Tuesday, July 23, 2013 — After my previous entry about cootie keys, I was bound and determined to locate my missing cootie key.
As a result, I made major progress cleaning my shack and threw away a bunch of things that I didn’t need to keep. I have this developing theory that there is a direct causal link between hoarding and exposure to RF. Why do you think the spark-era XYLs relegated their OM’s station to a shack behind the house? No woman in her right mind wanted such a mess in their house. Anyway, back to my story …
THE WANDERING COOTIE. The key you see in the photos at right are of my long-lost cootie key (click the photos to enlarge them). The key is nearly all brass, including the lever. The only non-brass components are the locking screws on the contact posts; the base, which I believe is some form of bakelite material, and the finger piece.
There are some aspects of the key that made it interesting, which is why I pursued it on eBay (there wasn’t much competition, trust me). As it arrived, the key looked pretty 
sad. Years and years of tarnish had turned the brass a dull, dirty brown. You really weren’t sure what kind of metal the key was made from until you started cleaning the years of accumulated grime.
GOTHIC COOTIE? The way the posts are finished was another interesting aspect of this key. I wasn’t sure if this was truly a key or a torture device. The points of the posts aren’t sharp, but from my point of view, there’s something very gothic about the look the posts give the key.
You’ll notice the key lever is soldered to the rear mounting post. The post was slotted and the blade was soldered very solidly to its mounting post. The builder did an admirable job soldering the brass and keeping the solder on the joint and not on the blade or post.
WARP SPEED. Another interesting aspect of this key is the base … it is some sort of manmade composite, a bakelite-sort of material. But the base is warped right where the left and right contact posts are mounted. I have wondered if perhaps this key sat someplace for a long time with something heavy on top; perhaps the base warped due to 
heat, time and pressure? I’m not sure, frankly.
I mounted four feet to the key in existing holes that were mostly likely used to mount the bakelite base to a heavier base. The key is very lightweight, and as it sits now, it is difficult to use as a cootie key because it jumps around so much unless it is held firmly with the non-keying hand. I have no idea what kind of original metal base was used, but I suppose it was roughly the same size as the bakelite base.
I have wondered if I could straighten the base with pressure, heat and time. I have heard some horror stories of people who have tried to unwarp bakelite and other similar plastics. I would rather not break the original base, but I would like to straighten it.
The edges of the base are finished, so someone put some time in on getting the base “just so.” The finger piece is another item that is a bit of a mystery — it is black plastic of some 
sort, and it securely mounted. The knob almost seems ideally shaped for this particularly application.
Well, that’s enough for now on my cootie key. Oh, yeah, before I go — after all the earthmoving I did to clean up the shack in search of the cootie, I found the key tucked snug as a bug in one of my key storage cases. I had something standing in front of the cootie and missed it!
73 es CUL de KY4Z SK dit dit …