Ü in Morse code

No. ITU-R M.1677-1 defines the 26 letters A to Z and only one accented letter, É. Ü comes from the national tables of German, Hungarian and Turkish, so operators who share one of those languages know it and others may not.

With a station you don’t know, send UE instead. Between two operators who both use Ü, the extension keeps the spelling exact.

German, Hungarian and Turkish tables send Ü with this signal. It was one of the umlauts added to Gerke’s German code in 1851.

Esperanto gives the same signal to Ŭ, so read it in the language of the message.

National tables reuse spare signals, so ..-- is also Ŭ (Esperanto). Each table was made for one language, so the letters never clash at home: read the signal in the language of the message.

Decoders have to pick one letter. The Morse code to English decoder on this site reads the signal as Ü, whichever letter was meant.

Send UE, ..- ., with a normal letter gap. Every operator can copy it. It takes 11 units, 733 ms at 18 WPM, the same length as Ü.

German writes UE when the umlaut is not available, so Müller becomes MUELLER and every operator can copy it.

• Hear it:

  at 18 WPM one unit lasts 66.7 ms, so Ü takes 733 ms (11 units). Press Play above, slow it to 5 WPM to pick out each element, or turn on Repeat.

• Tap it:

  a short tap for each dot and a press three times as long for each dash, with a dot’s pause between them: short, short, long, long.

• Flash it:

  light on for each element, off between them, no faster than 7 WPM. There a unit is 171 ms and Ü takes 1.9 seconds; the Flashlight signaler keeps that pace.

• Write it:

  ..-- as one group, with a space on each side so it does not run into the next letter.

• Run U and T together with no gap, ..- then -, and you have Ü.
• Hungarian learners say “üvegtálból” (“from a glass bowl”): each syllable with a long vowel is a dash and the others are dots.
• Learn the sound, not the picture: say di-di-dah-dah until you hear it as one shape.

• ÜBER is ..-- -... . .-., four letters and 37 units long (2.5 seconds at 18 WPM).
• GRÜN is --. .-. ..-- -., four letters and 41 units long (2.7 seconds at 18 WPM).

To hear a whole word or sentence, type it into the Morse code translator. The standard letters are all on the alphabet chart, and the other national letters are with the rest of the accented letters.