting themselves in the foot with poor QC. To wit: with this unit I found a couple of things that *could* have been very damaging. (1). I found a couple of tiny solder balls/splashes in between the circuit paths on a couple of the power supply diodes; not good. I am sure the unit passed initial operation tests ( I HOPE they do that !!!), but these were an arc/short looking for a place to happen...and possibly would have killed some diodes. (2). I found one of the meter leads almost touching the tank coil. That CAN'T be good....so I repositioned it. (3.) I found two HV powersupply wires not really well positioned for HV lines and I repositioned those. These are little things but CAN be a cause of a failure and/or a warranty claim. I found one screw totally loose (fortuantely, it was a non-critical, mechanical fastener). Several screws were clearly not adequately torqued down and some of these were component grounding screws. It took me less than 10 minutes to find and correct these items. Again, it is beyond me why MFJ/Ameritron's management cannot comprehend the great benefits they would receive by looking for and catching these little things at the factory. There is no question it would cut their warranty costs and generate a ton of customer satisfaction/positive word of mouth advertising....instead, they threads like this! About the only design aspect that I did not really care for was the fact that the three tubes are in line and the cooling air *probably* is not as effective/cool by the time it gets to the 3rd tube. Operated properly and with in specifications, it appears to be a good medium power amplifier.
Bottomline: It is a good basic amplifier and (so far) operates very well and gives a useful boost over a 100 W signal. I WANTED to give it a 5 out of 5, but I just can't when the customer has to do the final Quality Control check !! ...so a 4 out of 5.
73, K0ZN
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OE3SGU
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Rating: 5/5
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Mar 2, 2009 11:11
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all you may need to work DX
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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The amp works fine, giving me an easy 400-600 Watts out on all bands which is more than enough for our 400 W legal limit here in OE. Thats all you may ever need to work DX and for the price you cant beat it. The valves are very cheap and easily replacable. I might install 572Bs to see if it makes a difference. Like the AL-80B and all other Ameritrion products I owned some time ago it is well finished. The only complaint I have are the shared inputs for 30/40, 15/17 and 12/10 meters but that is common on many amplifiers. I wouldn't hesitate to buy another one.
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WI7B
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Rating: 5/5
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Jan 16, 2009 12:58
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After Re-Work, Still Strong
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I still use it after 4.5 years. Re-tubed with Taylor 572Bs, still a linear 500W averaged on CW.
I had a slight detour for a while with the input and output relays. They burned out, twice. Cheap to fix, but after the second burn, the foil on the rear PCB delaminated. Not pretty. So, talked to Mike at the Ameritron factory and ordered a new rear PCB with installed components for about 20% of the price of the amp.
You can follow the 'adventure' of installing that board in the AL-811 here...
=> http://wi7b.org/newpcb.html
But now, it purrs like new.
73,
---* Ken
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KI6LO
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Rating: 3/5
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Nov 18, 2008 16:03
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Solid little amp for the price
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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Bought my 811 amp used about 18 months ago. Works just like advertised. Easy to tune. Have run both 572B and 811A tubes in it. Get a solid 600W on 80M to 500+ on 10M using a PEP reading wattmeter and two tone input on new set of Taylor 811A's.
One feature I really don't like is the shared input tuning circuit for 17M/15M and 12M/10M. I like to work both 17M and 15M so I had to split the SWR level between the 2 bands for my TS-940S to look into. 12/10 didn't really matter for now as I usually am only on 10M if open. How hard would it have been to add a couple more switch positions?
I have learned a good lesson about running RTTY. The manual says cut the power back to around 400W for RTTY. I guess I ran a few too many RTTY contests at max power cause I ate up a set of Chinese 572B's in about 12 months use. So now using 811A's and I turn the power back to 400W like the manual says. So far so good.
It ain't no ALPHA amp but then the tax on an ALPHA would pay for the AL-811.
Would I buy another one - probably, but depends on intended use. I would probably go for something in the 1 KW or higher class.
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K6VU
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Rating: 5/5
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Oct 17, 2008 05:30
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Better Than Expected!
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Time owned: 6 to 12 months
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I bought this amp slightly used on E-Bay about a year ago, to use until I made up my mind about buying a "real" amp. It puts out almost 700W, very clean on the scope, and has been very reliable, impressive for what most would call a "low end" amp. I now use the 811 with my old FT-101E setup and use a "new" 811H with my new 746ProII, and getting 870W from the "H" with 65W drive. Inexpensive to own & operate, you can re-valve the 811 for around $100, what's not to like?
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W4MJA
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Rating: 5/5
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Oct 12, 2008 16:30
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Good
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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I rescued this amplifier from a ham who has quite a reputation with amplifiers. I paid $325 for the amplifier, which made up for the basket of lies I had been told about the amps performance.
Upon inspection of the amplifier, it put out the most power it put out on any band was 440 watts, which was totally inexcusable. The filter capacitors needed to be replaced, and the IP/HV switch needed to be replaced.
After help from a fellow ham, we got the amplifier to do over 700 watts on a Bird.
It's not an Alpha or an Acom, but it all in all it works nice and gets the job done.
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K5RCR
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Rating: 5/5
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Oct 8, 2008 21:17
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Good first impression
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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I ordered the AL-811 about a week ago from AES and it arrived yesterday. I paid 719$ plus shipping. The amp arrived double boxed and each layer was padded with foam. There wasn't a scratch on the amp. The top cover was removed as per instructions and the tubes were found in their sockets and wrapped with foam. The tubes already had the plate caps installed. Tubes were unwrapped and secured in the sockets. Given several complaints about poor soldering, I went over the amp in some detail. While the solder joints were not beautiful, they were solid. The fuses were removed from the small bag, along with about a half-dozen extra cover screws and washers - a nice touch. Amp was powered up according to the manual and tuned up on each of the bands. Tuning is easy and not touchy at all.
I have had several qso's on 160 and 80 and got good reports with the amp loafing at 400 watts out on SSB.
So far, so good.
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KI4CRA
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Rating: 4/5
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Aug 14, 2008 14:51
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Decent amp
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Time owned: 0 to 3 months
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Got my AL-811 in a trade a couple of months ago,so this is a used amp and I knew it. Before the amp arrived I went ahead and ordered 3 new 911 tubes from Ameritron, I was going to put 3 new tubes in weather it needed it or not. Good thing I did, cause when the amp arrived it was only single boxed, suprised it came through at all. Well not only were two of the tubes broken (little metal caps on top broken off) but the board where the ceramic caps a soldered to the caps were broken off, in shipping no doubt. Well after another call to Ameritron ordered a new relay board with caps and all for $32. Well got everything ordered in tubes relay board. my plate current meter was dead, another call another order to Ameritron, got the meter in, got everything soldered back in. Powered up the amp, no output power. Checked and rechecked, ANOTHER call to Ameritron talked to one of their tech's and we spent the next half hour trouble shooting the amp came down to 2 wires one to the coil behind the grind current knob and another to the bandswitch, again probably due to the way it had been shipped.
Finally after all was said and done the amp now preforms flawlessly, with the new tubes and board, everything solderd in the way its supposed to be I easily get 600-650 watts on SSB. Good amplifier for the money, probably should have waited spent the extra on the AL-811H, but for an extra 200 watts probabl wouldn't make much difference.
Anyway, this amps a keeper, I'll run it till I can't get parts for it any longer, or it just gives up the ghost and dies on me. Even after all my troubles most of which were probably brought on by the way in which it was shipped, if the previous owner had taken the time and boxed it properly maybe none of this would have happened, then again maybe it would have. Still a good amp for the $125 I put into it.
73 de Mark
AI4HO
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K5DBX
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Rating: 5/5
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Jul 22, 2008 12:48
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Good product
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Time owned: more than 12 months
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The AL-811 is a very good value for the money. Yes, you can spend enormous money for amps that have very high build quality, and much more power, but for those who are looking for a good value in an amp, it would be hard to find a better one than Ameritron. I have re-tubed mine with the Svetlana 572B, (NOS from 1996 from RF parts branded and resold as 811H) with graphite plates. They have made this amp fairly bullet-proof, especially in the arena of digital and rtty. I can run this amp at 400+ watts all day long, (in digital) and ragchew at 600+ SSB and it has performed flawlessly.
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N4KC
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Rating: 5/5
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Apr 16, 2008 14:49
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Simple
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Time owned: 3 to 6 months
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Only been a ham 46 years and never had an amp before. I bought this one from a friend's estate when he went SK, so I knew it had received good treatment. Though it is at least 8 or 10 years old, it worked fine from the get-go...with one minor glitch. The T/R relay was not making after transmitting, leaving the antenna disconnected on receive. A bit of contact cleaner and it has worked fine since.
Also, don't be frightened by all the flak on how to tune one of these things up. Get a good wattmeter (MFJ makes a good peak-reading one, but don't use the peak setting when tuning! That is for SSB or CW.) and tune...with 20 watts or so of drive...for max power out while watching limits on PA and grid current. Re-touch with 40 or 45 watts drive, depending on how much compression and audio gain you run on SSB, and watch the wattmeter. Do it all quickly and make notes of the plate and load settings and your 811s will love you, even if they are cheap.
Seems to be a good entry-level, backup, or--in my case--go-to-when you-need-to amp. No, it won't handle full-break-in CW as is. No, it does not have a wattmeter. It is NOT a KW amp! But for the money, it is a workhorse. It seems mostly oblivious to reasonably high mismatches. Mine runs cool and the fan is quieter than I was led to believe it would be. And with as many in the field as there are, you know you would hear if there were any problems other than the ones caused by those who try to get the last watt out of one of these things before it fries. Or those nuts who spend fifteen minutes key-down (usually on top of DX) trying to tweak to the nth degree.
Don N4KC
www.n4kc.com
www.donkeith.com
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