morse code

[Hughman]

We've been having some fun with a practice key I found for learning Morse code. The six-year-old is pretty good at it. Does anyone use Morse anymore? Hams haven't had to learn it to get their license for 30 years. Where, besides SOS, is Morse used commercially?

http://www.imagestation.com/picture/sraid225/p050401c018d92fd8117feb6520357a2a/e7a5ba12.jpg

[paladin]

Although Morse code is no longer required, it is still used , especially on the 160, 80, 40, 20 and 15 meter ham bands. It is still a good way to get a message out, in questionale weather, or when the microphone circuits don't work.

[Michael Beckman]

A friend of mine and I have considered learning it so that we can converse by blinking. Not sure if the motivation is strong enough though.

[JimD]

A friend of mine and I have considered learning it so that we can converse by blinking.
.

Good to have a back up if your email is down.

[Michael Beckman]

That plan was formulated while rowing around the San Juans on a trip from hell. 7 days in a 26' longboat with 12 people aboard, and some serious sexual tensions in the group.(>__>)

We wanted to talk about stuff without people knowing what we said. We eventually just spoke in vague terms that made perfect sense to us as long as we made the right faces to go with them.

On a related topic, never go on a boat trip with a girl who just broke up with you, her mom, and her ex boyfriend who she apparently developed feelings for again. It does NOT go well. >__> From here on out I reserve extended outings for friends only.

[JimD]

... never go on a boat trip with a girl who just broke up with you, her mom, and her ex boyfriend who she apparently developed feelings for again...

You really shouldn't even be all on the same continent.

[Michael Beckman]

Continents are pretty nice. Rather small islands (http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&q=+48%C2%B040%2711.56%22N+122%C2%B040%273.02%22W&ie=UTF8&ll=48.669879,-122.667503&spn=0.002565,0.007167&t=k&z=18&iwloc=addr&om=1) aren't so nice. No camping on that bird reservation either, so we all slept aboard the boat. 12 people in 26 feet = little bit too cozy for the crowd.

[Hwyl]

I've heard that British fighter pilots communicate by morse hand signals, while flying alongside each other at mach whatever,

[JimD]

I can transmit SOS in morse, and therefore any combinations of the letters S and O. For example, if you asked me how was my day I could say, 'Soso'.

[John B]

Lets just hope you don't learn any more vowels.

[Ian McColgin]

The '60's rock group Perls Before Swine had a chorous that ran

"Dit Dit Dah Dit
Dit Dit Dah
Dah Dit Dah Dit
Dah Dit Dah"

That first letter always gets my attention because Dad (first name Franklin) always beeped it as he turned in the drive after coming home from a long flight.

You really need to be super good to just hear or see a message without writing it down as it goes along.

[JimD]

LetterMorse
A di-dah
B dah-di-di-dit
C dah-di-dah-dit
D dah-di-dit
E dit
F di-di-dah-dit
G dah-dah-dit
H di-di-di-dit
I di-dit
J di-dah-dah-dah
K dah-di-dah
L di-dah-di-dit
M dah-dah
N dah-dit
O dah-dah-dah
P di-dah-dah-dit
Q dah-dah-di-dah
R di-dah-dit
S di-di-dit
T dah
U di-di-dah
V di-di-di-dah
W di-dah-dah
X dah-di-di-dah
Y dah-di-dah-dah
Z dah-dah-di-dit

[Ian McColgin]

.--- .. --

-.-- --- ..- -- .- -.. . .. - - --- --- . .- ... -.--

[DaveWhitla]

I had to learn morse while training as an RAAF pilot many years ago.
It is a very handy backup to voice comms. For example, when radio information services fail for whatever reason, critical local weather info for airfields can be broadcast using morse code over radio direction finding beacons.
Using very directional light sources it is also simple and cheap to have private conversations over a reasonable distance without giving your position away (unlike encrypted radio).

And when you're captured by baddies you can call MacGiver for help three cells down via the sewer pipe :D

[JimD]

.--- .. --

-.-- --- ..- -- .- -.. . .. - - --- --- . .- ... -.--

Too easy? See if you can guess the name to this song?

-.. .- -.. --- .-. ..- -. .-. ..- -. .-. ..- -.
-.. .- -.. --- .-. ..- -. .-. ..- -.

[Don Z.]

And when you're captured by baddies you can call MacGiver for help three cells down via the sewer pipe :D

Ah, but that's what the tap code is for, and is much easier to remember, especially when you've had your head bashed in...

[kc8pql]

Hams haven't had to learn it to get their license for 30 years.

Not true, in the U.S. anyway. The last code requirement was dropped only this past spring.

[Ian McColgin]

You mean the Crystals' version, or Bette Middlers' ?

[JimD]

Ya know I never could figure out what's up with 'da do run run'.

[Mad Scientist]

The trouble with Morse code is that it is so damned S L O W !
The old international requirement for Morse sent by flashing light was 8 words per minute. I can't remember the minimum speed for CW (radio), but I do know that it was faster - just because humans seem to be more adept at processing sounds rather than flashes of light.
The fastest visual method I've used was semaphore flags, where the min. speed requirement (in NATO) was 15 wpm.
For comparison, a reasonbly competent typist can reach 40 wpm, and for decades, radioteletype messages had a speed of 100 wpm. I know of a typist who was so fast that the Teletype machine couldn't keep up, on a 100 wpm land-line...

[Jay Greer]

All I can remember is the phonetic sound of letter "D"; Dog did it!
Jay

[Ken Hutchins]

The trouble with Morse code is that it is so damned S L O W !
The old international requirement for Morse sent by flashing light was 8 words per minute. I can't remember the minimum speed for CW (radio), but I do know that it was faster - just because humans seem to be more adept at processing sounds rather than flashes of light.
The fastest visual method I've used was semaphore flags, where the min. speed requirement (in NATO) was 15 wpm.
For comparison, a reasonbly competent typist can reach 40 wpm, and for decades, radioteletype messages had a speed of 100 wpm. I know of a typist who was so fast that the Teletype machine couldn't keep up, on a 100 wpm land-line...


That's a lot better then the WBF these days.:D:D:D:D

[Hughman]

My six year old asked me what a telegram was - I was reading the beginning of Swallows and Amazons to him- which prompted me to tinker with the practice key.

He wondered why telegrams were so terse, and so, in explaining how telegrams were paid for by the word.....it became necessary to demonstrate how tedious it is to send messages by Morse.

I might just set up a telegraph from here to the bushes down the hill....(now where did I leave that buzzer...)

[DaveWhitla]

Swallows and Amazons

Was just thinking of this the other day.
The book that first made me want to learn to sail as a young boy.

[Hwyl]

Here's a story about a very clever composer using Morse

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7026637.stm

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Thirty quid was thirty quid in those days, but even so, he deserved more!

Very clever!

I was very intrigued that Barrington Pheloung pulled the same trick with his "Inspector Morse" theme tune.

On a simpler note, everyone knows why the opening bars of Beethoven's fifth symphony were used as the theme tune for BBC broadcasts to occupied Europe in WW2 .._

[P.I. Stazzer-Newt]

did dit dit
dah dah
dit dit dit

Half the fxxxin phones in Britain do that - frequently.

[Dave Hadfield]

Morse is still used to identify radio nav aids in aviation. You dial up the frequency, listen to the morse code letters, and confirm that you've got the right one selected before you home to or from it.

I had to learn it at 7 words a minute in the late 70s as a condition of employment at Air Canada. Nowadays they print the dots and ashes on the maps and plates so that the person can read it as they listen.

All this is being supplanted now of course, by GPS and other integrated nav systems.

Dave

[Rich VanValkenburg]

Maybe one of you can tell me what the morse code is that you hear in the opening credits to the TV show Jericho.

Rich

[bob easton]

Maybe one of you can tell me what the morse code is that you hear in the opening credits to the TV show Jericho.

Rich

Yes, it is. I don't watch the show and just picked up a bit of the code from a YouTube video. The code speed is only about 10 words per minute (I used to do 30). I caught only these few characters at the end of a promo ... j - e - r - i - c - h - o ---fades away.