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How fast is to fast?
6 July 2023 | by Good afternoon blog readers I hope you are still enjoying the summer heat and are putting it into perspective as it compares to winters freezing cold?
I have a question, when it comes to CW contesting…how fast is to fast? I have asked myself this question during CW contests, when I decide to search and pounce most of the time the speed is in around 30-34 wpm. Now having said that there are some big guns that run at close to 40wpm. BUT they have been spotted and always will be thus for the most part then the caller already knows their call. It is just the exchange that has to be handled and if it is a contest that has a generic exchange (CQ zone, ITU zone so on) then the software fills in the exchange details.
For a small gun like me it’s only now and then I get spotted on the cluster and I know when this happens as I get into a pileup situation. I am not some multi operator high power station with dream antennas I am just small potatoes. I feel that if I was to knock out code at 36 wpm I think my contact rate would drop? In my humble opinion ( please correct me if I am wrong) I should stay in the 30-34 wpm range to gather fish in my net?
What say you fellow CW contesters…..in a dark place in my mind I am thinking that for me its a waste of time to practice for the 38-40 wpm goal because with my 100 watts along with a simple vertical antenna at that speed I will hear crickets when calling CQ contest? What say you…………
16 Responses to “How fast is to fast?”
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I can copy comfortably at around 25 WPM, and can copy up to around 30 WPM if conditions are good, and the sender has a good fist (HI!). While trying to work the Original 13 Colonies special event this week, I got my first two colonies (K2B and K2L) on CW. I saw K2M was on, so I went to that frequency, and I heard possibly the fastest CW I’ve ever heard. They were going so fast, I had a hard time making out dots or dashes, and I basically only heard their signal reports (cut numbers… SNN).
I say good on them if they can send and receive that fast, but there are a lot of us who can’t. I ended up getting K2M on FT8, so I’m good.
73, Howard
AC4FS
Good afternoon Howard and nice to hear from you, I too have heard the RTTY type CW as well but most of the time in CW contest situations. In a contest, I can manage up to 36 wpm but it’s nice when stations come back to me in around 32-34 wpm.
73 and have a good weekend,
Mike
VE9KK
I’m happy at 15 – 20. Can copy 30 in a structured qso. I’d guess speeds over 20-25 don’t increase rate (q’s per hour) and may lose potential q’s from slower people who won’t bother listening 4-5 times to pull out the q. I think high speeds also discourage participation in the contest to some extent. My experience is way over half high speed folks won’t qrs when they hear slower code.
I just think it is very unfair to the ones including myself when they won’t slow down to at least 20wpm we like to make contacts as the rest of you. I am not able to get the two colonies that I needed.
It is an interesting question .
The way I look at it is rx at 25 wpm
Send at 20 wpm. Speed is not
everything send the message once
When electrons go down you are
Left with a hand key Mike.
Hi all!
I have been participating in contests since 1978, almost at 100 watts. I almost always use 30-35 WPN and often reduce the speed to 20 if the correspondent transmits at this speed. I tried to work at 40-45 – a noticeable decrease in the number of QSOs per hour.
73! Vlad, R4II
I don’t believe that very many of the big guns are copying and sending code at 30wpm+, they are using their computers to do it for them. I do it all by ear and key, so 20wpm is comfortable. It seemed to work out ok for me, most everyone answering my CQs sent their callsign to me at my speed. It would take all the fun and challenge away from me if I were to do it any other way. Hope that you all had fun and success.
73 de NG9T “K2J”
Good morning Lenny thanks for taking the time to leave a comment. Yes I agree that listening to a call 4 or 5 times can get frustrating. At the start of my cw contesting I just to search and pounce only those who had been spotted. This way I already knew the call and if it was ITU or CQ zone exchange the contest program looked after it. I then moved on using a software code reader and that helped as well. I also used to add my own competition to the contest. For example I would operate QRPP at 500 milliwatts or less and see the best miles per watt I could get.
Thanks for stopping by Lenny and have a great weekend,
Mike
VE9KK
Good morning Ed and very nice to hear from you, yes I can understand the frustration when gathering the 13 colonies and your short a few because you can’t get the call due to speed. There are a few ways around that, one is to check the clusters and see if they are being spotted and you can get the call there. Or use a software code reader for the calls that just will not slow down. The software code readers have come a long way.
Have a nice weekend Ed,
73
Mike
VE9KK
Good morning Gerrard, very true Gerrard speed is not everything and when it some to CW accuracy is more important and a good fist.
73,
Mike
VE9KK
Good morning Vlad and nice to hear from you, my contest speed in in around 32 and I also will reduce speed for a slower caller. If not you are doing repeats if the exchange is a numbered one and not a zone. One thing that puts a smile on my face is when I am running at 32 wpm and someone answers my CQ at 40….don’t get that at all.
73,
Mike
VE9KK
Good morning Gary and thanks for taking the time to leave a comment. When using popular contest programs such as N1MM+ all the sending is done with the program. As for the receiving yes there is software out there that can do that for you but all contest ops I know will copy by ear. In my case all copying is done by ear unless it is at RTTY speed and then I just move on. I know in the weekly CWops mini test I take part in all copying for me is by ear but the sending is the PC program. But there are some that send and receive at those fast speeds. But as you said in your comment Gary it’s all about having fun no matter what the speed.
73
Mike
VE9KK
Welp, in all the 42 years I’ve been in this hobby (and in many cases a practical lifesaver), I’ve only noticed this observation. When someone wants a log in a contact, I am pretty confident that the person at the other end who is sending quite fast will slow down their code speed so that the person receiving will be able to copy it much easier.
Good afternoon Jim and very nice to hear from you, yes that this very true even in a contest situation.
73,
Mike
VE9KK
Well i can do comfortable cw at 22 wpm if they want to go faster that is up to them lots of these super speed guys use a computer generated morse i heard a guy the other day doing to my calculation about 50 wpm it sounded like computer morse there are some who cant do morse at all but use computer even at slow speeds that’s what ham radio has aspired to sadly.
Good morning Mike thanks for taking the time to leave a comment. Yes for a CW QSO that is a comfortable speed and up to around 25wpm. Most contesting CW the exchanges are PC generated but in most cases the receiving of the code is done by ear. There are CW decoding programs and some do use them in contests but I would say that most are done by ear.
73,
Mike
VE9KK