Thread: anyone here in the Straight Key Century Club?

Gasman,

Our QTHs are close enough that we should be able to easily have a chat (using straight keys) on 40m, even in the cruddy conditions we've had lately.

I'll be attending the ARRL Southwest Division Convention in Torrance, CA tomorrow; I wonder if the W1AW/6 special event station there will have a straight key available. Their portable tower and beam with fair-sized amp would probably work a lot better than my barefoot rig and 10 ft. high mag loop antenna... *sneaky grin*

What band/freq do you usually hang out on? I'll try to keep the rig tuned to that general area in the evenings and listen for your call.

Hey Jeff. Sense 8 drive truck im not always home. Soonest ill be on the air is monday night. Dont do much on 40m but i do have a rotatable dipole in the air at 45ft for 40m. 7.055 is standard if im on 40m. Ill try to be there monday eve sometime. Or im on 14.053 with a 3element SteppIR when i get the time. You can always shoot me a pm if you dont hear me then.

Thanks for the reply.

i've had my tech license for many years but I must admit I haven't even used that very much. Don't know why but I just couldn't much get into it. Probably because my circle is very small and no one there seems to be interested. My radio is packed in a box. Sigh

KG6IOC

Well, get that sucker out of the box. Read a little on making a dipole and toss a wire in a tree as high as you can get. Being only a tech, your limited on your frequencies of operation but i bet you could find something on 10m if you put s9me time in. Try around sunset or around 10am your time. The bands are not good but remember, there are a lot of folks wanting to comunicate and most 9f them are just monitoring. Try 28.400 to 28.440 and start calling cq. You can do it man. Then when you gat a chance work on getting that General lic and the whole world opens up to you. The Extra class is more for bragging rights so dont worry about that one. I got mine just to out do my Elmer/mentor.

If you have questions send me a pm. Just get that radio station on the air. Then start learning cw. Ha.

Just sold my house in California and I'm still in my condo that I purchased in Texas two years ago. Looking for a house with a couple acres right now so until then.........Talked to a guy locally and he did tell me about a local Ham club. Gotta go soon so I can wrangle up an Elmer.


Mike

Yep, An older Elmer is what you want. Not one of the really old guys as most of them have lost the will to keep up with the new stuff and rules. Good luck on finding a great one. It sure can help a guy out to understand and to get over the fear of getting on the air. That happens to most of us in the beginning.

As I told Jerry awhile back guitarist Joe Walsh is a Ham and uses only vintage equipment.

I hope all will enjoy this:

https://video.search.yahoo.com/yhs/s...e&action=click

Id say that texting is faster. I hate to admit it. But even with a fast code sender and reciever, there is more movement per letter. Some guys are pretty damn fast but one push of a button for a letter compared to as many as 4 pushes on a key...

Then there is numbers. No mater if its a 1 or 5 or 0, its still five pushes to make any number. BTW, the shortest letter is the "e" and a period and very long. Go figure.

I checked my log book and have never worked Joe Walsh. Bummer. But because of being a lic. Ham, i was able to find his home address. Ha.

Originally Posted by Gasman

Id say that texting is faster. I hate to admit it. But even with a fast code sender and reciever, there is more movement per letter. Some guys are pretty damn fast but one push of a button for a letter compared to as many as 4 pushes on a key...

Once upon a time, Jay Leno hosted a "Morse vs SMS" contest on his show. The SMS guy
was a national speed texting champ, vs 2 hams...one sending Morse to the other, with a
hard copy result.

The hams sending Morse won, hands down, by sending/receiving CW at about
30 words per minute.