[Elecraft] K3 Auto CW copy

[David Yarnes]

Hi All,

I have only tried using he CW reading feature on my K3 a few times.  Like 
most code readers, it misses a lot, and a little interference can throw it 
off track fairly easily.  It takes a pretty good signal to minimize the 
errors.  But I did check once by having it copy W1AW.  There are two 
benefits to trying that.  First, the CW is machine sent, so it's nearly 
perfect.  Secondly, W1AW has such a good signal that interference issues are 
minimal.  The reader did very well in that test.  There were very few 
errors, and word separation was very good.  I would strongly suggest that 
you check your K3 in the same manner to see if you are getting the word 
spacing problem.

It was also interesting to watch my own sending.  I've always thought my 
sending was reasonably good, and the reader did confirm that by showing the 
text I was sending in pretty much the correct text and spacing.  But if I 
got the least bit casual about it, the reader reflected that as well. 
Spacing was the big issue, although most of my errors were exaggerated 
spaces rather than insufficient spacing.  But I send with somewhat 
exaggerated spacing between words on purpose.  I try to send words correctly 
spaced, and then leave a slightly extended space between words.  I think 
this helps the receiving station clearly identify just what the word is I am 
sending.  Every so often expresses appreciation for my doing it that way. 
In my view, I'm not sure there is a greater CW "sin" than running words 
and/or letters together.

Interestingly, this process pointed out a glaring error that I have probably 
been making forever.  That was in how I sent my call.  I have a "K" on the 
end of my call, and I've always had problems in contest exchanges, etc. with 
the other station truncating my call to just a two letter suffix, presumably 
thinking my last letter "K" was asking them to transmit.  It only takes a 
slight hesitation to cause the reader to reflect that.  I kept seeing my 
call appear on the reader as "W7AQ K" rather than "W7AQK".  In thinking 
about it, it made me realize how easy it is to slip into these little bad 
habits.  Some stations send their calls with insufficient spacing between 
letters.  Things that we send repeatedly, like call, name, QTH, etc. seem to 
be common candidates for this type of error.  It's as if, on occasion, we 
develop our own rhythm for sending these standard items in violation of the 
standard timing and spacing rules.  And some folks just plain don't put the 
right number of "dits" in what they send.  I heard one W6 station who 
repeatedly sent his call with 5 dits in the number 6, as well as repeatedly 
sending a "5" for an "H".  In cases like that, the reader won't lie!  But 
your brain won't lie either.  You will probably get that "hey, wait a 
minute" feeling about what you are hearing.

Anyway, I then used the reader to "retrain" myself to send my call so that 
it did not insert an extra space between the "Q" and the "K".  It was a hard 
habit to break.  Years of doing it wrong aren't easily erased.  But I would 
strongly recommend that folks use the reader now and then to monitor their 
own sending.  On a transmitted signal, the reader is very accurate in my 
view.  And if you intend to utilize the K3's capability of translating your 
CW into RTTY, you better have your sending timing in good shape.

Anyway, as I said above, the W1AW test is about the best way I know to 
really check out the reading capability of your K3.  If it doesn't read that 
pretty well, I would guess you have a problem with your K3.

Dave W7AQK


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Tom Childers, N5GE" <n5ge at n5ge.com>
To: <mike at paxsen.com>
Cc: <Elecraft at mailman.qth.net>
Sent: Tuesday, May 20, 2008 9:08 PM
Subject: Re: [Elecraft] K3 Auto CW copy


On Tue, 20 May 2008 20:12:14 -0700, you wrote:

>I have noticed that the CW text display of auto copied CW signals often 
>does
>not get the spacing between words and runs words together. When I copy the
>same text in my head the word spacing seems pretty good. Also when I send 
>CW
>it will also run words together. So I am wondering about a tweak to the
>algorithm. Making a computer copy CW of unknown speed must be difficult. 
>But
>everyone knows my code is perfect :)

I noticed the same thing when I was sending, but when I paid more attention 
to
making sure my timing between words was consistent the spacing improved 
along
with my sending ;o)  What a nice tool for improving my sending!

>On the other hand I had a QSO with a near local (80 miles) and he had
>trouble copying me because of QRM. I was dialed down to 50 Hz and heard no
>other signal present. I opened up to 1 KHz and there they all were. Isn't
>that great or what?
>
>Mike Scott - AE6WA
>Tarzana, CA (DM04 / near LA)
>K3-100 #508/ KX1  #1311
>
>