Have you ever actually tried it, Tony ?? Its far from easy to go from
fully non-iambic squeeze keying to iambic. It simply does not work. I
have been stuck with it whilst guest operating overseas, and it was
awful and extremely tiring. I can easily switch my own external keyer
into iambic mode; in fact any time someone wants to hear garbage (more
than my usual garbage that is) I'll do it.
But going the opposite way is trivial, as long as the non-iambic keyer
has dot/dash memories, because at the end of the day, all iambic keying
has is a dot/dash memory to stop you losing the odd dot/dash off the end
of a character through slamming the lever(s) over too fast. All the
iambic buff needs do is exactly what he/she did before and it works
fine. You cannot single squeeze anything more elaborate than an "a" or
an "n" with an iambic keyer and thats exactly what a non-iambic keyer
with dot/dash memories will do for you. You do not have to learn any new
tricks at all.
If you go from a keyer with dot/dash memories to one without ANY such
memories at all (and they are now mainly useful as museum pieces) then
you do have a serious timing problem, but so would anyone unfamiliar
with vintage keyers. The guys who can use those old fashioned keyers
well have had years of practice to sharpen up their timing, because the
leeway for error is zilch.
Now why do they build keyers into rigs at all if they cannot be set up
to suit different operators ?? One answer: the availability of the
Curtis dedicated CW chip. Very neat, but inflexible. I think Mr Curtis
missed a trick and everyone since then has simply copied the same logic.
Maybe its as simple as him not having room on his original chip for any
more code ?? So iambic is the flavour of the month, even at TT, (and I'm
about as relevant as the dinosaur). At least my Omni-V has no built-in
keyer for me to curse/ignore, and it still keys beautifully.
Now that is what we really want. The actual keying gizmo is a
distraction as long as the signal is clean and the op takes care to
send readable code. TT got their part right; its up to those whose
ambitions exceed 5 wpm to deliver the "readable" bit, through practice.
No-one can tell what key you use - they only hear the output.
73 to all John G3JAG
Hutbers Law of Re-structuring: "Improvement" means deterioration.
(Someone always loses .....)
On 01-Jan-00 B. J. \"Tony\" Martin wrote:
>
> I couldn't agree more. A non-iambic operator can use an iambic
> operator's
> key configuration with ease. BUT, it is a very different story if
> you are
> an iambic operator faced with a non-iambic configuration (like field
> day,
> or a real emergency).
----------------------------------
E-Mail: John - G3JAG <patents@dx0man.prestel.co.uk>
To: <tentec@contesting.com>
Date: 02-Jan-00
Time: 00:29:03
This message was sent by XFMail
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