cq_qrs_newsletter

2025 33 CQ QRS RagChew

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Contents

CQ QRS RagChew

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:

Please help attract new and old team members to have a go by submitting your repor 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

[15m] Not a sausage (I’m unclear as to why not). But many thanks to the operators at the Aussie enc who tried their best to contact me. If it were ea there’d be no satisfaction in success.

[80m] Hello from Germany, and thank you very much for your calls. Todays condx were slightly weaker than last week. Nevertheless I was very lucky to work 4 stations during my 30 min shift. All your signals were clear and easy to copy.

Even louder than the Norway stations that answered my “CQ VK” call, when I did the intro call for the RBN HI. Great

[40m] Much better conditions tonight – I could hear workable signals 🙂

A0m] onditions generally poor except for lively ropagation stretching from VK7 right up the east yast. Only one VK6 heard, he is usually FB copy ut this time struggled to put his call sign together, r the remainder he was QNP.

BE OENEEE BONE EGRESS © POU EERE SAL Ge INEEE CEN

[40m] Good signals from over east. I was mo in a listening mood than a sending moc so just listened in on others signals wh I find more useful practice than the cle: code on teaching systems.

I could hear a ZL2 from the superior islands to the east where they know th: football matches that are worth watchir

Rootdall Matcenes Mat are worth watcning start with the Maka and end In an All Blacks victory. However every time I tried to hear the call sign there was QRM. Was great to see another system for ladder line being promoted.

It is so cheap to make up ladder line and if well made it outlasts coax, out performs coax and looks great too. There is also something in the way of an ego reward when you make stuff from simple readily available bits rather than buy some product that only a factory can manufacture and for which the price is not right.

My ladder line has been up a few years now and would have failed by now if it were coax with our strong winds, scorching summers and the birds that strip off coax outer plastic.

[40m] What a week! The late nights and long days ‘eally caught up with me tonight during this CW session. I even started falling asleep on the key during my fifth contact! Despite being exhausted, it was still a great nigh

Of you on the air later this week. And remember, if you’re looking for a contact, don’t hesitate to reach out! I’m always happy to slow down to whatever speed you’re comfortable with and not just on Tuesday nights!

[40m] 40m was a bit weak but 80m seemed ok was sick and not intending to play, but came into shack and heard some CW…..and did a little twirl on the VFO wi a ragchew resulting (with fellow Homebrewer Jordan VK3ACU)!

I ended my evening listening on my 1970’s Realistic DX160, single conversion superhet on 80m and although the selec

[40m] Noisy with QRM & SSB from Asian fishermen?? N many stations heard. Good QSO with VK3ECH/P4

[80m] I logged into a number of SDR receivers around WA and SA to hear activity on different bands. There didn’t appear to be many stations which could be heard fror my QTH in Ballajura WA. I skipped past some QSOs to come back find all stations had moved on.

I concluded after my play on the SDRs, definitely appeared to be more stations active on the East side of Oz, however I could not hear them on my I Until next week, 73s.

From Wal VK2WP at Bathurst NSW Cl Silas cy

Conditions on 20m to Europe were good. Mike, DL3YZ and I exchanged RSTs of 569. Both using 100 watts. Mike – GSRV antenna. Me – 3 el yagi.

[40m] Good signals from both ZL4TE in Ranmalanaan Al ams iLL ea ie Olare CA

[40m] What the ionosphere giveth the ionosphere taketh away: VK3BTV dropped from S9 to $1 in one over.

Though that we did exchange sig reports. Catch you next time Sava!

[80m] There appeared to be a contest on 80m with lots of VK and ZL stations giving numbers to each other. The number were separated by a slash. I heard ZL4SA call CQ, matched his frequency and tried an answer. No response. Then the same experience with ZL2ACL.

When he went silent, I tried ‘IS THIS QRS NET?’. There was a baffling silence in response to that one. I got myself back to 40m after that where there was more action, albeit with a lot of noise and QSB.

This was only my fourth serious try at QRS NET and it only netted me three contacts so not sure if itis worth pursuing. That said, my Tuesdays are rather dull if I don’t hear a dit and a dah so I will probably try again [Yes, I also saw on the Ironstone Range KiwiSDR all the activity below our 80m QRS segment and figured there was something else going on Peter.]

[40m] Good to hear the more experienced operators slowing down for newbies like myself and some coaching going on as well, thank I you.

[80m] Enjoyed the 20m session via a local Kiwi SDR good signals from all. I nathina haard fram Rrnec AACANIAI An I1EKM

[80m] I I was not hearing anything on 40m so I had a quick look at 20m where I heard Mike K10V calling ata QRS speed from Connecticut US. We were both 5 and 7 and chatted for quite a while.

This was my first true DX contact on CW and I can thank the experience gained with you all on this net. [Outstanding Greg!]

[40m] The Scouts were on their own, planning script anc scenes for their video project under the guidance of the patrol leaders so I had a Tuesday night in the shack / lounge room.

Signals on 40 were gooc for a few hours, at least a few S points above the S6 noise floor. A FB QSO with Stan ZL3TK broug| the wrist, ears and some brain into action. Having read Stan’s QRZ page (recommended reading) I better understand the RSN 442.

[40m] The Scouts were on their own, planning script ar scenes for their video project under the guidance of the patrol leaders so I had a Tuesday night in the shack / lounge room.

Signals on 40 were goc for a few hours, at least a few S points above the $6 noise floor. AFB QSO with Stan ZL3TK brou the wrist, ears and some brain into action. Havin read Stan’s QRZ page (recommended reading) I better understand the RSN 442. I wrote RST, mu

[80m] After 40 fizzled south of the noise floor I was preparing damper dough when I heard lan VK5C calling CQ loud and clear on 80m. A quick wash, don’t key or write with dough on your fingers. Another FB QSO then more listening practice around the band.

[80m] After 40 fizzled south of the noise floor I was preparing damper dough when I heard lan VK5C calling CQ loud and clear on 80m. A quick wash, don’t key or write with dough on your fingers. Another FB QSO then more listening practice around the band.

From Your editor Mark VK2KI at Beautiful South

[15m] Nothing at all heard of Ross MONNK on 15m this time. I heard both Kevin VK3KEV at Seymour and Paul VK3KLE at Stawell calling, but nothing from the other end.

I emailed to Ross – who reported hearing absolutely nothing at his end – but he thanked the Aussies for trying. TONM 1]

| had the speaker on my TS-120S on as I prepared for the net (I usually use headphones for CW) and I was pleased to hear from the other end of the house (Ms e was in the garden!) Mike DL3YZ started calling five minutes early – RSN 511.

Nice to hear Mike having some fun chatting to Patrick VK2IOW near Orange and David VKSDBD at Yakandandah. Patrick was mostly in the skip zone for me and beaming away – but was RSN 511 – about the same as Mike.

Mike finally had to say he had to go QRT half an hour after he’d planned – so we exchanged QRQ “73 TU” – not a confirmed QSO, but near enough for Government work – and I didn’t want to be blamed for keeping him from getting to work on time.

[40m] Aiter calling it quits on 15 m and 20m, I came down to 40 and hooked up with Rob VK2COS operating as VI100SIG, commemorating 100 years of operation of the Army’s Royal Australian Corps of Signals.

I also chatted with James VI7JZ/P who was testing his new linked dipole from a local park. Good to hear a number of other QSOs underway as well.

[80m] I came down to 80m early for James VK7JZ‘s test of his new portable linked dipole. Signals were down a bit compared to 40m, but the D-layer probably hadn’t finished evaporating – sunset on the ground between here and there was around an hour earlier; and less for the D-layer (50 to 90KM up).

After that I chatted to Paul VKSKLE at Stawell – this time he was using his refurbished FT-901. After dinner, I listened in to the numerous QSOs going on on 80m and tried calling Wayne VK6NW after he finished with Richard VK6HRC (Richard wasn’t copyable here).

Anyway, Wayne wouldn’t talk to me, so I took my bat and ball and went home. I got over it though, and later I had a chat to Sava VK4PN.

Once again, I asked Sava to describe his antenna – Sava puts in a very reliable signal around Australia and New Zealand on 40m and 80m, so I was interested to learn more of his secrets.

With a promise of more articles for the RagChew newsletter, Sava described his antenna. If I copied him correctly, i’s an offset-fed random-length long-wire approximately 56m long, fed via a balanced feed-line (see the blue Rawiplug and cable-tie article in last week’s edition).

The feed is offset from centre by about 3m, and the wire is in inverted-vee configuration – 8m high at the centre and 5m high at the ends. The balanced feeder has a current BALUN at the shack end – which will be described in a future edition of the newsletter.

Judging by Sava’s consistently good signals in the region, I’d suggest that this configuration would be terrific for others in our team to try out at home.

We just need to twist Sava’s arm to give a phase-cancelling noise canceller a try as well to help with his $8 noise level!

PO SANT ENON FE eee Nr UE) Salen EU ESN OE AE ON ere FE CON ere Se Nhen I worked James VK7JZ on his new dipole, 1€ was romping in to the VKSPH SDR network in SA and was a decent S5 into WA; amazing for the

Low-angle propagation, considering his dipole was doing a reasonable impression of a beverage antenna.

[80m] James’ linked dipole was a ripping S8 into South Aus. After dinner, I really enjoyed listening in to the various rag chews going on around Australia. Despite some Post Morsum reports of nothing heard, the band seemed ok when I listened.

[80m] Even though OM Mike’s signals were very poor, only RSN 222 with QSB in downtown Blackburn, we managed to have a nice chat with those beeps going back and forth LP around the Globe. Thanks for you patience dear Mike.

On another token, I wish to sincerely congratulate the Author of the Very Nice CW Poetry.

[40m] Had a busy day, so after dinner I decided to sit back, relax and enjoy head-copying some longer QSOs. Rob, VK3ECH/p, talked about his outback adventures. Jordan, VK3ACU had a long QSO with George VK2AOI about home brew antennas, ladder lines and amps.

Sometimes it is good to just listen and get the gist of the conversation. 40m became noisy with DX QRM as the « eS ae oe

From Sava Magazinovic VK4PN at Brisbane [20] Got on 20m a bit late so before checking propagation on the Reverse Beacon net I had a quick scan between 14.04 and 14.05. There was a slow morse at 14.048, unmistakably Manny VK3DRQ.

The advantage of using a straight key is that it gives you a personality, by now I can identify quite a few QRS participants by their Morse style and rhythm. Conveniently Manny was finishing with Mike so I did not have to wait long.

Mike responded to my first call but his signal was weak and I was struggling to copy, OK for a basic QSO but certainly inadequate for any meaningful

Struggling to copy, OK for a basic QsoO Dut ce! chat. After a while and exchange of RSNs I ge following Tuesday. After the QSO with Mike, and out of curiosity, I called CQ a couple of times to see if I was heard anywhere and to m surprise I could see multiple paths to EU, US, JA and around Australia!

I wonder why I had s much trouble copying Mike. TAnem)

Abit quiet from down south but plenty of Kiwis with good signals. Couple of longish QSOs with ZL1PX and ZL3TK so my keying fist started to ctamp and troubled me for the rest of the evening.

Managed to catch up Rob VK3ECH/P4 somewhere west of Targomindah he is travelling in the back of beyond probably on dirt roads. He expects to be back at Echucha for the next Tuesday’s QRS Net.

[80m] A few nice QSOs on 80m as well, all lengthy. Rob VK3ECH/P4 was very strong into Brisbane we had a nice chat and by this stage my keying was getting a bit erratic, cramping was painful. Swapped to FT8 for a while to get some relief from pains.

On return I logged on Araluen SDR to do a bit of spotting and managed another long QSO with VK2KI. Painful experience again my speed and spelling were alll over the place but miraculously Mark copied everything. Another enjoyable evening.

[Sorry to hear it was such a paintul night for you Sava. I asked the question some months ago about our family members’ ideas on reducing wrist pain (carpel-tunnel syndrome and similar arthritic-type conditions) – but didn’t get any replies.

Perhaps your cries might bring a few thoughts this time? Take care mate.]

[40m] Condx seemed great! Jordan VK3ACU was a massive 10 over SQ. All others armchair copy a: well. Never got to 80m

Post Morsum – 13 August 2025

From Richard VK6HRC. Seven checked in on the South West AllStar / Echolink and Repeater Hub.

VK6KD David VK6NW Wayne VK6QI_ Mark VK6FN Max VKS5ET John VK6HRC VK6MRB swl Mul

VAOMIRB swi Mulligan and others. David mostly listened on a Kiwi sdr over East on 40m as he was not hearing much direct, then tried 80m later on. He had a couple of overs with us before he had to sign off as he had arrived at his workplace..

Wayne worked four on 40m and then on to 80m not much activity though, too cold for some ? There is a possibility he might be active through the week if time avails.

Mark monitored the activity on 20m and 15m, nothing heard from Ross MONNK unfortunately but a full hour from Mike DL3YZ and the crew on 20m. Worked two on 40m heard seven, heard twelve on 80m tried calling Wayne VK6NW but no response !

The master of multi tasking spotting / chatting on WhatsApp as well. Max enjoyed the evening in SWL mode making sure everyone behaved. He is very happy to report that most of the electrical gremlins have been sorted with the help of Rob VK6LD.

John enjoyed the session, happy to catch up Rob VK3ECH portable VK4. I had three contacts on 40m and one on 80m and enjoyed the 20m traffic on a local Kiwi sdr. Thank you to all on last night and this morning, stay safe. Richard VK6HRC

FYI As we were signing off WA6ZFT Steve from La Mesa California called in – a very interesting fellow indeed. Steve was the co-inventor of the AllStar network that we use for the call-backs, and was the the second node on the network at the start.

He was also heavily involved with the ear- ly California repeater and remote station systems and still homebrews HF rigs for fun when he has the time. Steve’s QRZ page is well worth a look.

Post Morsum – II

For our Sandgropers, getting up at 6am in the morning for the Post Morsum call- back after a late CQQRS net may not be everyone’s cup of tea.

And for those of us in places afar from Richard our Post Morsition, some have to work, others have better things to do at that time of the day. So, here’s a suggestion – how about we run two Post Morsums for a trial period?

One at the original time of 6am WA time on Wednesday (2200Z Tuesday in places meridian), and one at say 7pm WA time, 8:30pm SA time and 9pm Eastern (1100Z Wednesday)? Would you be interested in calling in from time to time if we did that?

Is there a better time that would suit you perhaps – Richard isn’t available from 5 to 5:45pm his time when he listens to Nic VK7WW‘s brilliant CW training net, but apart from that, he’s flexible.

All you need is Echolink on your phone or computer – and you’re in. Please let Richard know your thoughts vk6hro(at)gmail.com and Cc me cqarsnet@gmail.com

IMS WeeKs FOpic OT INtTerest This week, Nigel G4RWI continues his dive into his research into using Artificial Intelligence tools for amateur radio.

He’s jumped ahead a bit to give us some insight into the capabilities of these new tools – in this case, tackling imperfectly sent and received CW.

Artificial Intelligence and Hand-Sent Morse Code.

From Nigel G4RWI Given that Al is a rapidly developing technology, and nearly everyday we read of another industry or company taking advantage of it, how could it be relevant to Amateur Radio, and specifically to our shared interest in Morse code?

Ie One thing that Al is very good at is pattern recognition. Think face recognition. Al can recognise faces in an image, not because its seen that image before, but because its learnt something about that face.

I’ve thought for a long time that Al should be able to decode Morse code Py ae ey TE bg Jae A) a ees rN ke Ss ace one cn

Should be able to decode Morse code. eaene cena Ifyou think about it, thats what we are training our brains to do, recognise patterns, often in a noisy environment, and often when the dots and dashes are not perfectly formed or timed.

Also or brains get good at auto-correct. Someone sends QTS but we know because of the context he meant QTH, and they just miss-sent the H So I thought I would pose the question to ChatGPT.

Here is what I asked it: “With Human sent Morse the timings vary slightly plus when received via a radio there is a lot of noise and other unwanted signals.

Al should be good at recognising the underlying patterns, as a good human operator would” This is what came back! You’re absolutely right — and you’ve hit the key insight.

Human-sent Morse is imperfectly timed, and over-the-air (OTA) reception introduces noise, fading, key clicks, splatter, QRM, and QRN.

These all make strict rule-based decoding brittle — but they’re exactly the kind of variability Alcan learn to deal with, just like a skilled operator.

Why Al Works Well for Human-Sent Morse + Noisy Conditions + Human brains recognize relative patterns, not exact timings. + Almodels can be trained the same way: to detect temporal shapes in sound waves, not fixed durations. + Neural networks (esp.

Convolutional Neural Networks and Recurrent Neural Networks) are great at this kind of sequence/pattern recognition under distortion. \ Al-Powered Approaches That Mimic Human Decoding 1.

Use a Pretrained Deep Learning Model These are designed exactly for what you described: © Deepmorse + Deep CNN trained on audio with realistic noise + Input: WAV files with Morse + Output: Decoded text a Includes synthetic and real data, can be fine-tuned with your own recordings 9 Handles variable timing and noise better than traditional decoders © Morseal + Uses raw audio and deep learning to decode variable-speed Morse + Includes Jupyter notebooks + Good starting point for experimentation 2.

Train Your Own Model Ifyou have specific kinds of signals (e.g. noisy HF SSB vs clean CW), you can train a custom model: @ Steps: 1. Collect Audio Samples: Record real-world Morse (multiple operators, variable speeds). 2.

Preprocess: + Convert to spectrograms or Mel-Frequency Cepstral Coefficients using librosa (a Python languge audio analysis program) + Optionally filter out lowhigh-trequency noise 3.

Label: + Annotate using something like Audacity or Praat + Label dots, dashes, intra-character gaps, letter gaps, word gaps 4.

Train a Model: + Use a CNN (e.g., for spectrograms) or RNN/Transformer (for sequences) + Frameworks: PyTorch, TensorFiow, or even Keras for fast prototyping @ Example Architecture: + Input: Spectrogram slice + CNN ayers: detect tone bursts + RNN layers: learn sequences over time + Output: ., -, or space, followed by decoding into letters 4X If You Want a Shortcut (Prototype): You can combine: + Audio Preprocessing with librosa + Basic CNN+RNN architecture + Greedy decoding or CTC (Connectionist Temporal Classification) if aligning audio to text Happy to walk you through code for any of this, or even adapt a pretrained model if you share a short WAV file of your Morse (especially if it’s noisy HF).

Shoule/ be able Olde COME: IOS Cy CO CC a If you think about it, thats what we are training our brains to do, recognise patterns, often in a noisy environment, and often when the dots and dashes are not perfectly formed or timed.

Also or brains get good at auto-correct. Someone sends QTS but we know because of the context he meant QTH, and they just miss-sent the H So I thought I would pose the question to ChatGPT. Here is what I asked it:

“With Human sent Morse the timings vary slightly plus when received via a radio there is a lot of noise and other unwanted signals. Ai should be good at recognising the underlying patterns, as a good human operator would” This is what came back!

You’re absolutely right — and you’ve hit the key insight. Human-sent Morse is imperfectly timed, and over-the-air 2s noise, fading, key clicks, splatter, QRM, and QRN.

These decoding brittle — but they’re exactly the kind of variability niet lila a ekillan nnorator

Happy to walk you through code for any of this, or even adapt a pretrained model if you share a short WAV file of your Morse (especially if it’s noisy HF).

Gl ka ARD Bil Rt Nt Beh ie OS ake od tee So all very interesting if a little incomprehensible in parts. I have no idea what CNN and RNN means, but a quick follow up question gave me a basic understanding of differences. So what did I learn.

Firstly I was probably right. It seems to be a characteristic of all Al’s in that they like to inflate your own ego “You’re La 998

Like to inflate your own ego “You’re absolutely right — and you’ve hit the key insight.”! Secondly its given me some existing examples to experiment with, and some pointers as to how I might roll my own. Could I have got here with Google and YouTube?

Probably, but with a lot more effort and clutter to wade through. Cheers, Nigel G4RWI

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; for guidance on writing for RagChew, see Articles below. Please email material to Mark VK2KI: cqqrsnet@gmail.com

On My Workbench

Improving the Performance of In-Line, Phase-inverting Noise Cancellers by Adopting a Different Approach to Noise Pick-Up from Stan ZL3TK

Ing the Performance of In-Line, Phase-in Noise Cancellers by Adopting a Different Approach to Noise Pick-Up from Stan ZL3TK

The secret to optimizing the performance of RF phase-inverting noise cancellers is in delivering to the auxiliary (AUX) antenna input as near-perfect facsimile as possible nt the nnicea nna wichec tn rancreal

Users of such devices have often lamented the perceived need to hunt down the source of the offending noise then install a customized noise pick-up antenna as close as possible to the actual noise source.

In reality, even if there was only one noise source, such an endeavour is usually considered impractical for a range of reasons.

But in an urban environment there is never only one noise source, so to deploy a separate pick-up antenna for every source and trunk their signals into the operating room is clearly impossible.

Amazingly, an aggregation of all those noise sources is already on hand. Whether picked up by the main antenna or on the shield of the main antenna’s coaxial feed line, noise currents will flow down the braid of the main antenna coax on their journey to ground at the transceiver end.

What if an exact facsimile of the aggregated noise which your antenna system is picking up could be delivered directly to the noise canceller’s AUX antenna input?

Surely that would eliminate the myriad of frustrating variables encountered when trying to discover by experimentation a compromise between polarization, length and orientation of a single random wire AUX antenna.

Allegedly, it can be done very easily by simple capacitive coupling to the main-antenna feed line’s braided copper shield. Find an off-cut piece of coaxial cable 1.5 m in length with a diameter at least that of the antenna’s feed line.

Carefully slit the outer jacket lengthwise to half its thickness, ensuring no damage to the copper braid beneath, then tear along the slit to remove the jacket. Now, bunching the braid slightly will allow the dielectric and inner conductor to be withdrawn.

Depending upon the diameter of your station coax and whether it already has a connector fitted, it may be necessary to carefully insert a wooden dowel, or mandrel, into the piece of copper braid increasing its diameter sufficiently to allow it to be slid onto the main antenna’s coax.

Now stretch the braid for a tight fit over the main coax jacket leaving the near end of the braid about 500 mm from your noise canceller’s main antenna input socket.

Select a 700 mm length of insulated wire to reach from the near end of the new copper sleeve and the noise canceller’s AUX antenna, input socket.

Strip off 100 mm of insulation from one end and wind the bare wire three or four times around the sleeve’s near end, cinching it to make good contact with the sleeve. Add a banana-

The original article was published in the August 2025 newsletter from ‘The Antique Wireless Association of Southem Africa’.

Credit goes to the author Warren Akerman, ZS6AKW, who wrote, ‘I used this hack while living for four years in an area suffering from a constant S7 to $9+ noise floor. Even though my noise floor was this high, I could null out the noise and work DX.

This little project looks like it is based on sound theory. To improve flow readability, the article has been considerably edited by Stan, ZLSTK. Stan doesn’t own a noise canceller so he has not been able to test the device.

For those who see possible merit in it and decide to try one, please carefully evaluate any improvements then write a report for RagChew detailing your experience. 73 de Stan Thank you Stan.

For those who haven’t tried the phase-type noise cancellers to reduce or get rid of the switch mode power supply hash that these days is the bane of our existence on the low bands, I recommend that you do.

Terry VKSTM makes an excellent kit, or you could buy a copy (complete with pick-up antenna) from China for under $100; 1 don’t recommend the ridiculously expensive and poorly made MFJ one – email me for my previous articles in RagChew).

They can be tricky to adjust and as Stan said, rely on pick up of noise from a suitably placed noise antenna (I use the little whip on the back of mine – and the S9 noise drops to S zero on 40m and S1- 20n 80m).

I like the approach proposed by Warren and will be giving it a try. Thanks to Stan from bringing it to our attention. For those who have noise cancellers and want to give this a try, please let us know how you went cagrsnet@gmail.com

What’s going on on your workbench? If you have an article or two that you think might be of interest to our readers, please let Mark VK2KI know; email to cqqrsnet@gmail.com For guidance on writing for RagChew, see Articles below.

Head Copy Practice

Last week we waved goodbye to Winnie and friends. This week we’ve drifted into a new adventure, though probably not very far. Surely it can’t be too great a distance from the Hundred Aker Wood to the riverbank.

Our new journey is The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. A riverside tale of friendship, mischief, and the quiet beauty of life along an English river. First published in 1908, it follows Mole, Rat, Badger, and the irrepressible Mr. Toad.

Beneath the laughter and escapades lies a celebration of loyalty, the natural world, and the comforts of home. It’s a slightly more challenging book for head copy, but after ten weeks in the Hundred Ake Wood, we should be ready for it.

I’ve made a few small adjustments to make the text Morse friendly. I have removed less common punctuation that the Ditto CW app doesn’t recognise, and simplified contractions (for example, “we’ll” becomes “we will”).

Chapter 1 is quite large, so due to MailChimp’s size limits, we’ll be spreading it over two weeks. This week’s files for Chapter 1 include: * One .txt file with the full chapter—perfect for use with the Ebook2cw app if you’d like to make your own single mp3 file.

~ https://fkurz.net/ham/ebook2cw.html + Two .mp3 files, each containing about a quarter of the chapter. * Two text files matching the mp3 segments. Click on the images below to download.

You can load the .txt files into the Ditto CW: Morse Player app – https://dittocw.andro.io/ , or simply play the .mp3 files on your media player.

Both will work fine, but the Ditto CW app lets you adjust every Morse setting to your liking, while a standard media player will only allow a change in speed, and it will be in steps such as +1.25x, 1.5x, or 1.75x.

Other News

This Tuesday I got nowhere trying UK-VK on 15m, but not for any good reason other than maybe Propagation.

| was Portable on a perfect English summer morning, at a quiet rural location. So n noise floor was as low as it can be:

| feel for all you operators with a noise floor of S5 and above. Less than S1 is my norm. On transmit, the Xiegu G90’s 20 watts is far more useful than QRP but it does lack a bit of punch for DX. Still, as in Life, we have to work with what we’ve got.

And the G90 is a great radio for Portable. The T2LT antenna may have been the culprit, but I tested it in this location a couple of weeks ago and it worked fine then. So, who knows.

Anyway, I have an exciting idea for next week’s DXpedition so watch out for news of that! Ross MONNK

CW Ops Column — 14 August 2025

Bry Peel pyhot rathct Drectet os Gd i LAN – rach eth reat tine

From Chris VK3QB CW Ops OC Ambassador Hello again, I hope everyone has had some great on-air activity this week and you are fighting your CW gremlins, whatever they may be.

I’ve been assisting one member with some tips on improving his CW; both sending and receiving. If you’d like to share your challenges, just drop me an email and we can either chat via email or have a phone call/Zoom.

Sked?

Would you like a sked outside the Tuesday sessions (ideally Monday night) – where you can get feedback and ask questions? Email and VK1CWO can help! Vk1cwo@outlook.com

CW Ops Academy

CW Ops offers a great training program. It’s called CW Academy and caters to all levels of capability. Beginner: For those with limited or no experience — raslhs nAsatarinn tn tha haninnar

Fundamental: Once you’ve mastered the basics and want to improve your skills this is your course. You are pretty confident with the alphabet and numbers and can send and receive at 6-10 WPM.

Intermediate: For those in the 10-15 WPM range looking to improve skills for contesting, DX, and ragchews. Advanced: If you’re confident with sending and receiving at 18-20WPM this is your class to achieve 25WPM and start the journey towards full head-copy and really get the best out of our mode.

You can read more and complete a questionnaire to better determine which class would best suit you here: https://cwops.org/cw-academy/ Classes run for eight weeks — they are hosted twice a week on Zoom.

You need to apply yourself and be committed if you want to get the most out of these courses.

If you’d like to know more, please drop me an email. I’m more than happy to send you my phone number and we can have a chat.

Helpful Hint

• s a As noted last week, before getting on air, spend 2-3 minutes doing some practice. Start with “v v v” and “test” and then your callsign. For some more thorough practice, try sending Pangrams off-air every day.

You can download a PDF here: https:// morsecodesessions.wordpress.com/resources/ Pangrams are a great way to ensure you’re confident with all characters and can send a complete sentence with good timing and rhythm.

Again, record your sending and listen — how does the timing sound? If you’d like some feedback, please send me a recoding. Next week I’ll share a really useful tool to help you with copying callsigns.

Lastly, don’t forget the Remembrance Day contest this weekend. Its starts 0300Z on Saturday and goes for 24 hours. (NB. O300Z means O300UTC.

UTC is the universal time we all work to — makes life so much easier than trying to reference humpteen different time zones — I can provide a reference to an article on UTC next week).

Read more about the RD Contest here: https:/Avww.wia.org.au/members/contests/rdcontest/ Give it a go… even for 2-3 hours — it’s a friendly contest and there isn’t any pressure to QRQ. Email me if you have any questions.

————— As always, local CW Ops members are here to help. Some are on-air regularly and more than happy to have practice QSOs with you. Just send me an email and we can go from there.

73, Chris VK3QB CW Ops OC Ambassador WwWwW.CWops.org

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=PLHsQmZz6fBXO7swAfbTmutrbbEL17fUQL 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

International Flignt Contest It’s not too late to join this interesting Morse Code exercise. Progress report on the QRS International Flight Contest

From Stan ZL3TK Our penultimate journey has begun. Northbound on Wednesday 13 August at 0000Z, Flight NR 09 departed from Runway 36, a 1.4 km strip at 2.8 km AMSL in one of those infamous, criminal- infested narco countries of South America, en route for the fourth-richest city in North America.

Any suspicions about what might be stashed away in passenger luggage for CBP

SKCC Oceania QRS Saunter – This Weekend

From Garry VK2GAZ: The SKCC Oceania QRS Saunter will take place this Saturday, 16TH August, 2025 from 00:00 UTC until 11:59 UTC a 12 hour event.

All are welcome to join in!!

All the details for the Oceania QRS Saunter (OQS) can be viewed on the SKCC website at: https:/Awww.skccgroup.com/operating_activities/oqs/ Please make use of the SKCC Sked Page and the CW Club RBN Spotter.

Https://sked.skccgroup.com/ https://rbn.telegraphy.de/ I look forward to contacting you during the event.

best regards.

VK6PZT BALUN – Smoke Test

From John VK2RU I’m pleased to report that I had my first QRP QSO today with Mark VK3MJ. 2000KM: on 5w going out of a bit of el-cheapo hookup wire. Mark gave me a 539. Very happy with that. My rig today:

• QCX+, powered by Anker 24,000mAh power bank through a PD trigger set on 15v. ¢ 49:1 transformer built to Richard’s VK6PZT design in the previous RagChew Newsletter – Jaycar LO 1230 toroid x2 stacked, Jaycar WH 3011 hookup wire.

• Ant – about 10m Jaycar hookup wire going up to a 7m squid pole. e JBL speaker. ¢ WT 8 Amp No 2 key.

RD Contest – This Weekend

Contests I hear you say? Pah! Well yes – it ain’t nearly as much fun as QRS rag chewing on a Tuesday… but it can be a good training opportunity. Pretty much a fixed format callsigns, report/serial number, maybe name, 73 dit-dit. Not very meaningful…

And probably done at lightning speed…. but because the format is pretty well fixed, no matter how well advanced your CW reading isn’t, you might find it useful.

If you’re not sure, perhaps try listening in – and if you find that you’re able to get a surprising amount written in your log, well perhaps try transmitting? Look at last year’s QRP results – anyone we know? 🙂

Da 1. Suggested Call: “CQ RD”, “CQ Contest”, or “CQ Test” 2. Exchange: A valid exchange consists of RS(1) followed by a number as follows: a. For a single operator, the number of years you have been a licenced Ham.

For example, if this is your 1st year as a ham then you will sign RS(T) 001. Round off to the nearest whole number. All zeros are not accepted. b.

For a multi-op or club station, the number of licenced years of the longest licenced Amateur present at the start of the contest. 3.

On all bands, stations may be contacted at intervals of not less than THREE hours since the previous contact on that band and mode. a. FM & SSB count as one mode, as does CW & TTY count for the CW mode.

Therefore one cannot QSO with a station in FM and work them on SSB on the same band before the three hours is up. 4, No cross band contacts are allowed. 5.

Exchange of contact information via satellites, telephones, repeaters, Echolink, IRLP, or the internet is not in the spirit of the contest and is banned; however, Remote stations can be used – see the Rules for details. 6.

Contacts via satellites are not allowed for scoring purposes. 7. Contacts within the same call area are permitted.

Maybe in a future year, we might consider a QRS push during the RD Contest – with the double points, imagine the impact if a whole bunch of QRSers submitted logs. It’d be great advertising for this outstanding sapect of our hobby, that’s for sure!

QRQ?

Now we know that one of the secrets to the huge success of our net is the fun and relaxation that can come from a lovely rolling slow-speed rag-chew.

For those who are comfortable with CW, it’s just so much fun and so relaxing (think gliding, compared to flying helicopters!). And for those early on the learning journey – it’s a great target to aim for – to be able to relax and enjoy a nice long rag-chew.

Maybe we should call it the QRS Rag-Chew net – HI!

However, there’s also lots of our team who learnt CW when Noah was a lad – and for are more comfortable with 15- 20+ words per minute than sub- 10WPM (I equate that to dancing (Ms e was originally my dance instructor – that’s how we met by the way!) – for me (and my poorly-lubricated arthritic hip joints) it’s always been easier to dance

Fast steps than slow). I know some of our family would just love to have some regular QRQ (ie non-QRS rag-chews). But finding people to chat to on air can be a challenge (UR 599, name is Flash, 73 dit-dit).

So, how about we crank up a QRQ net on a different night of the week, just for those who would enjoy a rattling-along rag-chew or three?_ I’m thinking we find a litle segment of 40m for a start (eg 7030 to 7035 – specifically to include the common SOTA calling frequency), pick a night and a time (eg Thursday or Saturday at say 1100 – 11302) and see what happens?

To keep it rolling though, we’d need a coordinator – someone who will be there often and could write a report for the RagChew newsletter each week.

If it becomes popular, we could run up another Reporting system like we use for the QRS net – but we’re getting ahead of ourselves! Who’s up for such a net, and in particular, who could take on the coordinator role to promote it? Thoughts? cgarsnet@gmail.com

If you’ve read something that you think might be of interest to our readers, please let me know. For guidance on writing for RagChew, see Articles below. Please email material to Mark VK2KI: cqqrsnet@gmail.com

Readable (Watchable) Five

In Newsletter 19 ~ 2025, I reviewed Chris Rutkowski’s MorseBusters YouTube video Keymanship 101 – The Beat and Rhythms of Morse Code – https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=noBXQRrxsrg&t=1898s .

Chris followed up with Keymanship 102 – Perception and Experience of Morse Code – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JPszqUgIIM8&t=1560s , which is a continuation of the first video and adds a few extra tips on technique, timing, and smooth sending.

This week, I’m looking at the latest in this series, Morse Code Basics — Introduction to the Straight Key – https://www. youtube.com/watch?v=iSVA8Og6GrM .

This latest video is exactly what the title promises — a no-pressure introduction to one of the simplest and most classic ways of sending Morse.

It starts with a quick look at the key itself — how it’s built, how to hold it comfortably, and how to set it up so you’re not fighting the spring tension.

From there, you’ll get clear demonstrations of sending dots and dashes, with the emphasis on proper spacing and rhythm. The approach is calm and encouraging, and there’s none of the “you must get it perfect from day one” pressure.

Towards the end, the video moves into some handy practical tips: how to keep you sending consistent over longer practice sessions, ways to avoid fatigue, and simple exercises to develop a steady rhythm.

Thanks John. Ross asked a question about key handling a while ago, which I’d like to return to and get others’ thoughts – for a future There’s No Such Thing segment I think.

If you’ve read something that you think might be of interest to our readers, please let me know so John and I can share more thoughts and ideas. For guidance on writing for RagChew, see Articles below. Please email material to Mark VK2KI: cqqrsnet@gmail.com

Prosign/Character/Signal of the Month

Our resident CW trainer Nic VK7WW (see Other Notes above for the link to Jordan VK3ACU’s recordings of Nic’s latest training transmissions) was asked about a standard two-or three-letter designation for an exclamation mark.

Nic has always used but suggested we get others’ opinions too. So what do you think? cqqrsnet@gmail.com Nic also suggested this as an interesting reference manual –> So, this week let’s go with :

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

Di-dan-ai-daan-ait

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.

And by the way, a reminder; if you send me any information by email, our report form or WhatsApp – unless you specifically state that material is not to be published, I’ll assume that you’re happy to see your thoughts in the RagChew newsletter.

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.

Articles

The newsletter is interesting to readers because of the material contributed by so many people – be it the reports each week or the various articles. Could you write a short article or articles for RagChew? You bet! Writing not your strong point?

Don’t worry, I’m very happy to help as much or as little as needed. Here’s a thought – although our readers will much prefer your own writing, perhaps have a go at using a Large Language Model Artificial Intelligence tool such as ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot or Google Gemini to check your writing or even to actually draft the whole article in a relaxed easy-to-read manner!

You can find out more about how to do that on the Newsletter page on our website bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite. Our website also includes a suitable prompt (the command you feed to the Al to make it do what you want).

Please remember though – you must fact-check anything that an Al tool drafts for you because Als ‘hallucinate’ – ie if an Al can’t find what you’re looking for, it will make up an answer and present it as a fact!

This is one of the dangers of using Als ~ it’s quite probable that the tool will create a very readable and convincing draft that is 100% wrong! You as the submitter are responsible for fact-checking.

But it’s a learning experience – please let us know how you went if you had a go with this new generation of tool. And by the way – lam very concerned about our future in a world of Al – but I’m pleased to see that school and university curriculums now focus on understanding the risks – for instance, kids are now learning critical thinking something that used to be taught mostly at post-graduate level.

When the typewriter was invented, people predicted the downfall of handwriting; when the word processor was invented, the art of writing was thought to be on the way out – ditto for the spreadsheet and arithmetic, AM, SSB and FT-8 for amateur radio etc.

We can ignore Al and hope that it just goes away… or we can learn to handle it through experimentation and use. For more guidance on writing for the RagChew newsletter (including help with using an Al), head to our website bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite then click the menu on the top right and then click RagChew Newsletter.

Teamwork

Thank you so much to our team of 40 contributors: DL8YZ, G4RWI, MONNK, VK2AOE, VK2ASB, VK2GAS, VK2GAZ, VK2IOW, VK2KJJ, VK2RU, VK2WP, VK3ACU, VK3BSE, VK3BTV, VK3CLD, VK3DRQ, VK3KEV, VK3QB, VK3WOW, VK4PN, VK5CZ, VKSET, VKSKFG, VKSLA, VK6BEK, VK6HRC, VK6JDM, VK6KD, VK6KHZ, VK6NQL, VK6IS, VK6NW, VK6RR, VK6WE, VK7TA, VK7WW, ZL1PX, ZL3TK, ZLACTS and ZLATE.

And a special thank you to our editorial team, Nigel G4RWI (head of software development), Patrick VK2IOW (reports wrangler), John VK2RU (researcher and Head Copy Facilitator) and Richard VK6HRC (Post Morsition). 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 from members by the editor or published on the CQQRS WhatsApp groups may be published in this newsletter unless specifically requested otherwise.

The values, doctrine and guidelines for the Group and for the newsletter are published on the Principles page of the group’s website https://bit.ly/CQQRSWebsite

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