[Elecraft] Ham radio as a side dish

[Martin Sole]

I can really relate to these two.

As a kid I played drums. My father taught and played pretty much all his 
life until his hearing gave out. Though my CW has never been more than 
remedial mostly the sense of rhythm and timing is mostly excellent and I 
attribute it to those early years. When I took the then GPO 12wpm UK 
Morse test the coastguard guy did comment on my good fist.

On the navaids ID I have a good one. Just recently I commissioned 2 
ILS's out in the Middle East, though primarily for the US Air Forces 
use. I had a good raport with the tower guys and would often spend time 
up in the tower. Having just programmed the ILS idents I asked a 
controller to have one of the approaching aircraft take a listen and 
report the code back to be sure it was keying okay. It seems this, to 
me, simple request caught this particular KC135 crew off guard. "Wait 
one", came back the response, a couple of minutes later, somewhat 
confused sounding they came back with a "er, well, its kinda dee dee 
doh, doh dee doh, dee dee". Took me a second or two to figure they had 
actually got it right just with no spacing. I guess they don't teach 
pilots code now either.

Though I've never worked on navaids in the US, only in Asia and EU, I've 
never done one with a voice ident, only ever CW.

Martin, HS0ZED


On 26/05/2018 19:56, Dave Sublette wrote:
>
>   Music: I play trumpet in a couple of bands. My experience with Morse Code
> has helped me (my opinion) be more precise with timing or rhythms.  I also
> believe, although I'm not sure studies have proven, that ability to learn
> and use Morse Code is highly correlated with musical ability.
>
> Flying: I hold Commercial, Multiiengine and Intrument ratings.  When I was
> taking lessons, flying cross country using VORs (before GPS), I would tune
> to the next VOR, I.D.it by hearing the Morse identifier, and turn the
> volume down.  My instructor would then lecture me on the need for properly
> I.D.ing the station before turning down the volume.  I had a hard time
> making him understand that those dits and dahs were telling me the same
> thing the voice would have.
>