Still Learning Morse Code (publ. 2024-12-10)

Those looking at my list of posts for the last year, might wonder if I am still involved in amateur radio. First of all, very recently I renewed my General Class (USA) license, KL1TL. Second, although I have had no involvement in club activities recently, I am still working steadily at learning morse code. I only can spare about 5 or 10 minutes a day for this, in a good week, so progress has been slow. But usually I get in about 20-30 minutes of practice per week.

For many months, I was using some Koch training software (free software) and I've learned most of the letters from that — maybe 80-90% accuracy at 5 WPM or less. I felt like I was stalling out in my progress with that, and that I really need to starting doing lots of copy from on-the-air signals. It is not practical for me to have an indoor station right now (various challenges related to apartment living) and it is too cold right now for me to use my mobile station. So, I made a comprise with my principles and starting using WebSDR in Firefox. Most days, this link gets me to a good frequency for monitoring CW, especially CW practice transmissions:

Northern Utah WebSDR - Server #2

I'm not fond of Web apps, and in particular proprietary ones, but I am planning to use this one for copy practice for a few more months, until we get close to Spring time. After that, I can ditch WebSDR and start monitoring from my mobile station during the lunch breaks, and maybe practice slow CW with some local hams.

I might do a little more research, if I can find the time, into setting up an HF station at my work bench, at least for listening. The building I am is a big box of metal — no windows even — and the only antennas nearby are for aviation use.