QTT: Year in Review

With 2025 upon us, it’s time for a review of Quality Telegraphy Time advocacy and results of the past year and what’s planned for this coming year.

Thank you to all those who have subscribed to our various communications. We recommend you to at least join the “Important Announcements” list at no5nn.org/lists and any others of interest. You may also like to join various discussion lists at mailman.no5nn.org and subscribe to the QTT Blog at no5nn.org and Telegram Channel @cwnews to be notified of new posts to the web site.

QTT is not an organization nor does it belong to any one. It is a concept, and a push back against the dumbing down of amateur radio and with a focus on CW. It is a rejection of quantity over quality, the quick unsatisfying 5NN TU, the modern day Con Tests and DX Peds.

Instead, QTT stands for the old time joy of CW and amateur radio that many of us used to experience. We still do, but we’re being crowded out and on the defensive when we need to be on the offensive. Otherwise, the negative trends will continue and push away more genuine OPs.

Quality True Telegraphy demands that we pay respect to time proven and tested traditions which make CW communications enjoyable. This means newcomers are required to do some studies and learn from Old Timers and Elmers in order to avoid confusing and bad practices.

Quality Telegraphy Time is what we aim for: Quality Over Quantity, the very reverse of the unsatisfying 5NN TU, we’re satisfied with nothing less than an unhurried, pleasurable QSO with at minimum an honest report and exchange of other meaningful information.

Achievements in 2024

During times of increased apathy and waiting for others to do on our behalf what we can and must do ourselves, any achievement is made much more difficult than in the past when many would all push and pull together making even the heaviest of burdens as light as a feather.

Nevertheless, we have made some progress over the past year. To highlight a few known achievements, we pushed back against an attempt by FT8 operators in Australia to impose a worldwide restriction of CW on 40m to the bottom 25kHz only. They also wished to remove the right of CW to use the rest of the band on a shared basis. There, we achieved victory, instead the effort to make a “one size fits all” has moved to giving Region 3 an extra 10kHz for CW.

In response to failures to defend the top 5 kHz of 12m and 17m which have been taken over by FT8 as a “DX Ped Window” and the response of CW operators to simply crowd down into the remaining bottom 20kHz, often full occupied by DX Ped Split and other contest-like operations, attempts are being made to increase activities on higher frequencies.

40m has become the comfortable haunt for many a CW operator in parts of the world where activity levels are still high: Japan, Europe and North America. This comes at a cost of neglecting the high bands which are wide open during the current sunspot maxima, leaving the territory to the above mentioned 5NN TU crowd.

This leaves those in more remote DX areas who crave for meaningful QSO without QSO partners. Along with solving a number of other long sought after solutions, QSX (Monitoring) / Calling Frequencies have been successfully established. QTT Operators can be found listening there, and there are increased activities expected during the coming year.

Plans for 2025

Further non-sectarian, i.e. non-club-specific, activities are planned for the year ahead which it is hoped will be embraced and promoted by the various CW clubs.

These will be announced once consultations and feedback among various interested QTT have been completed and will build on past achievements and include activities which promote and reward QTT on air activity and encourage it further.

We again urge you to support these efforts by joining the mailing lists and subscribing to the blog updates mentioned at the start above.

Why Activity Begets Activity

It is important to note how QTT activity actually works in practice. If a newcomer, without an abundance of patience and perseverance, turns on the radio and tunes across 30m, he or she may hear nothing. Going to the high bands, 10, 12, 15m, may be the same result.

When that experience is repeated several times, and high noise levels discourage active listening, the temptation is to simply give up and go onto FT8 and watch the screen at the end of each day.

Now, what happens however, if there is a different result? They tune across 30m and hear some activity. They tune into the 12m or 15m CW Calling Frequencies and notice the IBP Beacons. Now there is encouragement and results, they will persist and get satisfying QSO and the bug has bitten.

What happens when a newcomer hears DX always wanting only a 5NN TU? Of course, they follow suit and this becomes the norm also for the future generations. But, what happens when they come across a QTT DX who insists on an honest report, unhurried exchange of NAME, QTH and more?

They wait their turn as station after stations makes contacts with the QTT DX station one by one, with each QSO lasting 5 minutes. When the window of opportunity closes, the gray line DX is over, or work or other duties call, the return again the next day to try again.

Such QTT DX enhance the value of DX and the Quality in stark contrast to the 5NN TU. Furthermore, this increases activity and duration of activity on the bands, so that the above mentioned common scenario of finding nothing and falsely concluding “propagation is poor” is far less likely to happen.

A great many OPs blame propagation when they simply do not understand it nor make the time to study it. When 40m closes due to D Layer absorption, and 20m is long skip, the conclude CONDX are poor, whilst 30m is offering S9 propagation. They check the 10-12-15m bands, and encounter weak signals and don’t stick around more than a few minutes.

If they did, they’d see that QSB is natural and that what they heard was the minimum signal and that a few minutes later the signals are booming. All of this, to meet the expectations of the need of instant satisfaction and quick boredom of modern day generations, requires that they find more longer duration QTT to get their attention and interest, and experience.

An Appeal: Vacate 40m Comfort Zone

Therefore we make an appeal: during the coming year, please don’t sit on 40m and restrict yourself to the meaningful QSO with the same stations on the same band. Instead, spend time on 30m: explore the fact that this is the only band open world wide 24 hours a day every day of the year. Study the 30CW.NET website especially the menu item “30m Info”. Join and support them.

Please also take advantage of what may be the last solar maximum during many of our life times. Have a listen on the high frequency bands to the IBP Beacons. Listen on the Calling Frequencies with a wide filter so you can hear these beacons at the same time, and leave a RX sitting there.

You’ll note that propagation is open if you listen for at least 3 minutes or more to give a chance for each beacon around the world to send its 10 second long signal once every 3 minutes. There are 18 of them, so it takes a full 3 minutes for all the beacons around the world to complete transmission.

The callsign and first dah is at 100W, the second dah is sent at 10W power, the third at only 1W QRP and the fourth with 100mW (0.1W) QRPP. You may be surprised how often you can hear the QRP. Note that each of the beacons has the same simple omni-directional Ground Plane antenna.

There are stations in UAE, Thailand, Australia, Europe that are actively monitoring and calling at first on the Calling Frequencies before QSY to continue longer calls and QSO on the bands.

Don’t be cooked slowly like a frog, until you find we have lost our HF bands instead of expanding them. Instead, take your time, spend at least a good quarter hour on the high bands, unhurried, and let’s have more meaningful DX QSO — many DX QTT will be very grateful too!