[Elecraft] Prosign "IM" to end K3 RTTY idle not working: Solved

[Fred Jensen]

Hmmm ... I had punctuation on my 2nd Telegraph exam in 1956 and got 
credit for the code when I sat for the Extra that afternoon at the Los 
Angeles FCC office.  I didn't know the Extra code did not include 
punctuation.

All the mills at the coastal marine station I worked at had a slashed 
zero, and a "1" key [not present on regular typewriters, you used a 
lower-case "L"].  They also had a couple of prosigns on them, I remember 
BT and AR.  We had five mills, four of which were open-frame Underwoods. 
  The prosigns had no bar.  I can't remember the make of the fifth one, 
never really used it, but the prosigns on it had a bar.

I have a 1990 ARRL Handbook, and on pg 38-2, Table 2 lists four prosigns 
and a couple of other signals.  AR, KN, AS, and SK all have a bar.  K, 
R, and CL do not, not that this means anything.

The operating description for AR is interesting:  "Used after a call to 
a specific station before the contact has been established."  I wonder 
where they got that?

73,

Fred K6DGW
- Northern California Contest Club
- CU in the 2012 Cal QSO Party 6-7 Oct 2012
- www.cqp.org

On 12/3/2011 8:05 AM, Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
> I believe -.--. has always been a left-hand parenthesis.

That's what I learned.
>
> Since Hams didn't use parenthesis in CW communications, it didn't produce a
> conflict. (For me, the toughest part of passing the commercial RadioTelegaph
> license test back in the 1950's was learning to copy all the punctuation
> marks Hams never use mixed into 5-letter groups at 20 WPM.)