Pyramid PS-14KX Power Supply Review
I purchased this power supply on eBay for $18 + $10 shipping about a year ago and used it for testing various CB and Export radios on the shop table.
Over the past couple of years I’ve owned Astron, Radio Shack and Tripp Lite power supplies so I definitely had a good range of power supplies to use for comparison.
The Pyramid Power supply is a reasonable size and you can find room for it on your shack table easily. The power supply is small enough that it doesn’t come equipped with a cooling fan, but even with heavy use I didn’t notice an undue amount of heat buildup.
The power supply features a regulated supply and 13.8 VDC output which I measured and it came in pretty close if just a little bit lower (I believe it should be adjustable inside as are most power supplies but I forgot to check).
I mostly ran radios with max draw of around 6-8 amps of pull at peak and the supply performed flawlessly. I never noticed any serious dimming issues or problems associated with insufficient power draw.
I did try running a combo of a President AX144 and KL203 off of this power supply (around 12 amp pull) and although the power supply seemed to handle it in the short term, you could definitely tell it was working hard to do so, there was noticeable dimming in the radio.
The power supply has a negative and positive post which have plastic screw on caps on them. You place your wires or connector on the metal portion of the post and tighten the plastic knob until it clamps down on the wire. Unless you have power cords going into U clips this is pretty much a useless system. I drilled a hole through the terminal posts so that I could easily put wires through and then tighten down on them as necessary. This made using the supply much easier for my purposes.
These power supplies have pretty good filtering, which I didn’t expect since they are cheaper than many of the other brands. While using this power supply I didn’t encounter any electrical interference issues and there was never any “hum” in the receive of any of the radios I tested.
Since these can be found for less than $30 in many cases they really are a good deal. Brand new they come with a factory warranty although I’ve talked to other people who own pyramid power supplies and only one of their supplies has ever needed to be sent back for warranty repair.
- PRODUCT FEATURES & SPECIFICATIONS
- Perfect for Home, Shop and Hobbyist
- Input: 115V AC, 60Hz, 270 Watts
- Output: 13.8V DC
- 12 AMP Constant/14 AMP Surge
- Powers Cellular Phones,12V DC CB Radios, Scanners, HAM Radios, Autosound Systems
- Screw Terminal Connectors
- Electronic Overload Protection w/ Auto Reset
- Short Circuit & Thermal Protection
- Fuse Protected
- LED Condition Indicators
- Heavy Duty Cabinet & Heatsink with Anti-Skid Rubber Feet
- Dimensions:7.87”L x 7.16”W x 4.72”H