[CW] Dual VS. single lever

[David J. Ring, Jr.]

Ken,

Always nice to hear from you.  You always give such good advice.

One thing that I made up years ago that never fails to get rave compliments 
is a "turn-around" cable.

I take a 18-inch (good length I think - but 12 inches is also ok!) of good 
quality SHIELDED two conductor audio cable and one stereo plug and one 
stereo jack.

I wire the cable so that the tip and ring cross.

If the plug is wired:
1 - tip
2 - ring
3 - sleeve (braid) ground/earth connection

The jack is then wired:
1 - ring
2 - tip
3 - sleeve (grounding braid)

I find some radios are wired "backwards" from what I have for my radio, and 
this reverses it.

Also there is "always" a great CW operator who is a lefty and who sends on a 
paddle wired for left hand (thumb sends dots just like a righty, but of 
course the left thumb is on the "other" side!).

We had such a gentleman who visited FD one year - he was a great operator, 
and just "was visiting" - and we convinced him to operate.  And guess what? 
A lefty!  I took out this "turn around cable" and he was smiling ear to ear.

Plus one exhausted CW operator was able to take a break, and when he 
returned the lefty had more QSOs than the exhausted CW operator had done in 
the past three hour!

I keep on telling myself it was because the lefty came at sunrise when the 
"normal" operators came back on the air, but I guess he was really a better 
operator than I was.

One other good cable is a "Stereo quarter inch plug to TWO stereo quarter 
inch jacks" - or a Y cable to split to two keys!  This comes handy when 
using both a straight key and a bug.  Gone are the days when straight keys 
have "bug lips" and the bugs always had a "cord and wedge".

A "bug lip" is a slot on the left side of the telegraph key, and a cord 
(wire) and wedge (two long very very obtuse V shaped pieces of narrow copper 
with a piece of fiberboard insulation attached to the wires) were used by 
old telegraphers to hook up their bugs!  The wedge could also be stuck where 
the circuit closer (also known as a "shorting switch") was on the right 
side.

73

David N1EA
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Ken Brown" <ken.d.brown at hawaiiantel.net>
To: "CW" <CW at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Monday, June 26, 2006 11:32 PM
Subject: [CW] Dual VS. single lever


Someone said:

> A single paddle trained op can proficiently use a single lever paddle,
> BUT he/she can also use an Iambic paddle just as well.
Also, a CW trained operator can also proficiently operate phone, BUT  a
phone op that has not learned to operate CW isn't going to make many CW
QSOs. This is not a good reason to abandon CW operation any more than
the other statement is a good reason to not bring a dual paddle to Field
Day.

All who show up to operate at a group Field Day setup should arrive with
their preferred style of key and headphones, and a selection of adaptors
to fit common key and phone jacks. Probably a good idea to bring your
own keyer too.

DE N6KB


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