Above is a video of me CQing on 80 metres CW using my new EI2KC home-brew hacksaw blade key Mark II. I had a nice QSO with DK1IS. This is the whole QSO. I am thoroughly enjoying this home-brew key, which was made with parts that were donated, found lying around the shack, and purchased. It cost me about 10 euro to make. And it's really quite genuinely nice to use. I will be writing an article about the construction of this, and the Mark I key, for a future issue of Echo Ireland magazine. I made some improvements from the Mark I version, although in fairness apart from a cosmetic difference, there is no noticeable difference in their use. They are both very nice to the touch and responsive. I may not revert to using my Kent dual lever paddle again!!
The Mark II key (left) beside its less refined predecessor.
I have now mounted my home-brew hacksaw blade Morse paddle on a steel base, added a nice red handle (made of insulating tape of course!) and fixed the spacing a bit so that it better meets my satisfaction. It's working well, although the spacing gave me some interesting problems during a QSO with PW0F on 40m CW, when it seemed to send random extra dits and dahs seemingly without input from me!! I would ideally like to tidy up the wiring a bit but it's largely complete and I've made a number of QSOs with it. Here's a QSO I had with a German operator in Dominican Republic using the newly-mounted key:
This is a video showing my new home-brew single-lever hacksaw blade Morse key in action. I decided to test it "live", with the webcam running, by CQing on the 30 metre band using 100 watts. First station into my log was DL0BZA. I enjoyed using the key. It has no weight, so holding it down is required during operation, which is not ideal. I have a couple of steel bases, one of which I hope to "stick" it to, in some way. The morse key is a modification of one which used a much smaller hacksaw blade. I also improved the contacts. I may make further modifications in order to get more use out of it.
The key was made with spare parts lying around the shack. The wooden base is off some old bookshelves. The contacts are nuts and bolts supported with eyelets - the type that you crimp onto your DC wires to connect to your power supply. The hacksaw blade required sanding because it was painted blue and a proper connection was not being made. Here are a couple of photos from the construction phase:
The new contacts were made from bits and pieces lying around the shack.
The hacksaw blade during sanding. The eyelets are in place.
