AmateurRadio.com

There are all sorts of ways to teach Morse Code. There’s the old Army way (check out these youtube clips: part 1, part 2). Then there’s the way the ARRL taught me back in 1978 — with cassette tapes. And today, students can download software that will teach them Morse Code with the Farnsworth Method and the Koch Method. It all works, so long as the student sticks with it.

How do you get a student to stick with it? First and foremost, by cultivating within him an affection for Morse Code. As Antoine de Saint-Exupery purportedly said, “If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up people to collect wood and don’t assign them tasks and work, but rather teach them to long for the endless immensity of the sea.”¹ But since so many things can thwart this affection (from discouragement to competing interests), sometimes you simply need to come alongside the student and encourage him. This is where cassette tapes and computer programs usually fall short. There’s nothing like The Personal Method — a real, live Elmer teaching you Morse Code.

Just ask my son! A few days ago I purchased a nifty Nye Viking Speed-X straight key and code practice oscillator to begin teaching him Morse Code. I hooked up my own Speed-X to it so that we could both key the oscillator — him on one side of the table with his new practice set, and me on the other side of the table with my own key. Thus equipped, we had our first lesson before bedtime Wednesday night.

I was surprised by how hard the bug bit him. At first he wasn’t so sure about the whole thing, but by the end of the lesson he was so excited he said he wouldn’t be able to get to sleep. He even told me that he wouldn’t enjoy his classical guitar lesson and horse-riding lesson quite as much the next day because he just wanted to have the next Morse Code lesson! The next morning, he woke me up by sending “GM” outside my door with this practice set. And later in the day, he started sending me code as went down the road, saying “dit” and “dah” like a true CW operator.

So to my fellow CW operators who know somebody that wants to learn Morse Code, I say let’s try The Personal Method. And to those of you who do want to learn Morse Code, try to find an Elmer who is willing to spend some time with you. If you can’t find one who can meet with you, hang in there with your cassette tapes or your computer program until you know enough code to work with an Elmer on the air. As the SKCC website says, “If you can only key at 3 words per minute, so be it.” There are SKCC Elmers who are eager to work with you (http://www.skccgroup.com/elmers.php). You’ll be amazed at how quickly you build up your speed, and you’ll enjoy the experience a thousand times more than by trying to learn all by yourself.

¹ This quote is all over the Internet, but I’ve yet to see any citation for it. If you know where Antoine de Saint-Exupery wrote this, please let me know!

My friend is getting back into ham radio for the first time since he was a boy, and one of the first things he wants is a straight key. I’ve steered him toward the Nye Viking Speed-X key. You can spend lots of money on keys nowadays, and I admit that some of them are mighty pretty. But the eham reviews of the Speed-X key suggest that looks aren’t everything. Unless you’re willing to spend a fortune for a luxury-model, I say put your money on the Speed-X. It’s worth every penny.

Probably the best way to mount this key is to screw it down to your desk if you’re willing to. Or you can buy a nice heavy aluminum base for this key straight from Nye Viking. But here’s how you can make an attractive, heavy base for not a whole lot of money. Here’s the finished product (I made this years ago):

I found this inexpensive piece of wood at Michael’s (an arts and crafts store). It was unfinished with the edges already routed as shown. When you find your own piece of wood like this, figure out where you want to mount your key. I used nuts and bolts to mount my key, but wood screws probably would have been better (by the time you’re done with this project, you’ll have a hard time getting to any nuts on the underside because they will be covered with felt). If you do decide to use nuts and bolts, drill holes for the bolts now so that you know where those holes are in the next step.

Flip the piece of wood upside down and go to work hollowing out as much of it as you can, starting about a half inch in from each edge. I can’t remember if I used a chisel, a Dremel tool, or both, but either would work. Just be careful not to hollow out so much that you punch through to the other side! Leave enough wood in the spots where you’re going to bolt or screw down your key so that you have a good strong mount when you’re done.

Once you hollow out the underside of your piece of wood, take a hot glue gun and glue in as much lead shot as you can stuff in there. This is what makes the base nice and heavy so that your key doesn’t jump around while you’re pounding out CW.

Give the block of wood a quick sanding, stain it with your favorite stain, varnish it, and mount your key! If you are using nuts and bolts, I recommend using a bit of Locktite to keep them from coming loose.

The last step is to glue a piece of felt to the underside of the block of wood. This hides the unsightly gob of lead shot and glue you’ve put in there, and it lets you slide the thing around on your desk smoothly. Don’t worry, it won’t make it too slippery. If you’ve put enough lead shot in there it will stay put just fine while you’re pounding brass. Here’s a look at the underside of mine:

If you build one of these yourself, let me know! I’d love to hear from you.

Items required:
Wooden base (available from craft store)
Felt (also available from craft store)
Lead shot (available from sporting goods store)
Nuts & bolts (or wood screws) to mount key
Dremel tool and/or wood-chisel
Hot glue gun
Wood Stain
Varnish

For five months now my friend Keith (ACØVW) and I have been planning to get together and build Ham-Can kits together. Finally the day arrived when we could fit it in! Last Thursday Keith made the 2 1/2 hour drive from the Twin Cities to my house in Granite Falls for a kit-building session.

The first thing we did was to inventory the parts in each of our kits. All were present and accounted for except one — a 1000 pF capacitor was missing from Keith’s kit. So naturally I picked up the phone and called Radio Shack in Montevideo, MN. Where else are you going to find a part like this at a moment’s notice out in the sticks?

What I didn’t know when I called was that the store had already been closed for a half hour! But still the owner answered the phone, and without saying anything about being closed he went to see if he had the capacitor we needed. When he came back he said that he couldn’t find one, but that it was a bit hard for him to search all of his stock because he had to use a flashlight — that’s when he explained that the store was closed. After thanking him for going to the trouble I started lamenting our state, explaining how my friend had driven all the way out here only to find that he didn’t have all of his parts.

The fellow at Radio Shack told me to hold on while he went to search for the capacitor again. Next time he got back on the phone he told me he had found one! And not only that, he told me that he would deliver it to me since he and his wife happened to be heading our way in a few minutes. By now I’m really thanking him! But it gets better. He told me, “The only catch is that you can’t pay for it. We get paid by the smile.”

We met this gentleman and his charming wife at Subway, where he gave us the capacitor we needed along with a handful of others just for fun. All of this added up to way more than mere marketing. This was heart-warming small-town kindness, and yes, it did instantly make me a loyal customer.

Of course Keith and I insisted on purchasing their dinner. They showed us what had brought them our way. In the back of their pickup-truck was an antique mill they had just purchased. They were planning on grinding up a whole bunch of wheat that they had at home so they could make their own bread with flour they’d ground themselves. I gave them my card and told them to call me when they had a loaf of that bread, and we’d have them over for supper.

Whatever you think of Radio Shack, it’s still the only game in town for most of us when we need electronic components at a moment’s notice. Maybe we should think twice before going to Wal-Mart or ordering stuff online that we could otherwise get at the local Radio Shack. It may cost a few dollars more, but it might be worth it. If we don’t support our local Radio Shack, it may not be around for long (see here).

I for one am sure glad this Radio Shack is still around, and that the owner is such a fine fellow. I’d like to keep him in business so that the next time I come up short when building something, he’s still there to sell it to me.

My friend, ACØVW, is planning on visiting me the day after Easter. He’s just re-licensed for the first time since he was a boy, and he is eager to get on the air. Trying to figure out what kind of temporary antenna we might be able to set up, I dug into a junk box and came up with a couple coils of old twin-lead that we could use to feed a doublet.

I could tell by the way the twin-lead was methodically coiled and taped with strapping tape that my dad had been the last one to handle it. As I uncoiled it and measured how long it was, my fingers were quickly coated in white, powdery residue from the aging, well-weathered insulation. Suddenly, I realized what I was holding. Surely this must be what my dad used to make the radials for my first antenna, a Butternut vertical that he set up for me on the roof back in 1978.

And just as suddenly, something else struck me. My dad was really my first Elmer. No, he wasn’t a seasoned ham radio operator when he started helping me. But he was a very seasoned electrical engineer — and a fabulous father. He may not have been able to help me out with operating procedures, but he sure did help me get on the air when I was a 10-year-old boy.

Take a close look at that picture of my first ham shack, up at the top of this blog. See those little squares of paper neatly taped to the front of the Heathkit DX-100 transmitter? My dad put those there. They were little notes to help me as I learned to tune that great big tube-fired rig. The laminated sheet of paper in front of the transmitter is, as I recall, a list of settings that my dad figured out for the antenna tuner. And that straight key — the very thing that first got me interested in ham radio when I stumbled across it in my dad’s shop — was lovingly screwed down to the desk by my dad, permanently marring the beautifully finished surface of the desk he had built years before this hobby became part of my life.

My dad went on to become licensed as NØARQ, and he homebrewed some great stuff. Some of it made its way into ham radio magazines, and a fabulous spider-quad he built back in the early 80′s went into an ARRL Antenna Compendium. I couldn’t have built any of those things back then (some of them I still couldn’t design if my life depended on it!). If it weren’t for my dad, I would never have gotten on the air. But because of my dad, I did — and enjoyed using some really fine gear, too.

Today is my dad’s birthday. I didn’t get to see him today, but the memories came flooding back when I held that old, powdery radial in my hands. Dad really was my first Elmer, and so much more. He led me to Jesus Christ when I was a young boy. Years later, when I was a freshman seminary student, he led me to a high view of God’s sovereignty. And to this day, he leads me by example to be a loving father and husband.

So thank you, Dad.

And happy birthday!