Dear LF Group,
I'm sure that modes such as BPSK have considerable
technical advantages compared to the slow CW modes. But as in
most areas of engineering, technical excellence is not the only
factor.
The advantages of QRSS include the following:
- It is very easy to modify an existing CW station for QRSS
operation - all that is required are some simple keying circuits and
leads, and a rather basic PC with some free software.
-QRSS is not demanding on the transmitter/receiver. The duty
cycle is much the same as normal CW, any transmitter capable of
on-off keying can be used, all that is required of the receiver is an
audio output. Exceptional frequency stability is not required.
-There are no synchronisation or clock recovery issues with
QRSS; also, the PC spectrogram display effectively 'decodes' all
the signals present in a relatively wide bandwidth. These things
make random QSO's straightforwards - there is no need to know
the exact frequency a station is using, the time it will be operating,
or even to know the exact modulation method that will be used.
In summary, slow CW may not give the very best results, or be a
particularly satisfying intellectual challenge, but it does give rather
good results with simple equipment.
Cheers, Jim Moritz
73 de M0BMU
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