FWIW: As a senior in HS in '56-'57, I got a job as a relief operator at
a coastal marine station. Everyone had their own bug with a wedge to
connect it to the company-provided straight key, and all but mine were
Vibroplex. I had acquired a very proletarian looking black-based bug
(J-36?) made by Lionel (of model train fame) at a WW2 surplus outlet,
and used it until I built what I think was a predcessor of the TO-keyer.
The big difference between the Lionel and a Vibroplex was that you
could slow the J-36 dot speed down very nicely, whereas the Vibroplex
sent dots at about 45WPM with the two weights all the way out to the damper.
Not long ago, a friend and former radio operator in the USCG gave me his
Vibroplex. I fooled around with it some, including alligator clips on
the end of the dot arm to get the dot speed down, but I guess I've been
on keyers too long and made almost no progress. I finally modified it
to separate the dot and dash contacts and use it as the paddle for the
keyer in my FT-847 on 2m. The J36 (or whatever it was) was soooo much
easier to use than the Vibroplex.
Incidentally, when I first took my homebrew keyer (9 or 10 dual triodes,
and about 12 lbs) into work, the 16-yr old kid took a lot of verbal and
some physical flak from the OT's. Eventually, however, most of them
asked to try it out ... and two of them commissioned a friend of mine to
build one for each of them. People do change!
I don't have any problems with the KXPD1, and it is cool to have a
totally integrated rig like that.
YMMV
Fred K6DGW
Auburn CA CM98lw
K2/100 # 4398
KX1 # 897
Vic Rosenthal wrote:
After a similar layoff, I re-learned the bug -- it took me two years and
I *still* don't sound as good as I did in 1957.
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