Morse Code: Learn the Fastest Way to Print

In order to become proficient in the Morse code, you need to know how to print the characters efficiently. Some Morse character sounds are shorter than others. You want to spend the least effort jotting those characters down as possible. Learning Morse code is a challenge. This chapter will ask you to learn the fastest and most concise way to print. You will then find it less of a challenge to learn the code.

Please download Print the Alphabet and Figures 2021 (PDF). This is a new revision as of July 2021. I found an error in my earlier releases of the web address for WB3CGK's Morse code site. It carries a page out of the 1967 US Navy training manual, and the only source of such material containing a slashed zero that I could find on the Web.

Chapter 1: Learn the Fastest Way to Print

Over the years, I have been introduced to some techniques for teaching the best ways to print a Morse code message. I have also found good advice from off the web, in a US Army training diagram, together with this US Navy diagram that I have chosen to use. Among the modifications I have made is the letter D, redrawn as a triangle. This avoids a rushed printing that rounds it out to look like an O. I flattened the bottom of the U to better avoid it looking like a V. The Army manual suggested the way that I adopted to draw a Y.

The diagram below maps the areas of a grid to better define my printed instructions in the Print The Alphabet and Figures 2021 PDF.

Top
Left
Upper
Left
Middle
Left
Lower
Left
Bottom
Left
Top
Center
Upper
Center
Middle
Center
Lower
Center
Bottom
Center
Top
Right
Upper
Right
Middle
Right
Lower
Right
Bottom
Right

This diagram depicts how my instructions are called out. "Begin the letter at the upper right," for example.

Brief outline of WHY we do things the way we do

The military training manual depicts all uppercase letters — but for the letter E, the shortest Morse code character of all, you may use a single-stroke lowercase E.

There are many letters that are very similar in certain font faces, such as Capital I and lowercase L, together with number 1. With the letter I, we draw just a straight line. It is the second-shortest character sound in Morse code. Oh, and we make a figure 1 just like a capital I, plus a foot across the bottom, like an upside-down T. Because of this, there is no need to put a dash through the 7 — the 1 has no hook on its top. (Figure 1 is among the longest Morse code sounds.)

Continues

Brief outline — continued

We avoid the lowercase L issue altogether by using the capital L instead. The letter S and number 5 are easy to mix up. S is one of the shortest sounds, joining the A and N in a tie for third-shortest. We differentiate between numeral 5 and letter S by using a single stroke on the S, while drawing the top of #5 with a second stroke.

Letter O and number 0 have an uncanny similarity, and sometimes a font face will be identical for both. That presents a problem if you're typing on a computer the callsign WOOO or WOOO. (Here I used a letter O for all of the Ohs and zeros. If your O and zero are identical in appearance, this is what you'd see!) The FCC does issue both callsigns, Wo0o and W0oo — here depicted with a lowercase O and a bold figure zero. It is for this reason that we always put a slash (/) through the zero, and look for computer fonts with a slash-zero.

We do put a dash through the Z, to distinguish it from a figure 2 — just in case the Z gets rounded or the 2 gets flattened.

There are instances when the instructions shown can be performed in reverse-order. I found myself starting the letter J from the left side, down and clockwise, and up to the top. The concern here is that it looks like a J and not a U. And that's why there is a top bar on the J that would not be on a U. The Morse code J is one of the longest of the letters to send, so it may give you an extra moment in time to print.

I find myself doing the letter B in one stroke, starting at the top left, down to the bottom left, then continue counter-clockwise the bottom loop, counter-clockwise the top loop — just the reverse of the training manual.

I find myself printing a Y from top-left-to-middle-center-to-top-right for the first stroke, then starting from middle-center and going straight to the bottom-center for the second stroke. On this one, the Army training manual said to do it that way, and I redid the Y accordingly in my Web copy of the Navy manual.

There are more equally valid ways of printing a letter besides the ones I show here from the 1967 Navy Training Manual, some of which are listed on the second page of the handout.

Only once you can quickly print clearly such that another person can read it, should you proceed to Chapter 2.

Next page: Chapter 2: A language of SOUND! First Page: Morse Code for the Radio Amateur