Here are some things I’ve noticed about my CW operating lately:
- About nine months ago, I mentioned that I started working on sending R, L, and F iambically. These characters all have a dah sandwiched between two dits, and sending them with a dual-lever paddle is more difficult than sending characters with a dit sandwiched between two dahs. So much so that up until about nine months ago, I wasn’t sending them iambically at all. Well, I’ve been consciously practicing, and I’m actually getting the hang of it. Just like CW in general, you just gotta keep at it.
- I’m also getting faster. For the past year or so, when I got on the air, I’d set my keyer speed to 23 wpm and shoot for contacts at that speed. Lately, though, I’ve been calling CQ at 25 or 26 wpm and looking for faster QSOs. 20 wpm is starting to sound really slow to me. Tell yourself that you can do it, and then just do it.
- When I spoke at Dayton, I mentioned that it’s become the practice not to send a comma between a QTH’s city and state. Someone in the audience mentioned that he thought it was a good idea to retain the comma. He said it helped him copy the state. With that in mind, I’ve started sending the comma, especially when the operating speed is below 20 wpm. If it helps the other operator copy my code, then I’m all for it.
- This probably belongs in one of my “From my Twitter feed” posts, but I love it so much, I’m going to post it here.
Jeff, KE9V says
I had to work HARD to stop using the comma between city and state. But I managed to do it because I felt beat-up by the article ‘Your Novice Accent (and what to do about it)’.
It’s author had this to say about the use of the comma and how it was propagated by the Novice’s…
“Signals for period and comma were practically never heard on the ham bands until the novices got going. They are still not in use except in the novice bands. You may need to know them to pass a code examination, but they are clumsy and awkward in ham communications. All punctuation can be handled by the question mark and by the [BT] (dahdidididah). What do you need with a comma? Nothing! Don’t bother to use it.”
73, Jeff
Rich says
What if your state abbreviation is a prosign? As in Delaware or DE for short. Now the op is expecting your call to come next.
Dan KB6NU says
In general, I agree with you on the comma. There’s no place for it in general conversation, BUT if it helps some new operators copy my QTH properly, I don’t see a reason not to use it. Just sayin’
Gary Freeman WA0ZSU says
At University of Missouri club station W0ZLN in Columbia, MO we occasionally left out the comma, then claimed our QTH was in the little-known Central American country of Columbiamo.
I am OK with keeping the comma, especially in the first exchange with a newer op. I do occasionally use it for a break between connected thoughts.