Re: some questions about PLL
Reasons:
1) you exceeded the voltage tuning range that your charge pump/op amp can provide while maintaining lock
2) The VCO stopped oscillating at cold
3) Something is an intermittent contact, and it opens up cold (like a poor solder joint under the PLL chip)
4) the RF power into the PLL chip dips when cold, and the counter becomes unstable
5) some sort of oscillation in the op amp or voltage regulator cold (a long shot)
6) your reference frequency stops oscillating, or droops in power cold.