[CW] G3HGE, Tom Withers, Key and Equipment Maker, SK

[David J. J. Ring, Jr.]

>From Rich, G4FAD via the Side Swiper Net mail list:

Hello All,
    Tom Withers G3HGE has passed on, he passed away on Tuesday 5th
   November after a short illness. He was a great CW operator and maker of
   Morse keys.
   Tom was the inventor of the Twanger Side Swiper key. I was chatting one
   night on 80 Metres and we got talking about keys. I said to Tom what we
   really need is a good Sideswiper key. About a week later he sent me an
   email to say he had made one would I test it for him. I replied no but
   if you send it to Sandy G0VQW he will do a video on it and I will buy
   your first key. So Sandy has #000 and I have#001.
   Another good CW operator gone, may he rest in peace,
   Kind Regards Rich G4FAD..

I'm sorry to hear the sad news of not only a great Morse man, but a 
maker of nice Morse keys as well.

Tom sent me his dual lever bug, Olympia.  He was aiming for a bug that 
felt like sending on a electronic keyer, the movement was very slight on 
the pendulum.  I have no idea if that was successful for him because 
such small movement on a bug was troublesome for me, so I widened the 
spacing and let the pendulum swing a bit.  Maybe I have sensitive ears 
for dot sparkiness, but the dots sounded "flaky" when made with tiny 
amount of swing to the lever.   To my mind, you have to compress the dot 
spring to get the dot formed well and get push back to get the pendulum 
to push back to keep the vibrator moving back and forth.

I told him that I liked the idea of dual levers because you could send 
better code with practice especially on letters where a dash followed a 
dot because you could start the dash a bit earlier to compensate for any 
transition delay - moving from vibrator to the dash closure - it's a 
tiny amount but at high speeds you can hear it and it sounds like 
awkwardly sent code.  Tom's design eliminates this with the dual levers.

Tom, I hope Saint Peter has a solid gold Olympia waiting for you, go 
give those Vibroplex senders a good QSO and join the heavenly choir of 
beautiful sending!

RIP old friend.  We at the CW list will make some beautiful music for you.

73

DR
David N1EA