[Elecraft] Iambic Keying - Debunking the Myth

[David A. Belsley]

This is a no-win argument because you'll never convince anyone who  
thinks strongly one way or the other that he/she might not posses a  
universal truth.  But, the issue is really a matter of personal  
experience and not someone else's opinion.  My personal experience is  
entirely opposite that expressed in Bill's note.  I have been sending  
code for 55 years, using straight keys, bugs, and iambic keying.  And  
there is no question that, for me, iambic keying is vastly -- I  
repeat, vastly -- superior to the other methods.  It is faster and,  
once learned, simpler.  For the most part, I also find that iambic  
keying tends to lead to far better code -- although there are  
notorious counterexamples here.  Learning did not take me very long:  
I was up and running almost immediately, requiring only a few days  
"lone time" before I felt competent to go on the air at a decent  
speed.  Within a month I was quite easy with speeds in the 30s.

It is certainly not the case that "anyone can send twice as fast as  
he can receive," a comment that demonstrably does not apply to many I  
have encountered on the air, regardless of the method used.  This is  
a comment that may apply to those in their early stages of learning.   
Of course, I am assuming here that "sending" is done by key and not  
keyboard.

I have chimed in here against my better judgement because I feel this  
is an issue that has to be solved by each individual.  I know nothing  
I say is going to change the minds of the "fundamentalists" on issues  
like these, but for those who are still trying to figure out how the  
wind blows, I simply say, "put up your own wetted finger and come to  
your own conclusions -- they are the only ones that count."

best wishes,

david belsley, w1euy


On Sep 10, 2007, at 8:27 AM, Bill Tippett wrote:

> Iambic Keying - Debunking the Myth
>
> by
> Marshall G. Emm, N1FN
>
> "Iambic or "squeeze" keying is one of the "Great Expectations" in  
> CW operation.
> Operators will agonize over a huge variety of features in  
> electronic keyers, but
> support for iambic keying itself is a given. But Iambic keying is  
> really of very
> limited value, and it's easy to become convinced that it was a BAD  
> IDEA that
> happened to catch on"
>
> <MAJOR SNIP...full analysis in article below>
>
> http://www.morsex.com/pubs/iambicmyth.pdf
>
> "The Myth Exposed
>
> The idea that iambic keying is more efficient has been around for a  
> long time, and few operators
> ever question it, even if they are having trouble doing it. They  
> might blame themselves, or the
> paddle, and it stops being fun. At first it does seem to have a  
> certain “cool” factor, and no doubt
> that’s why it was invented to start with. Some computer programmer  
> looked at an electronic
> keyer, realized that he was looking at logic states (dot is on or  
> off, dash is on or off) and decided
> to fill in the rest of the truth table– he was using “either a or  
> b ,” and he was using “neither a nor
> b” but he wasn’t doing anything with “both a and b.” In other words  
> there was a third “switch”
> that wasn’t being used. Not a bad idea on the face of it, and we’ve  
> been paying the price ever
> since.
>
> Iambic keying became all the rage, and manufacturers got to make a  
> bunch of new-fangled dual
> paddles. Somewhere in there electronic keyer designers decided to  
> offer “refinements” of the
> basic principles, giving everybody Iambic A vs Iambic B to argue  
> about, and distracting them
> from any consideration of whether Iambic Anything was worth  
> bothering with. It’s like saying
> the emperor has no clothes, but I’ll say it anyhow– iambic keying  
> is clever, and fun, but of very
> little practical value. Worse, it can impose a speed limit on your  
> sending, and ruin another
> perfectly good amateur radio myth– the widely accepted notion that  
> anyone can send twice as
> fast as he can receive. But let’s talk about that one another  
> time....."
>
>         The fact that most High Speed Telegraphy contestants use
> single paddle keys (i.e. non-iambic) is further proof of the above.
>
>                                 73,  Bill  W4ZV
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--------------------------------------------
david a. belsley
professor of economics
boston college