Author Archive
Cosmetic K2 Upgrade
June 10th, 2013 | 
Author: 
My Elecraft K2 which is now more than 11 years old (serial #2198) has served me well, even earning me QRP DXCC (100 countries with 5 Watts) some years ago. It is still cosmetically in mint condition, except for that single item which sticks out like a sore thumb: The tuning knob.
This became very clear to me a couple of months ago when LA8OKA’s and my K2 were displayed side by side at our stand at Oslo Maker Faire. His is less than two years old, serial #7224, and they were similar except for the scratches in the faceplate of my tuning knob. If I am allowed to generalize from my knob only, it seems as if the faceplate had poor quality paint and has been replaced by a better quality version over the years.
Anyway I ordered a new one and paid the price which at present is $30.37 plus shipping. The difference is really striking and I feel like I have a new K2 now, well worth the price! The K2 now serves as my second rig, and I think it has many years of good service still to come.
Related posts:
The advantage of the single-lever paddle
 |
| My single-lever PCB keyer KI6SN/NB6M-style |
It may seem like a bad idea to downgrade from a dual-lever paddle and iambic keyer to a single-lever paddle. It must be inefficient since each individual dash and dot has to be generated by a right or left movement of the paddle. Despite this, many of the champions in the High Speed Telegraphy competitions use single-lever paddles, often home-made ones. How can that be?
K7QO, Chuck Adams, wrote “Using an Iambic Paddle” and compared the dual-lever paddle with the single-lever with respect to number of movements. If all 26 letters of the English alphabet and the numbers from 0 to 9 are sent, the single-lever paddle requires 73 strokes while a dual-lever and an iambic keyer requires 65. This is 11% less.
But when N1FN, Marshall G. Emm, wrote “Iambic Keying – Debunking the Myth” he analyzed the 7 letters that are faster to send with an iambic keyer – C, F, K, L, Y, Q, and R – and found that only one of them, the L, is among the 12 most frequent ones in English. He illustrated it this way:
Guess what’t wrong with this figure? He didn’t see the R and forgot that it is also among the most frequent letters!
So two of the faster letters are among the most frequent ones, not just one. I guess that N1FN’s estimate of only a 5% increase in efficiency when letter frequencies are taken into account is a bit too small then. In addition comes the fact that CQ, and all Q-codes use letters that are more efficient with the iambic keyer, so in radio amateur use the efficiency advantage of the iambic keyer is probably even more than 11%.
So this doesn’t explain the fact that many of the high speed champions do so well on single-lever paddles. My experience is based on learning to send Morse code at the age of 47. Somehow I feel that this was 20-30 years too late in order to master all the finer movements involved in iambic keying.
The issue must be tolerance to errors, not just efficiency. The high-speed champions value that and increasingly the producers of morse paddles are including single-lever paddles in their assortment.
A single-lever paddle is also easy to make yourself, much easier than a dual-lever paddle. I made one from printed circuit board based on the paddles of KI6SN. That design was a modified version of the miniature single-lever paddle of NB6M. I made it just to try the concept before I move on and eventually buy one. But the homemade one was surprisingly good to use, so I might stay with it for a while. The nice thing is that the single-lever couldn’t care less if your keyer is set up for iambic A og B. Neither if the keyer does the ultimatic mode which I promoted recently (Is the ultimatic Morse keyer really that efficient?)
There should be freedom in choice of paddle, so everyone should find what suits best regardless of what is the current fashion or what it is that is considered to be ‘best’. So whether you are a newcomer who struggle with learning to send properly with an iambic keyer, or an oldtimer who keep using the dual-lever as if it is a single-lever paddle, feel free to change to a single-lever paddle. I am sure you will notice a reduced error rate.
The question for me is what “real” single-lever key I should upgrade to, they all look attractive: Begali, Bencher, Bushwhacker, Hi-Mound, Kent, K8RA, N3ZN, Scheunemann, UR5CDX, Vibroplex, …
The radio amateur who felt compelled to abandon his own call sign
If you mention that you are a radio amateur to any Norwegian who was old enough to watch TV in the mid 70’s then he is bound to respond with LA8PV. This was the callsign of the fictious figure Marve Fleksnes in the comedy the “Radiot”. To bad for the poor guy who actually was given that callsign some years later. I had contact with him on CW (= morse) in 2002 just after I got my license and I just couldn’t believe that anybody actually was using that particular callsign.
The first of three cuts can be viewed in the embedded Youtube video. Unfortunately I couldn’t find any clip that was subtitled in English, but the first minute or so is almost silent and is about the joy of getting a replacement DF1987B (sic) tube for his transmitter. The tube is supposedly plugged into the output tube socket of a Quad II audio amplifier and then he is ready to go on the air. Later one gets a glimpse of his AR88D receiver.
As the story goes, the Norwegian Post and Telcom Authorities, had marked off LA8PV as a callsign that shouldn’t be used. But due to a mistake they blacklisted LA8PW instead. I had contact with LA8PV almost every year up to and including 2007, but have never had it since. I understand why now, because QRZ.com says that the real LA8PV finally must have given up and gotten the new call sign, LA2WRA, on 4 Jan. 2008. I don’t envy him the fate of having been made LA8PV, and fully understand why he finally abandoned that callsign.
The source for much of this story is a Swedish discussion page on hamradio.se. Marve Fleksnes and LA8PV also aired on Swedish television and were very popular there as well.
Is the ultimatic Morse keyer really that efficient?
 |
| Vintage Ten-Tec Ultramatic Keyer KR50. Nice name but the similarity to ultimatic seems to be coincidental. |
Iambic keying with a dual-lever paddle is by far the most popular form for Morse keying. But in recent years an old alternative has reemerged. This is the Ultimatic mode which goes back to W6SRY in the 1950’s.
The experience seems to be that it needs less timing precision than the iambic mode for letters like A, N, R, and K (· —, — ·, · — ·, — · —). When both paddles are squeezed, the last one to be pressed takes control. So when right-left is pressed one gets a dah followed by dits, not the dah-di-dah-dit of the iambic keyer.
It is very simple to add code for an ultimatic keyer to an iambic one. In recent years this has led to an ultimatic option in some stand-alone keyers, such as:
- Several of the keyers from Jackson Harbor Press, WB9KZY, like the PK-4.
- Several of the newer K1EL keyers, like the K14 which also has modes for dah priority, dit priority, and bug.
- The ultimatic kit from Elektor.
I have yet to hear of a single integrated keyer in a rig that supports the ultimatic mode, and that is probably why from time to time a request for a software upgrade to the Elecraft rigs is sent to the Elecraft reflector. If you really want that, and you don’t want to use a stand-alone keyer, then an alternative is to build the ultimatic adapter for iambic keyers by W9CF. It can be built with two logic ICs or with a microcontroller.
In “Using an Iambic Paddle” Chuck Adams, K7QO, compared the iambic paddle, the single-lever paddle, the bug, and the straight key with respect to number of movements. He counted the number of strokes if all 26 letters of the English alphabet and the numbers from 0 to 9 are sent.
I found it interesting to add to the analysis of K7QO by doing the counting for the ultimatic mode also. There are only 3 letters which have to be sent differently compared to an iambic keyer: P (· — — ·), X (— ·· —), and C (— · — ·). The P and the X are simpler to send with the ultimatic keyer, but the C takes more effort. A table of right and left movements and number of presses is:
Letter | Iambic | Ultimatic |
P | L-R-L = 3 | L-R = 2 |
X | R-L-R = 3 | R-L = 2 |
C | R-L = 2 | R-L-L = 3 |
Straight key: | 132 |
Bug: | 90 |
Single-lever paddle: | 73 |
Iambic mode, dual-lever paddle: | 65 |
Ultimatic, dual-lever paddle: | 64 |
It should be said though that in the ultimatic mode it requires much less coordination to send the letter C as if one is using a single-lever paddle and use four movements. Since three is the maximum number of presses for any letter in iambic mode, this may be one of the reasons why the iambic mode took over. But this was before my time, so I am only speculating.
Now that I have discovered the virtue of the ultimatic mode, I have used my K1EL WinKeyer with ultimatic mode more. I could need the greater tolerance to timing errors. So far I find it hard to remember to send the C differently and have a tendency to end up with a D (— ··) instead. The same goes for the letter Ä or Æ (· — · —) which we use in inter-Scandinavian contacts (as German-speakers also do) and which easily ends up as a W (· ——) instead. I’ll just practice P, X, and in particular C and Ä to build confidence.
JT9 and 100 Hz ghosts
 |
| Multiple decodes at 100 Hz spacing of K1JT on 30 m on 28 April 2013, 0101 UTC |
From time to time I receive duplicate ‘ghost’ decodes at 100 Hz intervals on either side of the main signal. Last night I saw the phenomenon on 30 m. You will notice here that I have decoded the message: “TNX 73 GL” four times (press image for better readability):
- -24 dB, 1063 Hz
- -19 dB, 1163 Hz
- -8 dB, 1263 Hz
- -18 dB, 1363 Hz
See also “Overmodulated JT65 on HF?
Which non-English Morse characters are the most important ones?
The Morse code for the 26 letters of the English language and the digits, you can find everywhere, e.g. here on Wikipedia. All one-, two-, and three-symbol combinations are in use.
In the international alphabet all but four of the four-symbol combinations are used. They are:
| Morse | German ++ | Norwegian/ Danish | Spanish | Esperanto | Polish 16.3.2014 | Greek | Russian | Arabic |
| ·-·- | Ä | Æ | – | – | Ą | – | Я | ع |
| —· | Ö | Ø | – | – | Ó | – | Ч | ز |
| ··– | Ü | – | – | Ŭ | – | – | Ю | – |
| —- | Ch | – | Ch | Ĥ | – | Χ | Ш | ش |
The two or three first German letters are used in many other languages also, e.g. Swedish, Finnish, Turkish, Hungarian etc.
All other characters use five symbols. These are the ones that I have been able to find:
| Morse | Norwegian/ Danish/ Swedish/Finnish | French | Spanish | Esperanto | Polish 16.3.2014 | Icelandic 16.3.2014 |
| ·–·- | Å | À | – | – | – | – |
| ·-··- | – | È | – | – | Ł | – |
| ··-·· | – | É | – | – | Ę | – |
| -·-·· | – | Ç | – | Ĉ | Ć | – |
| -··-· | – | Ê (also /) | – | – | – | – |
| –·– | – | – | Ñ | – | Ń | – |
| ···-· | – | – | – | Ŝ | – | – |
| –⋅-⋅ | – | – | – | Ĝ | – | – |
| ⋅—⋅ | – | – | – | Ĵ | – | – |
| –··- | – | – | – | – | Ż | – |
| ··–· | – | – | – | – | – | Ð |
| ·–·· | – | – | – | – | – | Þ |
There are also six-symbol combinations in Polish: Ź which is –⋅⋅-⋅ (ZN) and Ś which is ⋅⋅⋅-⋅⋅⋅ (SB). The German Wikipedia even lists a Morse code for the double S: ß, ⋅⋅⋅–⋅⋅ or SZ, but I believe two consecutive S’s work well or even better.
I recently asked on the Elecraft list if the K3 Morse decoder could support some of these letters, and I asked specifically about Ä/Æ, Ö/Ø, Å, and Ü. These are the four which are shown in the first figure in the upper right-hand corner of this post.
Sources:
Amazing Reverse Beacon Network
I haven’t called CQ for a long time on CW except in contests. Mostly I have just responded to DX calls with a super short “5nn TU” and that’s it. But this Saturday I heard a presentation at the Norwegian Ham Meeting by Roland, SM6EAT about a Swedish initiative to increase CW activity. It is called Scandinavian Open CW Activity (SOCWA) and it has at present 452 members from Scandinavia in a wide sense of the word. It really got me interested in improving my CW skills.
So now I have started to call CQ SAX and have had my first long CW QSOs for years with SM and OH.
It is also amazing to look at the reverse beacon network and watch your own CQ being reported almost in real time from various Software Defined Receivers with CW Skimmers. Below is the result of the two CQs I have sent these two last days.
