After about 15 or so CW QSO’s, I am really starting to enjoy this. 15 sure doesn’t add up to one a night, but its more than I thought I would ever do. Jay and I are still practicing every now and then. When Brad is not busy with work, he tries to join up as well. But, back to the story…I had talked to Brad several weeks ago about what I was doing. At first I mentioned it to him when he came by the house to help me hang the G5RV supports back in October. Mind you, I did not even have a radio yet, but I expressed my interest of relearning the code and actually trying to use it. He said it was always something he wanted to do, but nobody else was interested at the time.
When I finally got the radio in November, I bought a Bencher paddle with it, as well as a Bencher straight key. I already had a cheap Ameco key, but was not satisfied with it. I had never used a paddle before, but had read how much easier it was to use. Now if I was going to stick with this, then I needed easy. Once I had the radio and paddle, I hooked it up and tried it out. I will say this, if you have any desire to use CW and to become proficient, then by all means get a paddle. Not that a straight key is not fine, but for me the paddle made life a whole lot easier. And it made it a little less frustrating. Jay started out with a key and I begged and pleaded for him to get a paddle. Not only is it easier for the sender, its also easier for the receiver. The dits and dahs are a constant length and its just one less thing to think about while you are sending, especially if you’re new to it. Once Jay got his paddle, his sending improved dramatically.
Now that Jay and I were set up, it was time to get to Brad. Instead of waiting for Brad to buy a key (it seems Santa didn’t have one for him on Christmas day), I figured I would give him my Ameco key. If he wanted anything fancier than thet, then he would have to buy it. He was in town a while back to deliver and help install a G5RV for Jay. So, I slipped it in his truck. Several days later, Brad and I were on air practicing. I was absolutely amazed. Brad learned CW years ago and got up to 13 wpm for his General exam. He has never used it since. And here he was, sending and receiving at about 10 wpm. How he retained all of that over the years is a mystery to me. About 10 minutes or so into, I got to giggling so bad, I had to call him on the phone. Brad was now hooked. He had changed his avatar on the forums to CW Forever.
Jay and Brad practiced a few times with success, as well as Brad and I. We have yet to have a 3 person QSO, but it will happen soon enough. I figured our best shot was to designate an order to transmit just to make it a little easier.
Personally, I have seem my skill improve a lot. Usually when Jay and I practice, I ask him to crank it up to 15 wpm. The first time he did, he had me switch to SSB because he couldn’t believe he was sending and I was copying at such break-neck speed. Amazingly, Jay sends better at 15 wpm than at 10 wpm. During our last practice session, he proclaimed he could not copy at 15 wpm. So, during a band change, I secretly increased from 12 wpm to 15 wpm. After a couple of minutes I went up to 16. He copied everything 100%. I then congratulated him on successfully copying at 16 wpm. He said at first, he couldn’t tell I increased the speed. He didn’t know it until I went to 16. It just goes to show that the mind is capable of more than what you think it is. Also during this session, I decided to practice head copy. To me, when I can carry on a CW QSO without writing anything down, I will have arrived. At 10 – 15 wpm, it is not that easy. You have to retain the last letters while you continue to build the word in your head. I imagine as I improve and the speed gets a little higher, I will start to hear words instead of letters. This will make head copy a reality for me. But, for about 30 minutes, I managed to copy most everything without pen and paper. That was really amazing to me and I look forward to continuing to work on it.
My latest venture is into QRP CW. Although I am sure the QRP part will warrant another article, I felt it worth mentioning it here. I have ordered a NorCal 40A CW tranceiver kit from Wilderness radio. I hope to take this radio along on some outings and try my hand at QRP. I haven’t done much 40 meter CW, I tend to stay on 80. So it will be a new experience.
