"Stefan Wolfe" ) writes:
wrote in message
ups.com...

The big question is whether the signals (keyed carrier vs. keyed audio
tone) look different on a spectrum analyzer. If they don't, why should
FCC care?

I agree that it doesn't matter to the FCC as long is the keyed audio tone is
coupled to the radio with EM waves such as with light (optoisolators), RF or
wires (electrical connections).

However, if you couple the keyed audio carrier acoustically, speaker-to-mike
using only sound waves, then that is J3E and only permissible in the voice
portion of the band.

If I were to whistle nearly pure sine waves (I am a good whistler, perhaps
you have seen paintings of my mother :-)) in Morse code into the mike input,
it might look like CW and sound like CW but it would really be J3E, hence
illegal in the CW sub-bands.

Using acoustic coupling (J3E), it becomes a slippery slope; first computer
generated tones, then human whistling, then humming and before you know it,
"talking" (di dah di dah etc.. and finally, "words" :-))


But it could never be A1, because it doesn't meet the criteria of a pure
tone into a good SSB transmitter.

I doubt however good a whistler you are, that you can guarantee it's a sine
wave and doesn't include any peripheral noise. And that microphone is bound
to pick up background noise, so you aren't sending a CW signal.

Also, the speaker and microphone, if putting a tone oscillator into
the transmitter that way, may add distortion to the tone, which then means
you don't have a CW signal.

If it looks and sounds like CW, then it is CW. But your examples
aren't about sending CW, because you'd be sending peripheral audio along
with the tone.

In other words, it's the results that matter. You can't get those
results with a microphone, and that's why it's not CW.

Michael VE2BVW