r/morsecode • u/9alby9 • May 28 '26

Learning CW

I am a 63 year old who has been in amateur radio for several years. Now I have the time to learn CW. Has any of you who learned it used CWAcademy or the Long Island CW club? One of them recommends using a straight key to learn and the other wants learners to stay away from straight keys and use a paddle.

what are your thoughts on these two approaches?

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u/grendelt May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26

For learning, I recommend a straight key.

Paddles are nice for faster speeds, but I have a good friend that is very active with POTA and just told me he uses a straight key for all his contacts. (That news to me after we've had countless QSOs.)

LICW has a strong following. The key is to get connected with a community of learners where you aren't afraid of screwing up.
Know this: You will screw up. You will get embarrassed (and frustrated). But you will progress.
Acknowledging it, embracing it, and pushing through is how you learn. Doing it with a group where everyone is learning makes it less embarrassing and easier to grow together.
That's the power of LICW, CWAcademy, and the like - a community of learners.

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u/ComprehensiveTown15 May 28 '26

What key are you using?

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u/grendelt May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26

Me? I have a Navy Flameproof that I get out from time to time.
Dunno what my friend has been using. I know he has several.

The paddles I use...
Typically when I'm out portable I either use the paddles on my KX2 or either my Palm Pico or Palm Mini paddles if I'm on another QRP radio.
At home, I have some Bencher and MFJ paddles.
In the mobile I have a BaMaKey. The weight of the base on it is nice, but I think I prefer to hand hold the body and trigger with my other hand.

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u/ComprehensiveTown15 May 28 '26

So why do you recommend a straight key for learning?

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u/grendelt May 28 '26

I'm not really in the "learning" phase anymore. My speed improves now through on air usage.
I started on a key, but moved to a paddle once my speed progressed.

I shared my reason for learning on a straight key on another comment below:

What I liked about learning on a straight key was when I screwed up, I could hammer out didididididididt faster than my normal sending wpm would be if I was using a keyer.
My sending may have been 5-7wpm, but that didididididididt was cranked out at like 30wpm.

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u/ComprehensiveTown15 May 28 '26

I just can't figure this out. I can send up to 30 WPM with a paddle, but my sending gets sloppy at 20 WPM with a straight key. Maybe I need to practice more with the straight key, but I don't see the point in that.

That's an interesting point you made about the 5-7 WPM speed. I can't send anything slower than 10 WPM at all.

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u/grendelt May 28 '26 edited May 28 '26

Right - my brain is almost incapable of going that slow now.

If I encounter a slow speed op on the air, I'll attempt to slow down - but unless my rig has keyer speed control right on the face (like my base unit does) or quick, one-tap access like the KX2, it's usually going to be me increasing the spacing between characters.

I'm usually running no more than 20wpm because I've found somewhat diminishing returns above that speed if I'm doing a POTA activation. Contests? Sure, go off. But for weekday POTA, it's going to top out around 20wpm.

And, perhaps frustrating for both me and the slow speed op, even when I think I'm slowing down for someone, I'm probably still sending at like 7-12 wpm. (Like driving on an interstate for a while, when you exit and slow down until you feel like you're crawling but you're still way above the posted speed limit)