[Elecraft] Re: Learning CW

[Morrow, Michael A.]

Morrow, Michael A. wrote:
=20
>> It's so hard to find high speed CW on the air any more,

David wrote:
=20
> Someone hasn't been spending any time on the bottom of 40=20
> meters lately.

I guess I should have qualified the statement as "interesting
(to me) high speed CW."  I'll admit that I always found the
maritime CW in the 420 to 510 kHz, and in the 4, 6, 8, 12,
16, and 22 MHz bands to be more interesting practice and
recreational copy than ham chatter.  Alas, that's all gone
now.  I've never been interested in DX chasing and contests,
which are where you find much of the high speed ham activity.

>> How can one properly judge the quality of one's sent code=20
>> if one isn't capable of copying at that speed?

> This is a nonsequitur.  Sending and receiving are two very=20
> different acts, and you, unfortunately, needn't be good at
> one to be good at the other, or vice versa.

That misses my point, which is that you can't very well
properly QA your own sending if you can't well copy the speed
you're sending.  I've listened to more than one new CW op
whose sending was faster than they could receive, and was
rather poor, yet that fact was lost on them.  Hence the
oft-heard but erroneous claim of neophyte hams similar
to:  "I can't yet copy 5 wpm, but I can send 15 wpm."

I agree that one need not be good at sending CW to be a
good receiver.  Many military CW intercept ops fell into
that category.  However, I do disagree totally with the
statement that one can be a good sender without being a
good receiver (unless a keyboard is in use).

But it's all just my opinion.  I'm no expert.

73,
Mike / KK5F