K7QOs Code Course 1

K7QOs Code Course

Version 4.0
November 2013
by Chuck Adams, K7QO
http://www.k7qo.net/

This course if offered free of charge and royality rights.

If you are student and some one charges you for the disc
or material, I want to know about it. I have this course in
ISO format on the above web page for free downloading
at any time.

This version, 4.0, differs from previous versions in that I have cor-
rected any errors that I could find and I have added a daily sched-
ule for the first 8 weeks to get you into a rhythm of working on
the code daily. After the first 8 weeks you can then go at your own
pace and I do hope you will continue to work and use Morse code
for the remainder of your life. Enjoy the journey and good luck.

My name is Chuck Adams and my call is K7QO. I will be your men-

tor for this course. I dislike the term elmer that hams like to use
for instructors. It is sounds too much like an individual that has no
dress code and no hygiene care. (If you are an instructor, I would
like for you to do so with good habits and not offend any one with
poor conduct. Wear proper clothing and a shirt with a collar and
not some dirty teeshirt with some offensive text on it. Business
casual might be the term for a dress code.) I have been doing
Morse code since 1957 and it is my favorite mode of communica-
tion in amateur radio. That does not make me an expert on the
topic, but I do want to give you what I know and you can modify
it to fit your needs. But I have seen too many people learn the
Morse code the wrong way and then quit when they couldnt get
faster. Lets not let that happen to you.

The Morse code may not come easy and in order to get proficient
K7QOs Code Course 2

at it you must devote an appreciable amount of time to it. My job

is to guide you through the swamp of bad habits and keep you
from falling into the quicksand.

I did not start out with a mentor. My dad, W5NNB, felt that he
could not teach me the code, since I was his son and probably
wouldnt listen to him. So he took me to a amateur radio club
meeting in Kermit (12 miles away from Wink, TX) and I met some
kids my age. This was on a Thursday night. They told me to go
home and memorize the code and come back on Saturday and
they would start helping me.

And that is what I did. I went back home and started with an In-
structograph machine that used paper tapes with holes in them
to generate the code. I used a single tube audio oscillator with it
to generate the tones. Since I didnt have any one to help me for
two days, I started out memorizing the letters using the Instructo-
graph and the manual. On Saturday I went to Terrys, K5WNH, and
he and Roy Acuff, K5WSC, sat me down and gave me a test. They
asked me how much of the alphabet and numbers had I memo-
rized and I told them all of them. They said "Sure" and began the
test. I was doing 12WPM without errors.

What made this possible was the fact that I memorized the letters
and numbers at a higher speed than most people probably started
teaching in any course. And I did not use any charts, cute little
tunes, and other crutches that will later slow you down. If you
learned the code any other way than rote memorization of the
sounds, you may need to start over. Any one that teaches or
shows the Morse code with dots and dashes or other visual aids
is killing off high speeds and ruining a bunch of good minds. Ill
explain later. Dont use any materials or computer programs that
show you dits and dahs, etc. for feedback. Only the letters and
characters themselves.

There are a number of people running around that claim you should
K7QOs Code Course 3

not use tapes and CDs to learn the code. They claim that it is pos-
sible for you to memorize the materials. So what? Didnt we all
memorize "See Spot"? And if you memorize all the material on
this disc I will buy you a Krispy Kreme donut the next time I see
you. There are over 20 hours of Morse on this CD and not a human
voice to be heard.
A few years later after I obtained my Novice license I got a set of
vinyl records made by Conan W.B. Barger, W3CVE, that made up
about 2 hours of code practice. With that set of records (and I have
them copied to CD now, but the audio quality is bad) I practiced
and got to over 55WPM with them. But that required the variable
speed phonograph player to obtain the higher speeds with the
same physical tracks on vinyl.
Conan mentions on his record that CW operators are not born but
are trained. This is probably true of a majority of the things the
human race does. You just have to set aside the time to practice
and get good at this if you really want to do it. You cant do it in
one day, so set aside some time each day and you will do well.

Course Outline

In this course I will teach you how to do three things. It is my hope

and my wish that you learn all three techniques for copying code
and not skip one or more of them. You should learn each as each
has advantages and you should be able to do any of them. But
only you will know how much time you want to devote to learning
this mode of communication. I can not do it for you.

Copy Morse code using pen and paper.

Copy Morse code using a typewriter or keyboard.

Copy Morse code in your head without hard copy.

K7QOs Code Course 4

Figure 1: Materials Needed.

Materials You Will Need

This is a list of the materials that I recommend that you start with
for this course.

A Spiral Notebook.

A rolling writer type pen.

A portable MP3 player, either using CD or an iPod.

The K7QO Code Course CD.

A good set of headphones for the player.

Set aside about 3060 minutes per day.

K7QOs Code Course 5

Spiral Notebook

I recommend a spiral notebook for several reasons. I buy them

from Staples where I can get 6 of the single subject notebooks
for under five dollars including tax. I like a notebook that lies flat
on the desk when open and I can write on front or back of pages
without any problems. And I want you to be proud of the work
that you do for this course and keep it all together in one place.
Later I am going to give you an exercise that requires you to take
everything for this course out into the real world.

I started out with a novice class license in 1957 as KN5FJZ and

I wrote down everything that I copied and to this date I still do
the same thing. I use the spiral notebooks to record everything
during a QSO and then later transfer the date, time, and other
information to a computerized logbook. When I was a senior in
high school I filled up nine ARRL logbooks with one QSO per line
in a period of one year operating only on 40 meter CW using a
Heathkit Apache transmitter and a NC-300 receiver. I even had a
QSK setup made up of two 1N34 diodes and a 5W 120V bulb in a
small metal box. I wrote down everything I heard to paper.

Also in the same time period from the mid to late50s a great
deal of CW activity occurred in the commercial broadcast bands.
Remember. This was before the age of computers, satellites, CNN,
and cell phones. Both commercial cargo ships and passenger
ships at sea could only get the news via CW stations that broad-
cast the news daily on certain frequencies. UPI, API, and the wire
services at the time ran several stations that did this. I remember
some of them and list them here for historical purposes.

WSC from NY at 25WPM

NPG from CA at 1226WPM

WNU from LA at 1625WPM

K7QOs Code Course 6

KPH from CA at 1822WPM

WAX from FL at 1625WPM

NPM from HI at 1226WPM

WOE from FL at 1625WPM

KPH from CA at 1822WPM

WCO from NY at 22WPM

WFK from NY at 30WPM

Most of the stations were on daily and at specific times and fre-
quencies while others were on only a day or two per week. The
radio operator on each of the ships would copy the daily news us-
ing a mechanical typewriter and then post the news on a bulletin
board for the crew and passengers to read and keep informed as
to what was happening in the rest of the world. People forget that
we didnt always have photocopy machines and desktop comput-
ers... I used to listen to the above for copying plain text almost
daily.

On modern ships there is a complete news department that gets

the news from satellite and TV feeds, prints a small on board news-
paper and distributes it daily to each cabin under the door. Com-
plete with graphics and all the other frills. Not to mention on board
TV and computer links.

While these stations were in operation I used to copy them daily

when I wasnt tied up with other school activities. This helped
me to get my speed to over 20 WPM in a hurry. I also learned a
bunch of the characters that many CW ops dont know, dont use
and dont care about. Things like left and right parenthesis, colon
and semicolon just to mention a few. Ill have these on some files
K7QOs Code Course 7

and would like for you to learn them and impress your family and
friends. Of course, after this you may lose some of your friends.

Because of my learning to write down what I heard I still do that

and I want you to learn it also. It comes in handy in more ways
than you think. I used to win code copying contests at the Midland
TX ham meets yearly at 35 and 40 WPM because you could not
bring in a typewriter. Soupy Groves from Odessa and I used to
battle it out each year for the first place certificate and another
high speed op from Austin named Mark and I forget his last name.
This was all over 50 years ago.

Writing Instrument

I want you to use a rolling writer or other type gel pen. You want
something that has the least amount of friction across the paper
and something that at fast writing speeds does not skip. I buy
packages of a dozen Uniball GEL STICK pens or Bic GEL ROLLER
pens for around three bucks. They write smoothly and are very
inexpensive for a quarter each from Staples Office Supply.

The reason for using a rolling writer pen over a ball point or pencil
has to do with the physics of friction and resulting writing speed.
Also you must not print. You MUST use cursive writing and I wont
take no for an answer here. And here is a chance for you to work
on your penmanship at the same time. I frequently see articles
or letters in the newspaper about how the educational system in
America no longer teaches this and I of course see it when I am
in stores and other places and watch people write. Look online
using your favorite search engine for penmanship, speedwriting,
and cursive writing.

Here is a test. Take pen and paper. Have some one time you. For
one minute print as many capital As as you can. The repeat the
exercise using script and do lower case as. Which is faster?
K7QOs Code Course 8

I wrote the above almost 15 years ago. Today is June 18, 2013. On
the six oclock CBS news, Scott Pelley had a news snippet about
the Secretary of the Treasury of the US. When he was nominated,
Obama made a remark that Mr Jack Lew would work on his pen-
manship so that at least one letter of his name would be recogniz-
able so as not to deface the US currency.

Later I will mention that at high speeds you need to reduce the
length of descenders and ascenders of letters like g, q, l, and k.
And also you might want to practice, when receiving Morse code,
by not crossing your ts and dotting your is. Come back later
and do that. It will save you time for copying code at the higher
speeds, if you ever want to be able to do 30 WPM or more.
K7QOs Code Course 9

MP3 Player

I recommend that you buy one of the new small type MP3 players,
if you do not already have one. Any of the big box stores, say
Wal*Mart, should have a good MP3 player for under 20 dollars.
The Code Course will work well with any of them. If the MP3 player
has at least 2GB, you will have enough room for the entire code
course and your record collection.

I have the code course sound files in MP3 format and named so
that you are able to go through them in numerical order and there
is a low frequency tone (three times) at the end of each lesson so
that you will know when you have come to the end of the lesson.
If you get an MP3 player that has one of the LCD displays, they
typically show the file name and even the length of time for the
file. In the next photo you will see where I wrote down the time
for the file next to the rectangle containing the file number.

Because I wanted to get over 10 hours of audio on a single disc I

had to go to this format. Now if you already own a regular audio
CD player you can find a computer program to convert the MP3
files back to the format that you need. The only problem is that it
will take more than ten CDs to get the 100 plus files in that format.

Make sure that you have the batteries charged in the case of mod-
ern MP3 players or do as I do and use NiMH rechargables in a MP3
CD player as shown in the photo.

I would like for you to have the portability of being able to take this
code course with you and have access during the day if you get 5
or 10 minutes to practice. Every minute helps. And later I will ask
you to go to a busy place like a mall and practice an exercise or
two to work on your concentration and block distractions.

I do not want you to use a computer for this course to play the CD.
The computer is a distraction.
K7QOs Code Course 10

A note on distractions. Please. When you are working on this

course. Have no distractions. No TV. No radio. No music in the
background. No phones. No HF or VHF ham radios going. No until
much later in the course.

The reason for the quite environment. We are going to work on

your long term memory. In order to learn and remember the
morse code you need to concentrate and do repetition. Do you
remember how you learned the alphabet the first time in your life.
You were taught the alphabet in order and you had to hear it, write
it down and you did this for quite some time to get it into long term
memory. That is what is required here also.
K7QOs Code Course 11

Headphones

OK, first of all. Your ears are very important and you only get
issued one set per lifetime. So never never ever do you listen to
Morse at loud volumes. Headphones come with documentation
and you need to read it. Also make sure you have the volume at
a minimum when you turn on the MP3 player. Make sure you or
someone hasnt accidently moved the volume control to a higher
volume.

I dislike using speakers for copying Morse code. The sound from
the speaker echos off of walls and solid objects and it will interfere
with your hearing at high speeds. And the quality is an issue.

I like the new Sony h.ear light ear pieces that sell for 10 dollars
at WalMart. The model number is MDR-J10. I find them to be
comfortable for long periods of time, but mileage may vary. And
be very very careful as they are efficient and you will not need
much volume. These are the earphones that you see in the photo.

I listen at the lowest volume possible. Here are the reasons for
me. I want to be able to hear when Im a hundred years old. Also
at higher volumes you will generate a thump at the beginning
of each element of a character. And the ear drum is like a bass
drum. The harder you thump it the longer it will resonate, thus in-
terfering with the next element of the code character and slowing
you down.

And Im sure there is a physiological effect that loud volumes will

tire you much faster than low volumes. I have always protected
my hearing from an early age in high school when I had a rocket
that I built blow up when I bent over to pick it up after it did not
launch for 15 minutes. I was very lucky. But my left ear did ring for
two days after that event. I even left a KISS concert 5 minutes into
it when I was working on my PhD at TAMU because the volume was
so loud. I was almost at the back of the coliseum for the concert.
K7QOs Code Course 12

My ears rang for an hour after just that short exposure period of
high sound levels.

So protect your ears, please.

This CD can be used to experiment with different headphones and

earphones. There is no thump on each of the elements of each
character. So if you hear a thump or annoying pop then you need
to check your volume and experiment by using another set of
headphones or earphones.

Time and Place

Theres not much I can tell you about this topic. It just seems to
be going faster every year for all of us. You should start on this
course today. If you dont, you will keep thinking of excuses to
wait until tomorrow.

Find a quiet place away from the TV, family, and all the other
distractions. Hopefully a desk or kitchen table where you can be
comfortable and write easily. You just need about 30 to 60 minutes
per day to get started. Try not to over do it. Too much time is just
as bad as too little. Get into a regular habit.

Try to set aside the same time period each day and do this al-
most every day. Dont do this when you are tired as the human
mind doesnt work as well and you need every brain cell in top
condition.

I taught and developed courses in both the university system and

for a large computer company. One of the things that I learned
about human attention span is that the average attention span
for an adult is 20 minutes. After that the mind starts to wander
and daydream. So learning the Morse code is going to teach you
something about yourself and how well you concentrate. I find
that CW operation and especially contest operation helps me to
K7QOs Code Course 13

concentrate for longer periods of time. I play poker tournaments

where I may have to sit and concentrate for several hours at a
time before a break comes along. Look for me on ESPN starting
in July in one of the shows. My experience with Morse seems to
have helped.

Your short term memory will be helped also because this required
concentration helps exercise whatever part that is used for at-
tention to the outside world. If you find that you drift and lose
concentration then take a break, but do try to not use that as an
excuse not to keep working.

Getting Started

Now we are ready to start the first lesson. Im going through a

lengthy discussion for this to get you started correctly. After that
you keep on going until you get to the end.

Get setup with the player, earphones, pen, CD, and paper. OK.
Open the notebook to the first or second clean page. You may
want to put your name, call if any, etc. on the first page or in-
side cover in case the notebook gets misplaced so that it can be
returned to you. Also make a backup copy of the CD if you have
a CD burner on a computer. Make copies and give them to kids,
relatives, friends, and even your enemies (drive them insane).

Now I have gone through this entire course myself and used a
notebook as shown. What I do for each lesson or test is put the
file number enclosed in a block on a line along with the date that
I did the exercise. You can use this to keep track of your progress
and make sure that you arent skipping any days. You dont have
to go to a new page each day or each lesson, but if you retake
a test on the same page, then find a blank page to cover up the
previous run so that you arent tempted to compare while the test
K7QOs Code Course 14

Figure 2: A Notebook Page.

is in progress. Here is what my first page of my notebook looks

like.
K7QOs Code Course 15

The disc is setup to teach you two letters in two files and then a
test that covers all the letters that you have learned up to that
point in the course. For example, 001 is for the letter a and 002
is for the letter b. File 003 is a test over a and b. Do not write the
letters in caps. Always use lower case letters (script handwriting)
when copying CW. There is no need for capital letters and lower
case letters are faster to write. Then files 004 and 005 are for c
and d respectively with file 006 a test over the letters a, b, c and
d. On the test files you will first hear the letters in the alphabet
covered at that point then the letters in random order to test your
retention.

The time required for each file or lesson is given in a table near
the end of this manual (and it may be out of date and let me know
if you find a file that is different from the table). Start out trying
the first 6 files in one session (about 20 minutes or so).

A note here on the files on the disc. There are the MP3 files num-
bered 001.mp3, 002.mp3 and so forth. There is a directory named
answers that contains the text files for each audio file. The files
are named 001.txt, 002.txt and so forth. I recommend that you
not use them. Instead, do the following. After you listen to and
write down your responses to the audio file on paper for each test,
then go back to the first of the file and replay it. This time listening
to the audio and looking at and checking each character that you
wrote down the first time. This does two things. It allows you to
check your response to the audio and it also reinforces your long
term memory. If you are still having trouble or difficulty, then of
course you can examine the file and double check your work.

You may even want to use a red pen to grade your copy and write
down the number correct vs the total number of characters to
determine the percentage correct. There is no set number you
have to strive for. You will make mistakes, so dont get all OCD
on me. I like to think that if one is not making mistakes then the
K7QOs Code Course 16

speed is too slow. Pick a number that you are comfortable with.
Id say 85 per cent is a good number for the first or second time
through an exam exercise.

Morse code is a representation (via sound) of each character, nu-

meral, punctuation and even some special combinations for pro-
cedure signs (prosigns). Do not try to dissect them into individ-
ual components and most importantly do not count or visualize
the individual elements (the dits and dahs) of the character. This
will only slow you down and you will develop habits that are very
difficult to break. You will hear the descrete components at any
speed. Just dont use up valuable mental effort trying to think
about them.

On the Internet and in books you will see some people represent
the sounds with dots and dashes. These individuals are not doing
any one any favors by doing this. Id bet you a dollar to a hole in a
donut that these individuals cant do Morse at more than 18 WPM,
otherwise theyd know better than to ruin the future training of
other individuals. So dont you do it and I dont want to see you
ever with flash cards. Use the code course CD.

How would you put down the sound of a jet engine, siren, steam
locomotive (hope you have heard an actual locomotive in your life
other than the big screen), fog horn, or other common sounds?
No way. So why do the same thing with Morse?

So, for each character listen to the sound and then immediately
write it down. Do this all the time. Dont think about it and if you
do not recognize the character then skip it and get ready for the
next one. For starters just leave an extra space on the page or
put a small dot there for grading purposes. You are training your
neural networks in your mind to respond to the code sounds.

You will sometimes know what character is coming next. Do not

ever write down a character before it is completed. I could have
K7QOs Code Course 17

gotten nasty and made some files and inserted errors on purpose
to break you of this habit, but I trust you to do right. The reason
for tests with random letters is to make sure that you dont do
this and to make sure that you instantly respond to and recognize
characters rapidly. You will, during later sessions, know exactly
what letter is coming next. Dont write it down until it has been
completed. Red Barger, W3CVE, used to do this on the vinyl discs.
He would put the letters in the wrong order on some tests for
words just to make sure that you did not get ahead and to make
sure that you put down what was sent and not correct it on the fly.

Lesson One

Now open your notebook to your starting page and put 001 in
a small block and the current date next to it. Get positioned to
write and start the MP3 player on file 001. This is for the letter a
(remember write, not print, in lower case). Every time you hear
the sound combination for the letter a then immediately write it
down and get ready for the next one. They may seem to come
pretty fast but youll get used to it. Concentrate on the sound you
hear each time. Mentally, do not repeat it or convert it to what you
think it is in sound. Dont try to verbalize the sound. Just hear it
and then write down the letter. Make sure you try to remember it.
There is an exaggerated quiet area between every 5 characters,
so you may want to write the characters in groups of 5 letters with
a space in between the groups. Write small and neatly and see
how many you can get per line and still be able to read them.

After you finish file 001 then get ready for file 002 and do the
same thing except this time it is for the letter b and write it down
each time you hear it. Concentrate.

Hopefully your player doesnt get the two files too close in time,
but it is OK to stop the player between files and setup for the next
one on the page. Feel free to restart if necessary.
K7QOs Code Course 18

OK, after files 001 and 002 you should now have two letters mem-
orized. But your mind probably needs some work. That is the
purpose of file 003. Setup for file 003 and you will first hear a
followed by b. Go ahead and write them down when you hear
them. Then will come b followed by a, the letters in reverse order.
I do this on all the test files during the process of learning the let-
ters and numbers. Do not skip writing them down when you hear
them. Then will come a sequence of the letters in random order
and they will be in groups of five letters per group. Note the extra
silence between the groups. Copy the entire file and then stop the
player.

Here is another way to do the tests that are spread through out the
course. Listen to the test and write down the letters as you hear
them. After finishing the test, instead of looking up the answers,
play through the test again. You can rewrite the letters and then
compare the two copies or you can look at your answers as the
file is played again and see if there are any glaring errors.

Here is what you should have (dont peek at this until after you
finish the test). The spacing is not critical and blanks do not count
until we get to plain text.

ab ab
aaaba abaab ababa baaab
babbb aaaba bbaba abbbb
aabaa baaab aabab abbaa
abaaa bbaba bbbab baaba
babaa babab baaab aaabb
ababb ababa abbba aabaa
bbaab

Now mark your copy with a red pen for each letter that you missed.
This test should be an easy one, but dont feel badly if you miss
K7QOs Code Course 19

a few. Grade yourself. There are a total of 100 letters not count-
ing the first two. Thus if you missed 5 your grade is 95 per cent.
Feel free to do this as many times as you like. You be the guide.
Strive for perfection, but dont get too obsessive about this and
wear yourself out. If you can tell the difference between a country
and western song, classical music and rap, then you can learn the
Morse code to any speed you want.

Lesson Two

What you want to do now is move on to files 004, 005 and 006.
Do them the same way as you did for the previous files. Now this
is the last time Im going to do this for you, so dont get spoiled
easily. Here is what you should get for 006, the test for a, b, c,
and d.

abcd dcba
bdbdb bdcac ccddd aabac
aabbd cdcba caddb cbacb
ccbca cbcad adada caacc
dadac badac bccbc cbcad
badad acbab cdada cbabc

How did you do? Good. There is no passing or failing grade here.
You want to get to 100 per cent, but that will take time. Especially
after you memorize the entire alphabet and numbers. Be patient
and dont try to bite off too much at one time. If you work on 6 to
9 files per day and do this daily you should have all the alphabet
and the numbers in two weeks. Dont try to do them all in one day.
That is the way they do things in language schools where they do
saturation. You dont need that here.

Review individual letter files regularly. After tests check which

letter or letters are giving you the most trouble and go back to the
K7QOs Code Course 20

corresponding file and review it until you copy almost perfectly.

Practice makes perfect.

We have now reached the point where there is not much more to
tell you. You need to practice daily and do all that is on this CD.
Keep a page in the back of your notebook for your test scores and
dates. Take the tests multiple times. Each time will improve your
ability to copy the Morse code. Do not feel badly if there are some
files that seem to give you more trouble than others. Some are
more challenging. Keep coming back to them until you get them
mastered. You do not have to make 90 per cent or better every
time. But it is nice when you reach that skill level and you will.

At some point Id like for you to start over on the tests starting with
003. But on the second pass through them try to wait one or two
characters before you start writing and practice on having one or
two characters buffered in your mind. This takes some practice. It
is not unlike taking notes in school where you had to copy behind
what the instructor was saying or doing.

Advanced Exercises

Make at least one pass through the CD using your notebook and
pen. Keep a record of your progress. It may be possible that the
faster speeds and handwriting may be too much for you. Hope-
fully this will not happen but it could. Do the best you can.

Now that you have made it through the course, lets start all over
again. This time start with file 001 and start copying using a key-
board. I just spent 90 dollars for an electric daisy wheel typewriter
just to do it myself. I can use a computer keyboard, but what chal-
lenge is that?

You want to train yourself to copy direct from sound to the key
without any conscious thought. You may have heard the tales of
expert Morse operators being able to copy to a mill (old name
K7QOs Code Course 21

for the mechanical typewriter) and carry on a conversation at the

same time. It comes only with years of practice.

If you are a typist, then there should be no limit to the speed at

which you can copy.

Do the entire course several times on the keyboard until you can
get excellent results. This may take several months to do, but
dont stop in the middle for any reason. Work. Work. Work.

The contents of all the files are given in the answers subdirectory
on the CD. Use these files to double check your work only after
you have written down the code at least once. Try not to use
these files as a handicap. You can copy the code and have an
idea when an error has occurred. Build up your confidence with
practice.

The SweepStakes file (121.mp3) contains contest exchanges for

the November ARRL SweepStakes CW contest. Each line consists
of a series of Vs followed by a sequence number, a single letter,
a call sign, a two digit number and the abbreviation for an ARRL
section. This is good practice as the Vs set your mind up for a
speed and a tone then the characters start. You dont have to
write down the Vs as this represents where your call would go
during the actual contest.

Wrap Up

Several things that you can do after you have thoroughly mas-
tered the alphabet and all the numerals. You will note that through-
out this course I have not mentioned one thing about code speed.
That is secondary to learning the code. Practice and the speed
will get there as the mind responds more rapidly to the Morse
code sounds.

First thing that you might consider doing to supplement this code
course is to download files from
K7QOs Code Course 22

www.arrl.org/w1aw/morse.html

These are the on the air sessions run by W1AW on a weekly basis.
You can also check the ARRL web site for daily W1AW CW practice
sessions. For these, you will know the speed of the transmissions
and get an idea of just where your code speed is.

Also note the monthly code proficiency runs from W1AW and after
you get your code speed at a comfortable level you can attempt
to copy these runs and get a very nice certificate from the ARRL. I
collect these regularly at 40WPM, when they have the high speed
run. Just a part of the hobby of copying high speed Morse code.

And lastly the most challenging thing of all. Go to the web site:

http://www.rufzxp.net/

I challenge you to try this program. You can find my highest score
under the Senior Male scores under the tab toplist on the web
page. But dont be intimidated by the program. Just start out
practicing and try it every day for 10 minutes. Then submit your
highest score via the web as outlined on the web page. We need
more new scores from North America. Lets see what you can do.

And I leave you with the words of Alexander Pope. "Not failure but
low aim is crime". Give it your best shot and enjoy CW as a simple
and efficient means of communication. It is as close as you can
get for mind to mind communication when both parties are good
at Morse code.

dit dit de K7QO

K7QOs Code Course 23

Daily Schedule for 8 Weeks

Day One
001.mp3 the letter a
002.mp3 the letter b
003.mp3 ab exam
004.mp3 the letter c
005.mp3 the letter d
006.mp3 ae exam
007.mp3 the letter e
008.mp3 the letter f
009.mp3 af exam
K7QOs Code Course 24

FILE File Contents

001 a
002 b
003 a-b Test
004 c
005 d
006 a-d Test
007 e
008 f
009 a-f Test
010 g
011 h
012 a-h Test
013 i
014 j
015 a-j Test
016 k
017 l
018 a-l Test
019 m
020 n
021 a-n Test
022 o
023 p
024 a-p Test
025 q
026 r
027 a-r Test
028 s
029 t
030 a-t Test
031 u
032 v
033 a-v Test
034 w
035 x
036 a-x Test
K7QOs Code Course 25

FILE File Contents

037 y
038 z
039 a-z Test
040 Two Letter Words
041 Two Letter Words
042 Three Letter Words
043 Three Letter Words
044 Three Letter Words
045 Four Letter Words
046 Mixed Words
047 1
048 2
049 1-2
050 3
051 1-3
052 4
053 1-4
054 5
055 1-5
056 6
057 1-6
058 7
059 1-7
060 8
061 1-8
062 9
063 1-9
064 0
065 1-0
066 cq de
067 QSO Beginning
068 Comma
069 Period
070 qth hr is
071 name hr is
072 rig hr is
K7QOs Code Course 26

FILE File Contents

073 wx hr is
074 ur rst is
075 ant hr is
076 Question and Double Dash
077 QSO
078 QSO
079 QSO
080 QSO
081 QSO
082 QSO
083 Random Letters
084 Random Letters
085 Random Numbers
086 pi
087 Slant Sign /
088 Random Characters
089 Random Characters
090 Punctuation
091 kilometer
092 fort
093 fathom
094 logbook
095 mauna kea
096 watt
097 zenith
098 tugboat
099 teflon
100 quart
101 kakapo
102 mint
103 photon
104 summer
105 talc
106 putty
107 joule
108 hardness
K7QOs Code Course 27

FILE File Contents

109 vanilla
110 tile
111 scissors
112 rake
113 alberta
114 cardboard
115 waterplant
116 hexagon
117 krypton
118 liveoak
119 integer
120 keck
121 SweepStakes Contest
122 abacus
123 almond
124 sonar
125 umbrella
126 bleach
127 eclipse
128 dew
129 liquid
130 sprat
131 sirius
132 solstice
133 barometer
134 free fall
135 waves
136 radar
137 hearing
138 light
139 english
140 sentences
141 verbs
142 adjectives
143 periods
144 questions
K7QOs Code Course 28

FILE File Contents

145 commas
146 spelling
147 paragraph
148 outlines
149 alice
K7QOs Code Course 29

The following table is the time required for each MP3 file. The
times are shown in the form of mins:secs and are shown as close
as possible to the actual audio time in the file. Some players, if
they show the times, may be off a second or two. You may need
these only if you are on a time schedule, such as a break or lunch
at work.
K7QOs Code Course 30
K7QOs Code Course 31

+0 +1 +2 +3 +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9
000 2:14 2:35 6:18 2:46 2:24 6:45 1:53 2:35 8:34
010 2:35 2:24 10:00 2:03 2:57 10:10 2:35 2:35 11:25 2:24
020 2:14 11:25 2:46 2:46 11:52 2:56 2:24 13:11 2:14 2:03
030 14:11 2:24 2:35 14:12 2:35 2:46 14:36 2:56 2:46 16:13
040 16:26 12:17 14:38 13:23 13:51 16:09 11:26 6:24 6:08 7:06
050 5:52 6:53 5:35 6:44 5:17 7:37 5:33 10:21 5:52 10:24
060 6:09 10:31 6:25 10:41 6:43 14:02 20:44 9:34 4:37 3:42
070 13:59 6:31 7:08 8:01 10:34 7:44 14:18 19:39 14:01 10:51
080 11:08 9:18 10:15 4:49 4:01 6:45 17:32 4:40 6:12 5:32
090 15:43 4:25 5:19 5:40 6:50 5:33 10:04 9:50 8:35 9:50
100 8:06 8:54 14:51 10:54 9:03 9:15 8:21 10:49 13:26 14:10
110 17:33 12:16 14:22 13:33 8:18 8:39 5:15 6:22 5:38 7:51
120 11:15 11:45 12:07 11:33 13:53 9:24 11:14 11:56 10:14 12:06
130 3:14 8:31 9:43 11:16 5:02 7:23 9:47 9:24 7:19 15:42
140 8:28 6:04 7:16 9:00 7:12 11:30 13:46 16:8 13:40 16:27
150 11:21 1:51 2:02 4:08 2:07 1:56 4:27 1:39 2:2 4:20
160 2:02 1:56 4:30 1:45 2:15 4:32 2:02 2:02 5:29 1:56
170 1:51 5:05 2:07 2:07 5:46 2:13 1:56 5:54 1:51 1:45
180 6:45 1:56 2:02 6:48 2:02 2:07 6:56 2:13 2:07 7:11
190 8:35 8:07 9:30 9:37 9:37 10:33 3:14 3:17 3:00 2:08
200 2:55 2:10 2:46 2:01 2:36 1:59 2:45 2:37 2:55 2:42
210 3:05 2:37 3:14 2:43 2:58 3:31 8:22 4:38 1:59 1:51
220 3:15
K7QOs Code Course 32
K7QOs Code Course 33

+0 +1 +2 +3 +4 +5 +6 +7 +8 +9
300 12:32 17:57 18:07 17:00 16:26 17:00 16:19 15:05 17:16
310 15:36 16:58 11:24 13:45 16:23 13:48 15:42 11:56 13:09 17:18
320 16:36 11:29 12:46 13:36 13:57 13:57 9:39 14:44 14:24 11:58
330 13:57 11:48 8:55 11:52 12:11 11:22 15:04 13:30 11:55 11:48
340 12:14 9:33 12:11 9:49 8:16 12:35 9:59 12:06 12:03 12:04
350 12:44 11:18 11:33 11:54 8:47 13:04 10:55 5:08 11:26 12:00
360 12:05 9:29 11:31 10:56 6:59 9:49 9:10 10:17 10:41 10:06
370 10:30 11:17 10:33 11:03 11:06 9:11 12:28 11:51 10:03 7:58
380 6:15 7:21 6:56 9:34 12:10 11:42 11:08 10:05 11:48 11:23
390 11:00 11:22 10:35 11:07 9:09 11:13 8:00 11:20 10:59 10:21
400 12:11 8:44 9:32 10:06 9:26 9:38 8:14 10:09 9:16 9:05
410 6:55 9:00 8:44 9:28 7:11 8:15 9:11 8:36 6:07 7:21
420 9:05 8:34 7:32 10:46 9:55 9:48 10:03 9:49 9:18 10:02
430 9:47 8:30 8:47 8:50 8:51 9:08 10:10 9:07 8:47 9:33
440 6:31 8:50 7:57 7:23 10:22 9:14 10:09 9:27 9:53 9:35
450 9:46 11:12 10:30 10:18 8:36 9:59 10:04 10:02 10:00 9:44
460 8:30 8:47 7:43 8:30 9:07 6:45 7:45 7:55 7:52 7:46
470 9:08 9:53 9:47 9:24 9:01 10:51 10:24 7:40 6:40 6:18
480 6:23 7:50 9:00 6:33 9:29 7:59 7:59 8:56 9:54 10:07
490 7:23 8:02 7:42 9:52 7:23 9:31 9:39 9:27 9:36 9:38
500 9:34 9:56 9:19 9:49 8:32 10:13 9:28 10:38 9:13 8:53
510 7:05 9:44 9:45 9:36 6:41

References

1. The American Radio Relay League, Inc., "The ARRL Handbook".

Connecticut, The ARRL. 1995 and later.

2. The American Radio Relay League, Inc., web page, http://www.arrl.org/