Yes, you're correct! Give that man a double scoop of ice cream, whatever flavor he wants!  You strike me as a guy who would order one scoop of rum raisin and the other of peppermint stick ice cream. (It's a good combination.)

Remember the contact on the dot contact post is "hot" and a ground return must be provided by the other end of the dot contact spring (Joe's answer - which is correct) - but is it a good contact? And what is the return path?

The only ground return is via the dot tension spring which has a small loop at the end.  This little loop attaches dot lever tension adjusting screw the end of which that is towards the key is specially fashioned and cast into a "point" at the end so it can stick into the little loop in the conical dot tension spring, and (worse even) the other end of the conical dot contact spring where it attaches to the lever of the Vibroplex bug has a stiff tinned wire soldered to it and that stiff tinned wire is pushed into a drilled hole in the lever but unfortunately since the lever has to move, the drilled hole cannot be tight, it has to allow the stiff wire attached to the dot contact spring to move even though it moves only maybe 10 degrees back and forth as dots are produced. But all of these ground return connections are "iffy" - the vibrations of the vibirator often cause the stiff wire NOT to make good contact with the lever which means that the keying can be defective. The little braid that was there before 1980 on Vibroplex keys avoided this problem.

This is why I tell people wanting a Vibroplex semi-automatic key to get the Standard version, not the new Deluxe version, but to get an old 1960s vintage Deluxe semiautomatic Vibroplex.  (The I1QOD semi-automatic key has a braid and has excellent functionality!)

73

DR

N1EA