Powermax PM4-100 questions

[Cutlass327]

Ok, I bought it on eBay, was a scratch-and-dent item. Looks more like it was a display item.. When they shipped it, it was just in a USPS Priority mail box, so the fan, being externally mounted, was broken. New fan on it, and it is up and running...

Is it supposed to be warm when nothing connected to it is turned on? The fan cycles every so often even when all loads are off.

At idle it is at 13.0V. When I key up at full power I see it drop into the 12s, sometimes it will kick output up to 13.6 or so, but not often. Is this normal?

Should I have this connected to a battery, too? It is called a power converter/battery charger.

https://powermaxconverters.com/product/pm4-series-2/

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

Make sure it's not in battery charger mode. There is a switch on the side I saw it in the manual let me see if I can find it.

 

[543_Dallas]

The voltage fluctuation is normal. I believe there's something in the manual about that. It doesn't have to be connected to a battery. I don't remember if mine got warm with no load or how often the fan cycled. I didn't use it long because of the receiver noise it caused. No one else seems to have that problem so maybe I got a lemon. This is the first I've heard about the mode switch so maybe that was my problem.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

This is the pm3 I think they are the same.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

I just bought one it should be here Thursday. I will let you all know how it turns out.

 

[Shadetree Mechanic]

The voltage fluctuation is normal. I believe there's something in the manual about that. It doesn't have to be connected to a battery. I don't remember if mine got warm with no load or how often the fan cycled. I didn't use it long because of the receiver noise it caused. No one else seems to have that problem so maybe I got a lemon. This is the first I've heard about the mode switch so maybe that was my problem.

Did it make noise on a particular band or was it noise on everything?

 

[543_Dallas]

Did it make noise on a particular band or was it noise on everything?

I was only using 11m at the time. It's been several years but I want to say the hash from it was about an s3. My typical noise level was around S1.

 

[Cutlass327]

I have no noise from it. There isn't any switch on it, either. I emailed about getting a manual, but they never replied.

 

[Tallman]

Will this help?

 

[Cutlass327]

Will this help?

Perfect! Thank you!

 

[Eldorado828]

I use a couple of the pm-3's and they work well but they do cycle often. Sometimes when you put a load on them they get confused as to what they want to jump up to on the voltage if that makes sense. They are pretty clean with no birdies and being a couple of years old they hold up pretty well too. I believe the newer pm-4 you can change where it'll float and all that good stuff but not on the pm3.