I recently realised that the bands I have access to (20m & 40m) have improved again in the evening giving me the opportunity to make some more CW QSOs. I have been back practicing after a bit of a hiatus in the winter and feel that my head copying in particular has really improved.
I’ve been using certain sections of the Chuck Adams K7QO course files, just listening and not copying down on paper. To start with I was using files 070 – 075 which are qth hr is…, name hr is…, rig hr is…, wx hr is, ur rst is… and ant hr is… reasonably slow, I also listened to the QSOs, 077 – 082 and the random letters, random numbers and pi 083 – 086 (I probably should have used random characters 088-089 too, but missed those). I’ve now moved on to various “essays” from 091 onwards.
One thing I’ve noticed with improved head copy is that even when I’m having a QSO and copying onto paper my hearing where spaces are has hugely improved, this was something I really struggled with, I can also sometimes skip over bits of a QSO I might not need to write down.
Over the last week (and a day) I’ve made 5 contacts which for me is a big deal, I am also feeling much more confident in the contacts I’m making, and hoping to be able to better use whatever little time I have spare to make contacts in future without it being such a “big deal”.
I am still really enjoying CW and get a kick out of this mode in a way I don’t with other modes, but that’s a personal thing at the moment. There are so many facets of radio I’m still yet to explore!