Thanks for the support guys, Stew GW0ETF, Stuart GD0OUD, Dan SM5IMO and Ken JN1THL. I hope I do you proud!
My name is Iain (the Gaelic for John), I am a passionate ham radio operator who loves using the bands to chase DX, contest and ragchew using CW as a means to communicate. Now in my early seventies and still very active, with a body of that vintage but a mind of a twenty year old.
As far as I can recall, I have always been technically curious and have a strong passion to understand how things work, which has lead me into a variety of hobbies, from reading, collecting Morse keys, to restoring cars, vintage photography especially black/white and Ansel Adams. Music is always in the air and assists to focus the mind while reading or out on the hills trudging thru’ peat bogs.
Discovering radio as a teenager, with hands on ex-military equipment and trying to resolve SSB/CW, was the catalyst to kick start a career in radio and on paths which would take me most of my adult life. I was hooked!!!
I passed the RAE (Radio Amateurs Exam) in March ’72, while attending Nautical College for a career in maritime electronics and ship to shore communications, including the required Morse examination of 25 wpm.
It was not until I had sailed the seven seas, discovered women and settled down that I had the urge to get licenced, becoming a reality in ’77. During my early years of everything radio as a pastime, there was a family with needs to support, a house to develop and a career to map out.
Radio had become ‘me time’ to develop my interests and discover how things worked, and from the start CW was my means to the outside world, while carrying out the necessary improvements to better my self on the air. Yes, I have built many a rig using valves, transistors and ICs, and can remember the joy of someone coming back to the call, while holding on to the VFO with a pencil mark for guidance and a faint warm orange flickering glow from the final.
There was a period of 25 years, in which I was absent from ham radio due to family issues, work projects in foreign countries, and supporting our armed forces, but I was an observer, a listener and a discoverer as to what was happening in the amateur world.
Now in my seventies, and back in the land of my birth, retirement has given me the space to put up decent antennas, operate fabulous communication equipment while exercising a skill I thought I would never use again.
Oh! the art of Morse telegraphy and the best filters you can own, your ears!
Hope to catch you on the air!
This biography is what appeared in Solid Copy when the member joined CWops.