cq_qrs_newsletter

2025 28 CQ QRS RagChew

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Contents

CQ QRS RagChew

Did you have fun on this week’s CQQRS practice QSO net? I certainly did! 20m wasn’t cooperating with our European / UK family this time – Mike DL3YZ in Stuttgart was coming through into WA and weakly into SA, but here in Southern NSW nothing was heard of him, Simon MOKBJ portable North of Wolverhampton or Geoff PA/VK6HD on the canals of Friesland Netherlands.

40m was better behaved with a good number of QSOs going on, and we had a nice turn-out on 80m as well; what’s more, the push to have a go on 160M continued, and we had a number giving top band a go.

This week it’s my pleasure to welcome Patrick VK2IOW from Millthorpe near Orange NSW to the editorial team. Responding to my previous weeks’ Walrus comments, Patrick has pu up his hand to join Richard VK6HRC and John VK2RU to help out with the editorial effort – thanks mate.

So this week, when you read the reports from our team in the newsletter, you’ll be enjoying the fruits of Patrick’s labours; well done mate!

As we head out of the depths of Winter (ha – today we had a maximum temperature of 7 degrees, with 57KPH winds and near 100% RH – figure out that apparent temperature!) here in the Southern hemisphere, I’ve made some adjustments to our scheduled times and frequencies.

Changes: + 20m now has a segment allocated based on recommendations from our European family members and an earlier start time as suggested by Mike DL3YZ to catch the earlier long-path opening.

I’m also hoping the team there will consider a weekly short path trial as well – stay tuned. + The 80m segment has been moved down a tad; unlike when we started the net on 80 only, these days we’re not struggling to find a quiet spot (switch-mode power supply hash aside), so I wanted to narrow the segment to about 20KHZ.

However, I also recognised that some of our QRS family members like to operate below 3540 so I’ve shot for 25KHZ from 3535 to 3560KHZ.

+ And in consultation with Mister 160M QRS (Jordan VK3ACU), we’ve picked 1855KHZ < a landing spot for 160M activity; if 160M becomes popular, we'll add a segment. I at'e cae how thece channec mn - nieace lat me know voir thoiiqhtc

The Walrus Plan

With Patrick VK2IOW on board, we’ve made progress toward me being able to step back from the editing – and I’m still very keen to hear from anyone who might be interested in helping out in a small or large way.

But I’m also interested to learn more about what material readers do and don’t like in the RagChew – are we far eeinn An ta rink? s¢hinne) Car inetanran tha CHhMDOC AlhateAnn

Hear from anyone who might be interested in helping out in a small J». or large way. But I’m also interested to learn more about what material readers do and don’t like in the RagChew – are we focussing on the right things?

For instance, the CQQRS WhatsApp group snips that John VK2RU assembles take him a considerable amount of time; but are they being read by the members of our family who are not already on WhatsApp, and are they of interest? Please let us know your thoughts.

And speaking of the Walrus plan; I’ve found a way of allowing different editors and contributors to produce material for our MailChimp newsletter generator – material can now be produced on your word processor such as Microsoft Word, Apple Pages or the free Libre Office, including embedded photographs.

So from now on, if you’re contributing something to the newsletter, please help me by sending Word (.docx) or Pages (.pages) formatted documents, using Helvetica 16 font, and include photos etc in the document.

Contact me via cqgrsnet@gmail.com if you’d like more information. And by the way, a reminder, if you send me any information by email or WhatsApp – unless you specifically state that material is not to be published, I’l assume that you’re happy to see your thoughts in the RagChew newsletter.

Stan ZL3TK came up with an interesting suggestion this week; if the newsletter needs to cease production, we could consider establishing a groups.io website instead.

That would then allow team members to contribute freely without need for editing, and the contributions would instantly be emailed to the team.

A little bit like an email version of our WhatsApp groups, but the contributions can be categorised and remain on the website for future reference. Nowhere near as nice as having a newsletter to read, but perhaps a more efficient long-term solution? Thoughts?

DXperiment ‘Simon MOKBJ has decided to take a break from his weekly portable adventures in the wee- ‘small hours of the UK mornings for a while; thank you for all you’ve done mate – it’s been great fun trying to get through, and your reports and photographs have really made the newsletter interesting.

‘As I said above, I’m hoping that our European team members will consider adding a short- path test to the weekly schedule – on a different day of the week perhaps?

I’m also hoping that they’ll consider running something like our 40m QRS nets as well to attract new EU and UK operators to the gentle art of slow CW; fingers crossed.

You’ll also see that we now have one of our foundingfamily members Geoff VK6HD operating on the canals of Holland for the next couple of months when his busy schedule allows. |’m glad you found room in your luggage for that QMX transceiver mate!

Masthead Image

Thanks this week to Geoff VK6HD who’s again operating from his boat on the canal: of Holland. Geoff and Jackie try to squeeze three months of canal time into their busy schedule while running their Peel WA area not-for-profit organisation that addresses domestic violence at the cause.

That means very early hour video conferences every day – making radio operation a challenge. However, this time Geoff snuck his new QRP-Labs QMX transceiver and 20m vertical into his three- month luggage and as you can see, he’s found the time to make electromagnetic waves.

New Team Member!

Welcome this week to Otto, VK4OLB who lives in Brisbane. Otto received one of the hallowed CQQRS net First CW Contact awards this week; I was very pleased to have Otto’s very first CW QSO when he came up on the net last week.

Our new team member was operating portable while camping near Mount Surprise with 4.5 Watts into an end-fed half-wave antenna via a 56:1 BALUN.

He’d been practicing CW for about two months in between school work, and hopefully he’ll be able to come up on the net from time to time when his study allows; listen out for him and say g’day if you hear him on.

Reports

After next Tuesday’s Group, please send me a list of who you worked and / or who you heard using our web form here: bit.ly/WCQQRSNET

Please help attract new and old team members to have a go by submitting your repo! each week. Submissions close 1300 (Eastern Australian time) on Thursday.

Website

If you’d like to find out a bit about our net, or would like to pass information to others about our Tuesday get-togethers, here’s the link to our website.

Bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite Cheers, mb Mark Bosma VK2KI / VK6QI Beautiful South Bowning NSW mark.bosma@icloud.com non impsditi ratione cogitationis

The spreadsheets above show the known stations on last Tuesday’s Group; the comments in the team members’ reports (Submitted via our webform bit.ly/CQQRSNET ) follow:

This week’s comments have come from our webform reports and have beer compiled for us by Patrick VK2IOW; thanks Patrick.

From Simon MOKBJ at Cannock Chase forest, UK

[80m] Back to one of my favourite locations up on Cannock Chase. We’re : the start of another warm spell of weather – the third already this yea Temperatures at O7OOUTC were only 12C but the sun was up and I didn’t need my coat.

I got no VK/ZL stations in the bag but did manage a new country: Z35M in Macedonia. According to his QRZ page, this operator achieved an amazing 43,000 QSOs in the year of 2001. It was also great to chat on air with fellow net member Mike DL3YZ.

I’m going to shift my activities over the coming weeks so won’t be on the net again until the autumn, when DX should improve. See you later.

[40m] 3ASED on signal reports, westbound propagation was superior to 2astbound. Again this discredits the legend of symmetry which 2veryone used to believe back in the ‘International Years of the Quiet Sun’ (1964 ~ 1969), because either evidence to the contrar Jidn’t exist or hadn’t been reported.

[40m] Too noisy, too cold in shack, Too many noisy northern neighbours

[80m] Not many Locals on 80m these days, on any mode, actually.

[40m] I observed a high SWR, which worsened on the lower bands. This ultimately prevented me from tuning my homebrew balanced-L matching unit on 160M. The cause?

A snail had positioned itself on one leg of the ladder line outside, nestled between the ladder line leg and the spark gap to ground! Remarkably, the snail was still alive, though it certainly received an unexpected lesson in CW.

I atar in tas avianinn miu rat daringnd ta “sccices” hiv eiftinga AN my

[40m] I scanned 40m for a short time over the evening but 80m had more activity and I didn’t get the chance to go back.

[80m] Good practice on the CW key again. I started off a bit rusty and cleaned up my act with the practice, hihi. I managed to get a noise floor of S1 which was great.

Mark, VK2KI sent me a screenshot showing my TX sig had noise coming through when I transmitted approx 400HZ apart. Very different from last week’s crisp signal. Will need to investigate further. 73

[40m] Good sigs on 40m, nice to be called by Rick, VK6XT for a chat, then off to the kitchen for me to prepare Fettucini Boscaioli (sounds fancy but it’s not!) Then a quick QSO with lan VK1HF.

[80m] Headed dawn to CW after the RNm Hoat anchor net

Meaded Gown tO UvV alter tne ovim DOal ancnor net and worked Sava, VK4PN, we tried 160M, but no banana, he was 559 again this week (but with stronger and deeper QSB). His high noise level struggles with my 50 watts and compromised antenna.

Then our illustrious leader checked in to see what was on the menu, so I informed him of our tasty Italian cuisine!

[80m] Bug key produces interesting variations of morse code whe used at 10WPM! Callsign unknown.

[40m] Jidn’t hear ac many ectatinne aciic

From your editor Mark VK6QI at Beautiful South Bowning via various KiwiSDRs.

[20m] Mike DL3YZ was a nice RSN 421 into the VK6SEG KiwiSDR at Hoddys Well this week. I alsc checked Paul VK5PH‘s KiwiSDR network at Ironstone Range near Adelaide; Mike was not as strong, but readable.

I didn’t manage to get the VK6CRO Remote going on the night unfortunately. I think I also saw and heard the tail of some of the calls by one of our founding team members, Geoff PA/VK6HD who was maritime mobile on the Canals of Holland

It may have been Geoff’s 5 Watts or perhaps someone calling him – but each time I saw the signal sal aon hanafi ills that

(25t__ pre Sa S P < , * OP ae en Leute IO Mapa © Cente time I saw the signal pop-up on the SDR by the time I selected 14039, the signal disappeared - so hopefully that was the beacon keyer on his mighty QRP-Labs QMX transceiver.

POLL SLL LLG DONT Also from your editor Mark VK2KI at Beautiful South Bowning NSW

[20m] Nothing at all heard here in the East from our European contingent on 20m this week.

Also from your editor Mark VK2KI at Beautiful South Bowning NSW

[20m] Nothing at all heard here in the East from our European contingent on 20m this week.

Odd conditions continued in the Eastern zone. In particular, variable conditions from here in Southern NSW to Victoria and to WA, yet at one stage I was able to work into far North Queensland and Geelong, and also be heard by the Ironstone Range SA KiwiSDR network of our team member Paul VK5PH.

It was nice to chat to John VK2RU portable up near Charters Towers (near Townsville); John is one of our editors so we’ve had lots of chats along the way, but I was surprised to learn tha’ Fa an gm we ee gL BOX: pt LS pn ey PV VCS ea OCS ws = eT Py Pt Dee ay

Vas complaining ‘about how cold it was getting – dropping below 30 – rth he said! ‘ I also chatted to Dean VK3DL at Geelong.

I’d worked Dean before on SOTA / Parks activations, and in the Don Edwards Memorial and QRP Hours contests, but not on the net until now.

Dean continued the food _ discussions which I’d had with others on previous nets when he said he had to go QRT to rescue a loaf of home-made bread from the oven. I’m hoping we get a recipe from Dean for a future On My Workbench article.

Not long after I noticed deep and sharp QSB on the signal from Jordan VK3ACU at Meredith, and marginal signals continued to come ey Sy a rs a a er |

Through from WA; it was good to hear Clive ZL1CJB on the net again working Jordan before I tootled off for dinner.

[80m] After dinner, the band was full of non-QRS DX, so it was time to go through the antenna coupler and noise canceller adjustments for 80m.

I really enjoyed 80m again; conditions weren’t great across Australia from here to the West, and I didn’t notice any ZLs, but stil there was lots to listen to and enjoy.

Richard VK6PZT and Rick VK6XT both called me, but conditions just weren’t good enough to make a go of it – I’d hoped that later in the evening things would improve as the D-layer dissipated, but that was not to be this time.

In the mean-time I had a nice chat with Andy VKBLA who had the biggest signal I’d heard. Sava VIAPN came up but wasn’t hearing me, so I rounded out the evening with a struggling QSO with David VK6KD at Ballajura.

Signals were really marginal – with the occasional meteor-scatter-like bubble of QSB when half a letter would come through solidly. After many repeated “PSE RPT AGN?” we both exchanged RSN 211; what fun!

I noticed an interesting thing watching David’s signal on the waterfall displays of a couple of the KiwiSDRs in WA – instead of the beautiful crisp IC-7610 CW of the previous week, David’s signal appeared to comprise of a central carrier with what looked like intermodulation products 400HZ apart extending over +/- 2 kHz.

I’m sure David will be sneaking a look at his new Owner’s Manual during working hours this week!

[80m] Poor conditions with lightning crashes and QSB++. Will be catching up with grandsons next week – hoping to start the process of leading them down the path of radio addiction disorder, and away from the screen addiction disorder they seem to be developing.

[40m] Conditions were good. Contacts were easy to make. During the week I repositioned my EFHW dipole to give better proximity distance to a 80m dipole. Also new wire location is mosily in the clear further away from shack and other objects.

Ied in strength some with fair amount of QSB. Overall another very

| have just finished the QMX Plus project and was pleasantly surprised to see that it worked, as intended, when power was applied for the first time. Naturally I was keen to show it off on Tuesday night.

Despite measuring a lusty 5w output on 80 (not quite as good on the other bands), my proud new QMX Plus sadly returned miserable signal reports. In fact, Peter VK3WOW, who was S39 here, apologetically reported that I was unreadable.

Knowing that the antenna hadn’t fallen down this time, I switched to the C7300. The signal improved his end so much that apparently Peter thought I may have moved next door. Luckily Peter is also a fan of the QMX and was most understanding.

We went on to have a nice lengthy chat on the subject. Finally, although it should probably not be mentioned in this forum, devoted to CW as it is, the SSB firmware upc

This forum, devoted to CW as it is, the SSB firmware update on the QMX went without a hitch and appears to work, even if, on current indications, no one is going to be able to hear it.

From Peter Dann VK3WOW at Blackburn, Victoria

~ By UTC 1000, conditions on 80m looked so good on BOM HAP chart compared with 40m, I did not even try 40m. Had a dramatic demonstration of difference between QRP and QRO in my QSO witt Greg VK5KFG.

Found him initially all but unworkable (but did catch his call sign) and was just about to give up when he came back to me sounding like he was operating from house next door.

Turned ou ’ he had switched from his QMX rig (5 watts) to a rig running more like 100 watts.

International Flight Contest – Oh my! Why did I ever let myself get sucked into this vale of tears? Nonetheless, I’ve started now (have submitted two entries my email), and what a challenge in patience, accuracy and following instructions it turns out to be.

Will be interestec to get some sense of how others are finding the experience. I must say Stan ZL38TK has clearly put a huge amount of effort into setting this up, and really I can only bow my head anc salute him for that!

[40m] I got home after a big meal at the RAOTC luncheon and promptly fell asleep in front of the rig. Several nights of staying up late watching the Tour de France and the AU v WI Test Match in Grenada caught up with me!

Thanks to one of our dogs for waking me up in time to have four nice chats on 40m.

Post Morsum – July 9th

From Richard VK6GHRC Five on the VK6RLM RPTR and South West Echolink / AllStar hub. VK6KD David VK6QI_ Mark VKSKDO Peter VK6HRC VK6MRB Mulligan SWL and others David worked three on 80 Mx and monitored 40 Mx at times, still going through the new setup to sort a few gremlins out.

Good to have Mark there this morning with helpful advice as he has gone through a setup of a noise canceller / matching unit a while ago. Mark had fun as usual, monitored the 20 Mx activity via KiwiSDRs and heard Mike calling.

On 40 Mx worked four heard nine and an 80 Mx worked two, tried to work Richard VK6PZT but conditions not quite good enough.

Peter previous call VK7KPC before the move worked 40 Mx took a break to take part in another net and came back to monitor the activity on 80 Mx. He is also going through a new setup sorting things out. I had fun on 40 Mx worked a few locals.

I then checked the RBN and saw that Stan ZL3TK had been spotted with a good SNR so tuned up and gave call and he came back but conditions had deteriorated so it was a brief contact. Hoping for better conditions soon!

FYI just had chat to Max on HF ( slumming it on SSB ) in spite of all the problems is in good spirits and hope to be back on ASAP.

This Week’s Topic of Interest

From Simon MOKBJ I’ve decided to shift my radio activities over the summer and will be taking a break from the early starts on Tuesdays.

Conditions for DX should improve in the autumn so I expect to get out and about in the early mornings again before the worst of the winter. Data I’ve done a bit of analysis of 2025’s Tuesday operating with the CQ QRS group on 20m and 15m.

The full data can be seen here (see below for the link). Since 11 March I have operated on 14 out of 17 Tuesdays which yields enough data:

Total days operating: 14 Total hours operating: 15 Total QSOs: 41 Total VK/ZL QSOs: 6 VK2IOW (2), VK3DBD (2), VK2QI, VKSACU Total EU QSOs: 34 Total USA QSOs: 1 Mean QSOs per day: 2.9 Mean VK/ZL QSOs per day: 0.4 I had a VK/ZL QSO on 4 days out of 14.

| made three quarters of DX QSOs from a coastal QTH. I used the same radio (Xiegu G90), power (20W) and antenna (JPC-12) for all attempts. I operated between 30 minutes and 3.5 hours after sunrise. I contacts when I operated closer to sunrise.

| operated between 30 minutes and 3.5 hours a generally got more DX contacts when I operated closer to sunrise. It’s been great fun to explore different locations for operating. My noise level at home is too high to pick up distant stations.

With my portable set-up in a nice quiet spot, I can always hear more stations than I can work.

Conclusions:

I’m making fewer contacts than I would like. To achieve more reliable and consistent summertime DX, I would need to consider: * getting up at 2am and driving over 2 hours to the coast for sunrise

• buying an FT891 or similar 100W radio for portable operating + using a directional antenna with a substantial gain over my omnidirectional vertical antenna. In other words, I think I’ve reached the limits of what my current equipment will allow.

|’tr looking forward to hearing from Mike DL3YZ and Ross MONNK on their portable antenne ideas and experiments.

The outlier is the one in Italy where I made three VK QSOs. It may just have been a very good day for propagation. I was at the end of a pier on the super-salty Mediterranean, which must have helped.

And I wonder if there were human factors – an exotic location and a bit of a buzz on the WhatsApp QRS Alert channel to stir extra interest perhaps?

Thanks for your thoughts too Ross. It made me look up Brian ZL3XDuJ’s YouTube channel again and by coincidence he has summed up 40 years of antenna experimentation in a new video today (see below for the link).

A 2-element vertical with elevated radials work best for his coastal location on 20m.

Over the next months, I want to do more in the afternoons and evenings on various bands, which I think may be more fruitful. I also want to use my neglected QRP radio more. I’ll definitely participate again in the autumn when the greyline works better for us.

I expect October and November will be the peak months.

Meanwhile, I will eavesdrop through the Ironstone web-SDR to listen on Tuesdays to CW with an Aussie accent and I’ll avidly read the brilliant newsletter. Enjoy the rest of the summer/winter and I’ll catch you on the air in due course.

I Rik I A i a RE a teil te alt ke rs NO lla a lia lahat a a arts tae aad Enjoy the rest of the summer/winter and I’ll catch you on the air in due course. All the very best, Simon MOKBJ

Simon’s analysis: https:// docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/ E/2PACX- 1vSfbAZ1xW1SXRVIEDRgW493ZDj7vrvLcOw6UknHJj- AISIxINMVc1pr_mTJwkl9vcpGDsthPBRKbCqQ/ pubhtml ZL8XDJ video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HGOPW-Dalt8 [Thank you so much Simon or your efforts to get out and have some fun at all hours of the morning; your photographs have been one of the highlights of the RagChew newsletters.

And of course thank you for tempting us with the testing of Ross MONNK’s hypothesis that at the peak of the sunspot cycle, you can work the world on a few Watts and a bit of wet string.

I reckon we should think about introducing a short-path test on a different day of the week as part of the DXperiment – short-path is so much easier; I’ve started discussions with Mike DL3YZ on this and other things that might be interesting.

Similarly, the higher bands such as 10m would be really

Interesting and so much fun. I look forward to your reports of what you hear of the net on the KiwiSDRs from the comfort of your nice warm home… and of course, your future adventures as we head toward the equinox.]

If you have an article or two that you think might be of interest to our readers, please let me know so we can share more thoughts and ideas; email to cqqrsnet@gmail.com

On My Workbench

A Simple Portable Antenna

Tell us about what’s going on on your workbench; do you have something on the go that others might be interested in? Please let me know cqqrsnet@gmail.com

Other News

From Mike DL3YZ I also noticed this morning that we need to start the DXperiment skeds a little earlier, to have full advantage of the DX window. My signal was S 5 in ironstone on 6:00 UTC and dropped to S 2.7 at 7:00 UTC.

Think I need to check different bands too. 40 m condx here in EU are excellent these days, reaching even to US. Even had a station just 80 km from here yesterday on the other side of the black forrest mountains.

Thats real NVIS, as we both are in river valleys 600 m lower than the moutains.

DXperiment Propagation Conditions

Now he is sending me tips to improve my CW; seems I must have not been at my best code HI. Thanks for the report and have a great week 73 Mike.

Morse Training Net

Our team member Nic VK7WW runs an on-air Slow Morse training net every Wednesday at 7pm EDST on 3580 for 30 mins. He uses the callsign of the Northern Tasmania Amateur Radio Club VK7TAZ on that net.

Many of our team learned Morse code with the support of Nic, and the weekly training session comes highly recommended for anyone who wants to learn the Code, or simply brush up.

Everyone’s welcome – 3580KHZ at 7pm Eastern time every Wednesday; you’ll hear lots of the CQQRS team on that net. Jordan VK3ACU has recorded the complete set of lessons which you can now find here:

Https://www. youtube.com/playlist?list=PLHsQmZz6fBXO7swAfbT mutrbbEL17fUQL Contact Nic VK7WW for more info nicholaschantler@hotmail.com including how to join the NTARC DISCORD group to follow the action, or just come along and join in on Wednesdays.

International Flight Contest

Progress report on the QRS International Flight Contest

From Stan ZL3TK Flight NR 04 took off on Wednesday as scheduled, heading NNE across the mighty Atlantic, Delighted to report that sound file entries to the contest have been regular and show an excellent standard of sending with perfect spacing, They’re a pleasure to hear.

Surprisingly, an OM in my ancestral Germany has popped up, possibly in response to the. contest getting mention on the VBand and Vail Discord sites. But boy-oh-boy, have I had to face up to my own shortcomings!

One might assume years of traffic would have eliminated most bad habits, but not so at all. Two major failures revealed by this contest have been my jumping to conclusions and scan reading. Shamefaced, I’ve had to apologise to entrants several times.

Self-discipline must now be brought to the fore and exercised far more judiciously; sorry chaps, I will definitely try harder. A number of queries have been received asking why each flight appears for only two weeks, then disappears.

After giving the reasons for designing it that way and noting the long-term educational value of participating even if some flights are missed (who really cares about points anyway?) _ It appears since none have followed through, enquirers were merely tyre-kickers.

Disappointing but clest la vie. Contest information is available at bit.ly/arsife

Progress report on the QRS International Flight Contest

CWops Morse Mania – Winter 2025

Fives: This eight-week event has the following objectives: © To promote regular on-air QSOs primarily between VK and ZL operators. Other DX operators and contacts are welcome.

© For CW operators to have as many QSOs as possible whilst meeting the minimu criteria for a QSO. © To provide an event that meets the needs of different types of CW operators. © Touse these sessions to build on existing skills and satisfy your own goals.

© For aperson who normally operates POTA/SOTA, this might mean extendin their QSO vocabulary to include a few new words or phrases. © For an operator comfortable at 12WPM and basic QSOs, this might mean aiming to increase speeds by 2-3 WPM once a week.

© For acontester this might mean exchanging station details they don’t normal exchange. Participants are encouraged to notify the Event Administrator of their personal goals prior the event.

When: Start date: Tuesday 17 June 2025 End date: Sunday 10 August 2025 This is an eight-week event aimed at our CQQRS family, with one-hour sessions commencing 17 June 2025 and taking place on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays at 0930-1030z.

And there’s a bonus for QRS operators as well. How about having a go? Read more and review the rules here: https://morsecodesessions. wordpress.com/morse-mania-winter-2025/

Head Copy Practice

Another week, and another enthralling chapter of A.A. Milne’s classic – Winnie the Pooh. You can find the first five chapters in the five preceding newsletters.

This week, Chapter 6, in which Eeyore has a birthday and gets two presents. Of course, the material you use doesn’t have to be Winnie the Pooh. It can be anything you’re interested in.

I’ve chosen this book because it uses simple, familiar, and often predictable words, which I find makes learning to head copy a bit easier. You can find thousands of out of copyright books at Project Gutenberg.

I usually download the text file and then do some light editing to make it more suitable for head copy practice. At this stage, I only keep the following punctuation: ? . , / All other punctuation is either removed or changed to one of those four.

These are the most used punctuation in Morse, and the Ditto CW: Morse Player does not accept other punctuation. I also check for unusual spellings that might be confusing. Some things, however, I don’t touch.

For example, Owl’s spelling in this chapter: HIPY PAPY BTHUTHDTH THUTHDA BTHUTHDY . It is impossible to improve ‘on that.

That’s why I suggest reading the text first before listening to it in Morse. You don’t need surprises like Owls’ spelling when you’re trying to learn to head copy! The CW audio files are generated using ebook2cw.

I have set the speed to 12 WPM, the tone to 650 Hz, and have disabled for paragraph breaks. You can play the audio file on your phone or tablet and adjust the playback speed to suit.

Try setting it slightly faster than your comfortable speed – say, 3 WPM faster. Most media players let you adjust playback speed in steps (1.25x, 1.5x, 1.75x, etc.), which means you can replay these files at 15, 18, 21 or 24 wpm.

Or reduce the speed if necessary. Whatever works for you. But pick one that gives you a bit of a stretch. A better option is to use the text files with Ditto CW: Morse Player — https:// dittocw.andro.io/.

This app lets you fine tune every setting – speed, pitch, spacing, and more to suit your practice style.

Give it a go. Play it while you’re sitting in the train, walking the dog, in the car, in bed at night — wherever. You might surprise yourself on how much you can copy, and how quickly you will improve. Here are the files for this week.

The audio file has been split into 3 sections because of its’ size. There are 4 text files. One is the complete chapter, the other 3 are the split files. Enjoy! John, VK2RU

If you’ve read something that you think might be of interest to our readers, please I me know so John and I can share more thoughts and ideas; email to cqgrsnet@gmail.com

Prosign/Character/Signal of the Month

[Suggestion – put it on a sticky note near your key as a reminder for Tuesday. Tell us how you went!]

Di-dah-di-dah-dadil

So back to the CQQRS Slow CW QSO practice net.

Next Tuesday’s Net

Our CQQRS Group will be on as always on Tuesday from around 0700Z until about 1300Z; see https://bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite and navigate to the Net Details page for details.

Doesn’t matter whether you’re brand new and want to try just exchanging callsigns and RST reports, or you’re ready for a good old rag chew. We’ll have fun.

There’s usually people around until after 1300Z – so keep calling in the segment of the band designated in the table below until you catch someone.

I should be on as usual from home in NSW or via the Remote at Bedfordale WA, and I’ll also be watching the proceedings using the VK6QS and Tecsun SDRs in WA and NSW respectively. Hope to hear you there.

Please let us know via our Reports form bit.ly/CQQRSNET who you work or hear on Tuesday’s Group. The report form closes at lunchtime (Eastern Australian time) on Thursday.

Post Morsum

Richard VK6HRC will run our phone Post Morsum on the South West AllStar net (via repeaters and hotspots all over WA) from 0600 WA time, then from 0700 WA time on 80m (8605 LSB).

See https://bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite and navigate to the Net Details page for details of how you can connect via Echolink or even possibly via your local FM repeater.

Teamwork

Thank you so much to our team of 27 contributors: MOKBJ, VK1HF, VK2AOE, VK2I0W, VK2RU, VK2WP, VK3ACU, VK3DL, VK3DRQ, VK3KEV, VK3KLE, VK3QB, VK3WOW, VK5CZ, VKSKFG, VKBLA, VK6GX, VK6HRC, VK6IS, VK6JDM, VK6KD, VK6KHZ, VK6PZT, VK6RR, VK6XT, ZL3TK and ZL4CTS.

And a special thank you to our editorial team, Nigel G4RWI (head of software development), Patrick VK2IOW (reports coordinator), John VK2RU (researcher and WhatsApp spy) and Richard VK6HRC (Post Morsition and ear-to-the-ground spy).

Great work alll UY CW on Tuesday, mb. Mark Bosra VK2KI/ VK6QI Beautiful South Bowning NSW mark,bosma@icloud.com non impediti ratione cogitationis

About the CQ QRS Net

For the current schedule and more information about the CQQRS net, please go the the Net Details page on our website:

The opinions expressed in the RagChew newsletter are those of the individual contributors. The opinions do not necessarily reflect that of the editor or of the CQ QRS Group members.

Any material and images received by the editor or published on the CQQRS WhatsApp groups may be published in this newsletter unless specifically requested otherwise.

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