[Elecraft] KX3 manual page 14 regardincg "TUNE".

Jim Brown jim at audiosystemsgroup.com
Mon Feb 6 14:05:13 EST 2023


On 2/6/2023 9:47 AM, K9ZTV wrote:
> CW never means Morse Code.   It means continuous wave or carrier wave (used interchangeably).
> 
> Morse-type Code occurs only when a continuous wave is turned on and off to represent letters, numbers, and punctuation according to a given language's agreed upon chart of correlation.

Kent,

You're technically correct, but for the 67 years I've been a ham, "CW" 
has meant Morse code on the ham bands. This has, indeed, led to 
misunderstandings about the bandwidth of Morse transmission. A constant 
carrier has near zero bandwidth. Morse transmission occupies hundreds of 
Hz in a GOOD transmitter.

And Morse operation on the ham bands is 100% amplitude modulation of a 
carrier by a train of rectangular waves, which in poorly designed rigs 
produces intermodulation distortion in the RF signal chain, sidebands 
that are heard as key clicks. In general, the strength of sidebands is 
proportional to the speed of the transitions from on to off and off to 
on -- the faster the transition, the stronger the clicks. One of the 
many virtues of Elecraft rigs beginning with the original K3 is that 
these transitions are carefully shaped to minimize clicks while 
maximizing readability.

73, Jim K9YC


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