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Power Supply Needed for Texas Star Amps??

lrz50

lrz50

CQ 1-5-50 Arizona
May 8, 2014
20
49
23
Arizona/in the valley
Are the Texas Star amps drawing the amps, as the specs say they are? Dx-350HD 30a, Dx-500 45a I was going to buy Dx-350HD, but I would have to by a new 35-40amp power supply just for the Dx-350HD and bigger for the Dx-500. Ameritron 600 and 800 watt amps, only need 25 amp power supplies. Why does a 200-250 watt amp need 30a. I just bought a new 25a power supply a year ago and it powers every thing on my radio table, CB radio, 100w amp, SW radios all on at the same time, no problem. Does anyone run a Texas Star for a base amp, what do you use.(n)
 

I used to run a TS DX500v from the shack and powered it with an Astron 75 amp power supply. Not cheap, but it provided plenty of current with sufficient headroom to power the DX-500v without any problems. IIRC, I would see a current draw of between 40-45 amps on the front meter, at full output.

This was a good setup, as I worked my old friend 979 on the DX Tour, between Maine and Virginia, and all points in between, via groundwave, from my QTH in SE Pennsylvania. YMMV
 
My general rule of thumb on power supplies for amplifiers has always been, you will need at least 10 amps @13.8v per 100 watts, so a Texas Star 350 will need a 35A supply to be safe. This takes into effect resistive heat losses over the RF power being generated.
 
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I've used the powermax converter chargers for the 350 and 500 before and worked like a charm. The powermax boxes come in various flavors of amperage so pick your poison at a lesser cost than some of the other supplies.
 
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I checked out the power-max's on Amazon, great prices. Prices range from $98.00 for a 35a to $150.00 for a 100a. I might go with the 55a, that way it would handle ether the dx-350HD or the dx-500v Thanks for the info 828(y)
 
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PA770 said:
MegaWatt 30/33 power my TS350 just fine.. (y)
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I'm using that megawatt for my at-6666 now and it's been impressive so far but I don't pull a heavy amperage so I can't say from experience how it would do with the ts. For my needs it's done well. I've got a tin man 2.0b that I'll be putting in line soon but I think I'll go back to the powermax because I know that one will power it well. Many choices, all depends on how much of an extra current pillow you want or if you have a bigger box in the future. All good suggestions I have think.
 
The transistors in the Ameritron amplifier run from 50 Volts DC.

Not twelve.

This means that they put out four times the RF wattage per Amp of DC power-supply current.

The Ameritron draws 25 Amps to put out the same RF power you would need 100 Amps to get from a 12-Volt design like a Texas Star.

73
 
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lrz50 said:
Why does a 200-250 watt amp need 30a.
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Ohms law. 13 volts and 30 amps input power 13x30= 390 watts. Now remember that efficiency will be around 60% at best, so 390 x .6 = 234 watts. Where is gets tricky is when we start looking at PEP wattage. The above math is only good if you're using an average reading watt meter.

dave457 said:
Why not get a server power supply, can be had for about $20.0 , 62 amp and can do an easy mod to get 12.8-12.9v
Click to expand...

Ditto. I have 200+ amps of server power supply that I didn't pay much over $100 for. They will run a 16 pill and jump start a Kawasaki. :D
 
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