Review update, 8/23/23:
I spoke with a power supply engineer that I’ve known for years. He advised that a properly designed DC switching supply should not “bounce on the way down”, but its DC output should degrade smoothly to zero Volts w/o a “ringing bounce”, and that this kind of bouncing is not good for anything in the “on position” that may still be connected to it. With regret, I returned the Jesverty 50A supply for a refund. Amazon was good to its word and processed the refund because I did the return in the initial 30 day ownership period. So, while the supply works great when powering up and staying powered (even when sourcing very high current demands), this shutdown anomaly is enough reason to return it. Sorry, This removes one more star from my rating.
Original review:
I had a Motorola TPN-1154A linear regulated supply as my main ham station source of DC Voltage. Moto designed this supply to regulate at 14.5VDC with up to a 15A continuous draw (20A on surges) with minimal change in its regulated, nominal Voltage output. I had used this supply for over two decades without incident.
Since I monitor its Voltage with a small DMM module, I recently noticed the Moto supply’s output had climbed to 14.9VDC with no load. Most 12VDC devices do not like being fed with DC Voltages much above 15 Volts, so I felt uncomfortable with this recent development and didn’t want my nominal Voltage to climb much higher.
After much searching at the ham stores and on Amazon, I decided to purchase the Jesverty SPS-5011 to be my new ham station supply. I have owned a number of linear supplies over the years I’ve been a ham as well as switchers from Icom and MFJ and even a generic LED light string 12V/30A switcher I bought to power an IC-706 radio. Some switchers are better than others. Most regulate their output Voltage quite well. Some, like my generic unit can be a bit noisy with switching regulator noise. The Jesverty SPS-5011 is certainly one of the quieter switcher supplies I’ve owned.
With its dual metering, switchable fixed 13.8VDC versus 9-15VDC adjustable modes, noise movement control (moves the AC chopper frequency to move “birdies” around), and great current sourcing capability (along with the expected good Voltage regulation, I am very happy with its features and performance.
Since I like to power down my ham station by switching off an AC outlet strip that the Jesverty is plugged into, I have noticed one thing I do NOT like. This single “nit” is that unlike the predictable drop of a linear supply’s decaying DC output, and not like a similar drop in output when AC is removed from my Icom, MFJ, and even the 12V/30A generic supply…the Jesverty’s DC output “rings” as it decays.
By this I mean that the DC output does not drop as a somewhat steady decay when AC is removed (even by switching the Jesverty “off” with its front panel power switch) but it actually “bounces on the way down to zero Volts output”. One can see this with the Jesverty’s panel lamps turning off and on several times before finally going out completely. I can also hear some popping in my amplified speakers as this Voltage bounces during its ultimate decay to being totally “off”.
I’m not sure whether or not this is harmful to any of my equipment, so I do try to always FIRST turn off my radios before “throwing the big switch” on the AC strip. Since some of the radios do not have a hard, cold “off” mode (some parts of their circuitry is always drawing a bit of current when DC is present on their power cables, and they simply do a soft start when their power switches are depressed) I do have some minor concerns about this bouncy “on to off” transition behavior.
This is not so much a concern for me, however, that I feel I need to return this power supply. The other capabilities this Jesverty 50A supply has, for me, far outweigh this minor concern.
BTW, I diagnosed and repaired the Moto supply’s creeping regulated DC Voltage issue and even changed some of its “select in manufacturing” resistor values in it to recenter its own DC output to exactly 13.8VDC…but I’m keeping the Jesverty SPS-5011 anyway. I’m that happy with it and feel it’s that good of a purchase (unless it dies due to infant mortality).
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