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Date: Thu, 08 Nov 2001 10:12:43 -0800
From: Wayne Burdick <n6kr at elecraft.com>
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] Name

Jim Belt wrote:
> 
> I'm always interested in why things are named what they are. Why K2 for
> instance and why was it the first product and not the second. Was it named
> after K2, the mountain? We could say that it made and built to a higher
> standard:)


Hi Jim,

We wanted to offer a high-end QRP kit as our first product. But we also
wanted to name it in such a way that we could add transceiver products
above and below it.

We introduced the K2 concept in front of a packed audience at Pacificon
one year. Having designed the Sierra and spawned something of a rash of
rigs named for mountain ranges (by NorCal and other QRP groups), I swore
that I'd never name another rig after a mountain. So Eric and I
suggested naming our new rig after the millennium: the Elecraft "2K".
Since this was a QRP crowd, the irony was not lost on them--that's the
model number of a famous high-power linear amplifier! So we said, "OK,
let's reverse the characters--K2. OOPS, another mountain...."

FYI, there is also a mountain named "K1" (etc.). It happens to be the
23rd-highest mountain in the world. (K2 is the second tallest, but the
hardest to climb  ;)

The names the locals use for K1 and K2 are not pronounceable, and won't
fit on the front panels. 

73,
Wayne
N6KR

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