[CW] Learning hints

[Michael Josefsson]

Read Ken/N6KB's sound advice again. I have found that to be VERY true.

After that follows clips of CW learning hints I have given over the years. As you may gather I believe firmly in Hr Koch's findings back in tfe 1930-1940's.

/Micke

On 14 Jan 2010, at 08:38, Ken Brown wrote:

> 
>> (although I am sometimes wonder whether I am not 
>> making my life too hard by learning at 20 WPM char speed : )
>> 
>> 
> If you "learn" the characters at too slow a speed, you don't really 
> learn them properly. Then when you want to copy at speeds that make CW 
> really useful and enjoyable, you will have to learn them all over again. 
> Learning at at least 15 WPM (David says 17 WPM) is much better in the 
> long term. It will save you time and effort compared to "learning" at a 
> slow speed that allows you to mentally count dits and dahs, and convert 
> them to letters using a memorized look up table.
> 
> DE N6KB
> ______________________________________________________________

In the Koch method you start off with the "standard" pause between the characters. All at full speed. One should not use less than about 15 wpm or the brain starts to *think* and that interferes with the automatic receiving reflexes one aims at building up. Your should not think when learning morse, just practice the REFLEXES, a "didah" sounds like an "A" not like "a dot and a dash" etc.

Receiving morse code is not at all about intelligence, it is about reflexes. Learning to react on stimuli. The stimuli being sound patterns.

I agree that starting at a slow speed is completely disastrous. Don't even think of trying that. I have always used 15 wpm in my courses and that speed has proven to work well. A side effect is that the students actually can copy  short snippets of code , eg. a callsign, at 20 wpm too!

I'm glad you noticed that the "tune" is completely different at slow  morse, that's what it is all about. Slow morse is hard to copy. Once you've found that you're "on board"!

If you want to give morse code a try, do it at about 15 WPM to start with. Below that speed one starts to loose the rhythm of the characters and this makes learning morse more troublesome than it has to be. If you have trouble writing down the characters because they come too often then don't lower the speed but increase the gap between the individual characters instead.

You will find that starting off with 15 WPM make you understand shorter snippets of code in much higher speeds (say 20 WPM) e.g. first part of a call or even an entire call. Which is a good thing as you then can reply to higher speed transmissions. And unless the other station is very rude or a complete nutter, or both, he well lower his speed to something that you can read.

Teaching code for a couple of years it is my firm belief that it is counter productive to start learning code at lower than 15 WPMs.

Try G4FON:s superb software, set if for 15 WPM and don't try to grab more than 2 characters per week. Four is OK for a first lesson/week, but don't force the rest. It'll come to you in time.

THIS IS IMPORTANT===> The trick is: Try to write the letter down when you hear the  NEXT letter. *DO NOT* write down the letter between letters, there is simply not enough time in that space. It takes some practice but is  
the key to being comfortable with morse. Actually writing engages your brain so you have something to do while receiving. It also helps carving out the reflexes in your brain.


...with my learners of morse. What we did was that I manually sent only these problematic characters over and over and over in a random pattern. But as I sent, I saw what they wrote down and made many repeats of the signs that were wrong until they got it right. I then started randomizing again. It seemed to be a very efficient way of learning the "hear-alikes".

Many programs use too high a pitch. I use 550 Hz or lower. 800 Hz or whatever is VERY tiring to listen to in the long run. Around 500 Hz has a good pounce in it. I know some CW-operators that use as low as 200 Hz pitch. The logic is that it is more easy to single out the other station among others as the frequencies differ more at lower pitches. (50 Hz off at 200 Hz is easier to identify than 50 Hz off at 800 Hz)

Some personal exeprience here: I have never managed to get above about 18 wpm with a straight key, not for any greater lengths of time anyway. If you want to send quicker then get paddles of some sort. I  use an old 1963 Vibroplex bug and find that a fascinating tool to  master and use. I'm an old vintage 1963 myself so that might explain  my perseverance with it? With it I am quite comfortable at speeds up  to about 30 wpm. I can send faster but not as "comfortable":)

When copying I found that listening to FAST morse (turn the G4FON up to 35+ WPM!) a minute of two before a training session at, say, 20 wpm made my brain understand that there are really lots and lots of space between the individual characters at this speed.  And I didn't  feel at all stressed. I made files for my portable mp3-player with bursts of 20/25 WPM words and used it on the bus etc. Pure head copy of course but who REALLY needs to write everything down anyway? After a couple of weeks I noticed that I had less and less of trouble reading whole sequences of words at the higher speed. I still had troble REMEMBERING more than the last few words received, but that's another story.

Nowadays I can take some words here and there at 35-40 WPM, which is enough to get call signs etc. Though I am most comfortable with 23 WPM which I find is a relaxing speed. Who would have thought that!!

If you have been at it for 6 months and found no improvement yet, then stop! Don't push it. You can exhaust your brain. Wait a  fortnight or so and then start again. It is quite a wonderful experience to find out that ones brain solves matters in its own time. Perhaps you could have only every other week as "copying week"?

There is no doubt you can improve your speed!

/Micke