Alternative Base or Bezel for Soviet Mini Morse Key

thingiverse

These little Soviet Morse Keys are great for portable amateur radio use and they are quite inexpensive to buy online. However, they usually come without their original knee strap and pad that they are designed to fit into. Without those items the key is a bit uncomfortable to use, as you need to hold the green body of the key very firmly to stop it from tipping over. That gets quite tiring after a while. These alternative base-plate designs can be used instead of the original aluminium base-plate to make these Morse keys a bit more ergonomic and comfortable to use. There are two designs available here, i.e. the full base-plate version or just the bezel. You can 3D print the full base plate which includes a bezel and mount the key on it. Alternatively you can just print the bezel design and mount the key on a suitable base-plate material of your own choice (I used transparent acrylic for the example in the photo. You'll also need three 12mm long M2 bolts, as the original M2 bolts in the key are not long enough to use with these designs. Don't throw away the key's original aluminium base-plate when you're done, as it makes a great field bottle opener :o) Happy remote operation! From EI4GTB