[Elecraft] Paddles in General

[Vic Rosenthal]

Paul Heller wrote:

> Last year I dug the bug out of storage and decided to give it a try 
> again - after all, I was OK with it in the '60s.  I almost got to the 
> point where I'd be willing to go on the air with it, but after 40 years 
> I've definitely lost the knack.

Hi Paul!

After a similar layoff, I re-learned the bug -- it took me two years and
I *still* don't sound as good as I did in 1957.

One big improvement came when AC7AC told me to use relatively high
spring tension on the dot side.  This helps prevent the annoying
dit-splitting when sending the letter 'A', for example.

Another useful bug trick with modern rigs is to debounce the contacts.
After trying foam rubber and solid-state solutions, I settled on having
the bug operate a Radio Shack reed relay with a large capacitor across
the coil (without the capacitor, the relay is fast enough to follow the
bounce).

-- 
73,
Vic, K2VCO
Fresno CA
http://www.qsl.net/k2vco