Bible
Verse
Deuteronomy 6:5-9
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the doorframes of your houses and on your gates. (NIV)
President's Report
Hello all,
Well another month has come and gone. There is a tech class coming up soon and we will be needing help with the testing. If you would like to help, please let me know, but you must be certified to help administer or grade the test. Still we could use some in the registration process.
Our packet digi is up and working great. If you would like to try it out, you can connect to it on 145.010. Soon we will have another one up and running and hopefully it will have coverage in some of the areas not being covered at this time.
Come join us at the meeting and we can discuss more projects.
73's Charles Grisham, KB5SZJ
Next MARC Business Meeting
The next business meeting will be held at the Western Sizzlin Restaurant located on North Frontage Road on Saturday, March 6th beginning at 11 A.M. Come join us for some awesome sweet tea, lunch, and fellowship.
Mask are required to enter. We will meet in the back room. Hope you can join us!
2021 BirmingHAMfest
The Birmingham Amateur Radio Club announces the
2021 BirmingHAMfest date
March 6, 2021 (one day only)
Time – 8:00 am to 2:00 pm
The 2021 BirmingHAMfest will be an outdoor tailgating event due to the present-day health situation. Some of the close vendors who would not mind being outside may come, but we can't guarantee it. You will need to bring your own tables and chairs and canopies as well as any food and drink. No electricity will be provided. The venue will be in one of the parking lots at the Trussville Civic Center. We will be able to use the inside restrooms.
The club will not be responsible for any sales tax and there will not be any admission charged. No prizes would be awarded so no tickets will be sold. A suggestion was made that the individuals who purchased prize tickets could donate to the club instead.
Rosalind Fazel, KD4ZGO
2021 HamFest Chairman
(205) 853-3220
Thanks and 73'
Grady L. Evans W4GLE
It's not a Begali, but...
By Dan Romanchik, KB6NU
One of the questions I'm most frequently asked is, "What is a good paddle for a beginner?"" My usual answer to this question is to look for a used Bencher BY-1 at a hamfest or on one of the online venues. You used to be able to get them for $60 or less. Now, however, there are few hamfests and the price has gone up. Now, used Benchers are close to $80.
Another option that newcomers might consider is the CW Morse paddle (https://cwmorse.us/), shown in photo below. They cost $60 with a steel base ($43 without), and are available from 3rd Planet Solar and Gigaparts. I purchased one recently and used it for a couple of days. To be honest, I was prepared to hate it, but it actually works pretty well. It's not a Begali, but it's good enough that I'd recommend it as a starter key.
These keys are mostly made from 3D-printed plastic parts. You can tell this from the finish. While not as bad as some 3D-printed parts, they do look a little rough. I wouldn't be surprised if they go to molded parts, though, at some point. In high volumes, it has to be cheaper to mold the parts rather than print them.
The key does have metal parts where it counts, though. The contacts are all brass, the base is made from 1/2-in. cold-rolled steel, and the levers pivot on sealed ball bearings. My key weighed 22.5 oz (1.4 lbs.), and was quite stationary on the silicone mat that I use for my keys. The Begali is, of course, a lot heavier at nearly 60 oz. (3.75 lbs.).
A spring between the levers provides the tension. Two screws allow you to adjust the contact spacing. Unlike the Begali, whose adjustment screws have a very fine thread to give you plenty of adjustability, these screws are standard thread screws. What this means is that it can be a bit tricky to set the contact spacing. The screws are spring-loaded to prevent the adjustment from changing, but the springs don't seem to be very beefy, and I can see where the adjustment might change after a lot of use.
The ball bearings give the key a nice action. During my tests, I had the speed cranked up to 23 wpm, and this key performed well at that speed. One thing I didn't like very much is that the arms tend to flex more than I like, but I actually have the same problem with the plastic Begali finger pieces. That's why I use the aluminum finger pieces on the Begali.
Overall, though, I'm quite happy with this key. And, for sixty bucks, which is about one-fifth of the price of a new Begali Magnetic Pro, I can certainly recommend this key to newcomers getting started in CW.
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Dan Romanchik, KB6NU, is the author of the KB6NU amateur radio blog (KB6NU. Com), the "No Nonsense" amateur radio license study guides (KB6NU. Com/study-guides/), and often appears on the ICQPodcast (icqpodcast. com). When he's not testing new keys, he teaches online ham radio classes and likes to work special event stations and state QSO parties.
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