[Milsurplus] Why No Keying Bugs - individual keying characterstics

[Hue Miller]

If this is true, i mean no bugs on ship, that's not really different from 
Army use,
with or without some express Army policy. One thing is, a bug is a lot less 
robust
than a straight key, so for land-mobile operations you would not use a bug.
I have a Vibroplex that some Army used in Europe ( i think ) and the case 
has
the unit name on it. I think it was ground-air operations. I also have an 
Army
certificate that permits the user to use a bug key. Someday i'll post that 
as well
as other useful certificates so you can print them out and self-award 
whatever
certificate you might need.
Most miitary traffic was in the range 12-20 wpm if i am not mistaken. That 
hardly
calls for bug use. I recall reading in "Navy Retread" that Navy FOX 
broadcasts
were upped in speed in 1943 or 44 to 20 wpm to be able to pass more of the
mass  of messages they had - and that it was a bit of a stretch to reach 20.
How would you like to copy the day's news at even 20 wpm? That would take
forever, i'd think. I think the larger ships from ??? class upward all had 
RTTY
equipment anyway, for serious high capacity message taking. Also all the
larger Army land comm stations and air defense headquarters had RTTY, i 
believe,
even some pretty makeshift looking operations close to the front.
-Hue Miller