Wednesday, October 29, 2014

Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute Handiham World Weekly E-Letter for the week of Wednesday, 29 October 2014

Turning the Bencher CW paddle on its head

Pat holds up the Bencher paddle. 
What do you do when the wiring to your CW paddle needs to be replaced?  I wasn't really satisfied with the too-short length of the wiring between my Morse code key and the radio, but I'd been putting up with this minor annoyance for quite a while.  Then when I decided to push the IC-7200 transceiver back a bit in the desktop, I noticed that the radio wanted to send a constant stream of dits.  Obviously the 1/4 inch phone plug in the back of the radio was shorted.  It turned out that I had to cut it off and replace it because the way it had been installed in the first place made it impossible to reuse. 
It was finally a good time to rewire the Bencher!

Wednesday, October 22, 2014

Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute Handiham World Weekly E-Letter for the week of Wednesday, 22 October 2014

Welcome to Handiham World.

Cartoon world with radio tower

Broken technology?

Okay, I'll admit it.  This is going to start with a rant because I'm sick, sick, sick of things that don't work!
cartoon guy shaking fist at dead computer
Read or listen to the entire podcast here.

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute Handiham World Weekly E-Letter for the week of Wednesday, 15 October 2014

Welcome to Handiham World.

Cartoon world with radio tower

Are you a teacher?

You could be.  All it takes is a willingness to learn how to share your knowledge about Amateur Radio.
Pat, WA0TDA, holds three license manuals.
How did you learn to walk?  Who taught you how to tie your shoes?  To wear a coat when it's cold outdoors and a hat when the sun was hot? 
Mom and Dad!
Of course our parents were our first teachers.  If you are a mom or dad with children, you know what I'm talking about.  In a way, all of us are teachers at one time or another.  We help each other to learn almost as second nature when we explain the rules of a game to another kid or help our little brother to find his way home from the school bus. 
The teacher isn't always in a school classroom. 

Wednesday, October 08, 2014

Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute Handiham World Weekly E-Letter for the week of Wednesday, 08 October 2014

Are you a multimode operator?

You could be.  All it takes is a willingness to try something new.
The IC-7200 tuned to14.050 CW and the Bencher paddle.
Take a look at your HF transceiver.  Main tuning control, audio and RF gain, noise reduction...  Oh, there it is: MODE.  If you never press the MODE button, you don't know what you're missing.  Sure, we have our favorite modes of operation, mine being SSB phone - typically lower sideband on 160 through 40 meters.  The problem is that we can get into a rut, stuck in the same old places on the band and doing the same thing every day. 
That may be comfortable, but it really isn't going to stretch our operating skills, is it?

Wednesday, October 01, 2014

Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute Handiham World Weekly E-Letter for the week of Wednesday, 01 October 2014

Welcome to Handiham World.

Cartoon world with radio tower

What do you do when no one shows up for your class?
That's the situation I found myself in last week. I'd prepared to teach my assigned part of the General Class course and no one showed up. It was the second scheduled class, and the first instructor had reported the same thing the previous week, so I wasn't really that surprised.  It isn't the end of the world.  When I studied for my Novice license as a teen, it was all strictly do-it-yourself.  Once I passed Novice, I had to pump up my Morse code speed to 13 words per minute and also learn enough from my ARRL license manual to pass the exam given at the FCC office in St. Paul, MN, which was almost two hours drive from my home town.  And that was the days before the internet and on line question pools!  Most of us back then studied alone, working our way through the material and practicing code as best we could.  Having a class to go to would have been helpful, but it wasn't absolutely necessary.  I practiced my code on the air with my buddy Karl, WA0TFC, who is now a silent key.  Karl and I were both in the same radio club, and as you can tell from our pretty close callsign assignments, (TDA & TFC), we were licensed as Novices about the same time. Back then, on the air practice was expected - it was the purpose of having the Novice license, which was only good for a single year.  During that year, one was expected to study and pass the General or go off the air.