Basic Amateur Radio Morse Code
Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of the inventors of the telegraph. It is a method still used in telecommunications to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations. The complete International Morse Code encodes the 26 basic Latin letters A through Z, the Arabic numerals, and a set of punctuation and procedural prosigns. There is no distinction between upper and lower-case letters. These characters are represented by a series of dots and dashes or labeled as dits (short sound) and dahs (long sound.) The dit is the basic unit of time measurement and is 1/3rd the length of a dah. Each dit or dah within an encoded character is followed by a period of signal absence called a space, which is equal to the dit duration. The letters of a word are separated by a space of duration equal to three dits, and words are separated by a space equal to seven dits. With that out of the way…
In 1979 I received a novice license, callsign KA8IKJ. At first, I really didn’t do that much with the license. I did attempt to do CW. I even built a Heathkit CW rig with which I used a JJ-38 straight key. Later on, I built the above Heathkit HD-1410 Electronic Iambic Keyer. In the early 80s while I was at the Dayton Hamvention, I came across a fellow's booth where he was selling hand-built paddle keys.
His paddle keys had an oval silver label with black letters. The sticker on the one I bought soon peeled off. It said something like ScottKey. These keys looked very similar to the BENCHER Keys. This thing was solid as a rock and weighed about 3 lbs. a lot for its size. It had very positive smooth action, was rather comfortable, and was not springy or spongy. And it didn’t move around on the table as I used it. Well, in 2014 when I lost my job, I was a bit short of money. So, I sold a bunch of stuff on eBay, one of these things was the CW rig, the Heathkit HD-1410 Electronic Keyer, and the ScottKey. To this day I regret selling this key as well as the keyer. Here we are in the early 2020s and I’ve decided to attempt CW … again?
The Vintage March R-3A, A gorgeous key ... for a whapping $450! Yes, I do wanted to try the CW thing again. So,
This whole thing started, or rather, restarted when I found an old homemade iambic keyer on the last day of the 2022 Hamvention. The flea market was almost cleared out because most of the vendors had already left. There on the ground in a pile of junk was this small project box thing. After I got it home, I realized what it was. While doing some fiddling and retrofitted a wall wart, I got the thing to work. It sat around for about 5 months when I started lamenting selling the ScottKey. OK, so, let’s get another paddle key. I looked around on the web and found to my horror that used keys that are any good go for premium prices. I then asked myself, why not replicate the ScottKey key – with a few … modifications. I then decided to take it upon myself to build my own adjustable key. This would be my first major machining project.
So, what the heck. Let’s get started. I have both a Harbor Freight (SIG) mini lathe and mini mill. I used these things to make small parts for various woodworking projects as well as my magnetic loop antennas. With a bunch of scrap and a little ingenuity…
A few guesses at measurements, a bit of design work and a borrowed idea.
Getting there…
Now it's almost complete. Instead of a spring, I used magnets. I got inspiration for my key from both the ScottKey as well as the March R3-A key. So now, how do I send and receive CW? There’s this big fellow standing at a bus stop in New York City holding on to a big fiddle case at his side, when a little guy wakes up to him, taps him on the arm and asks, “Hey, how do you get to Carnegie Hall?” The big guy looks down at him annoyed and says, “Practice buddy, practice.” The best way I found to learn the code was using the Farnsworth method: listen to each character at 18 to 20 WPM with a 5 WPM spacing between characters. In general, what this does is keep the character speed up to what many people would send, but it extends the time between characters giving more time for recognition.
Weight: 2 lbs 6 oz. OK… Why am I messing around with this archaic di-dah language. Aren’t we in a highly technical era? I mean after all; we have literally countless ways and paths of communication. Why di-da-dit? Couldn't this question also be applied to all of ham radio? It could also be argued that technology can synthetically generating humans played music. We can now accurately store samples of famous and valuable instruments. Then we can compose music using a PC. Why would a person study and practice their whole life to master, say, a Stradivarius violin? Because humans make the best live sound from real instruments. And, they will always do so. It’s there and we can and want to. It’s the human thing to do. The same is true for Morse Code. It’s there and we want to. Besides, there may be countless methods of communication. But there are only two conduits available to the average person, that being relatively vulnerable fiber optic or cable land lines and a cell tower connected by said fiber optic or cable land lines. I’m sure you’ve heard the story of prisoners behind enemy lines constructing transmitters using wire, chewing gum wrappers, and a battery. All be it one way, their method of communication was CW. Many radical intellectuals say we are in the postmodernist era where there is this need for human kind to revert back to the simplistic. I strongly disagree. Also, amateur radio is not primitive, rather it promotes state of the art technology and has been on the forefront of much of our present day technologies. Yes, I want to learn the first form of wired/wireless communications not because of postmodernism, rather because it’s there and I can; and it’s another aspect of ham radio that’s a really neat thing to do.
The Controversy Surrounding Iambic Keying: See: morsex.com/pubs/iambicmyth.pdf. I myself still like this method of keying. One doesn't have to use this method exclusively. Contrary to the nay-sayers, ham radio is fun, interesting, and full of options. I wish to learn to use many types of keys. P. S. I facetiously use the term postmodernism to describe what some thinkers believe is an intellectual stance or mode of discourse defined by an attitude of skepticism toward the so-called grand narratives associated with modernism, meaning opposition to notions of knowledge and certainty or the stability of meaning, and emphasis on the role of ideology in maintaining systems of socio-political and economic power. In other words, relativism and socialism is the antidote to modernist certainty.
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