W4FSV
Breadboard Radio – Ham Radio Kits that are easy to build and fun to use!
KM4ACK
Build-a-Pi will allow you to get up and running fast with a Raspberry Pi for ham radio.
Whether you are a seasoned contester, a digital mode enthusiast, or a brand-new ham looking to make your first contact, Field Day is the ultimate “open house” for our hobby. It’s part emergency exercise, part contest, and 100% community.
Every year, Field Day reminds us why we do what we do. In an era where communication is often taken for granted, the 2026 focus remains clear: Science, Skill, and Service.
The goal isn’t just to rack up points; it’s to prove that when the grid goes down, and the “normal” world goes quiet, amateur radio operators are ready. This year, we are placing a special emphasis on:
A successful Field Day doesn’t happen by accident—it’s the result of teamwork and early preparation. We are calling on all club members to step up and help make 2026 our best year yet.
Here is how you can jump in right now:
Event Details at a Glance:
- When: June 27 (1800 UTC) to June 28 (2059 UTC)
- Where: TBD – will update as soon as possible
- Objective: To contact as many stations as possible and learn to operate in abnormal situations.
Let’s show the world what we can do! Check your email for the next planning meeting date, or reach out to the Club President to volunteer for a specific role.
“Did you know your smartphone can double as a powerful handheld transceiver? Whether you’re away from your shack or out of range of a local repeater, the AllStar Link network keeps you connected. This guide walks you through the essential steps to get your mobile device configured for AllStar—from obtaining your mandatory FCC documentation to…
Join W4CAE for Field Day 2026: The Year of the Club!
The Columbia Amateur Radio Club (W4CAE) invites all hams and enthusiasts to join us for ARRL Field Day 2026 at Sesquicentennial State Park! Starting June 27th at 8:00 AM, we’ll be operating through the night until noon on Sunday.
As part of the ARRL Year of the Club, we are celebrating the local groups that serve as the backbone of our hobby. Come out to the primitive camping area for portable stations, person-to-person QSOs, and on-site VE Testing.
Dinner is on us! We’ll be serving up a catered BBQ spread on Saturday evening—because great radio work deserves great food.
Stay Informed: It is crucial to join all planning calls, attend our May and June Club meetings, and join the Hams and Eggs Breakfasts. For the latest updates, keep a close watch on https://www.W4CAE.com and our Facebook page.
We have plenty of room for visiting groups and individual operators. See you there!
More details to come!
2021-01-28 00:34:04 Disconnected
2021-01-28 00:34:04 QRT Received
2021-01-28 00:33:39 Digipeating: WE5MAG <-> K4LLE <-> W1GTT-10 S/N: 2.0 dB
2021-01-28 00:33:37 Starting Digipeater: WE5MAG <-> K4LLE <-> W1GTT-10…
Click anywhere here for more information on Vara FM digipeater function and how to set it up.
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/vara-fm-digipeater-function-is-here/
The SEC-ARES group conducts Winlink training that many operators can learn from. Please click on the WINLINK tab above for a list of the training conducted so far and links to the recordings.
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/winlink-workshop/
If you would like to join please send an email to W0LEN@arrl.net and ask for an invite to the slack channel. We are also experimenting with JS8call as the “on radio” platform to coordinate our activities in the event of no internet.
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/winlink-p2p-group/
Kevan attended the clubs August 2020 meeting and his presentation was very very interesting. Not at such a high level like some presentations but at a level we could implement his suggestions and understand why.
Note: all of the club business, opining and show and tell has been edited out by K4LLE. Which means this is a heavily edited video because the August club meeting was also a business meeting. For club business I direct you to the meeting minutes which will be posted under the tab MINUTES. This video is Kevan’s presentation and the Q&A session he ran afterwards. Also, because this MP4 is so big it could not be uploaded to this website. As such it was placed on a google drive with a sharable link. Click on this link and you will go to the google drive where you can download or view the full presentation.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/15z6OOdXjGvNNUI5uP4QetKO2svu9rEas/view?usp=sharing
This video is a ZOOM recording of the Columbia Amateur Radio Clubs (CARC) August 3 2020 business meeting. The CARC is not responsible for anything you see or hear in this video. This video is rated G for all audiences.
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/station-grounding-bonding/
There is an LF beacon operating in the Columbia area. It can be received out to about 200 miles via groundwave – much further with skywave. This station is operating as a proof of concept Low Frequency alerting station, as part of a DHS SHARES trial program. Our Amateur HF community knows that long-range emergency communications can become unusable when HF skywave propagation is disrupted by a disturbed ionosphere. But groundwave communications independent of the ionosphere remain available. Such LF stations can provide essentially omni-directional blanket Alerting and low-bit-rate information coverage, nearly independent of mountains or foliage, etc.
The local station is transmitting on a center frequency of 194 khz. The best way to receive it is to tune your receiver’s USB Mode to 192.500 kHz, and use FLDIG or an equivalent program set at ‘1500 Hz CENTER,’ with a very narrow filter – the signal is only 36 Hz wide, so I use a 50 Hz filter for best reception.
The signal presently being transmitted is THOR-Micro, available free from fldigi. The signal is sent with a 50 second on, 60 second off duty cycle and runs 24/7.
We are very interested in getting signal reports, and prefer to get them taken near noon, when any skywave component is minimized. Reports of just the observance of the signal in a waterfall display, even of just an audable signal strong enough for CW (here: on/off as above), or of course, copy of the brief Alert text in the message window of THOR-Micro.
Send reports to Dan Goldston WD4NG@arrl.net
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/dhs-shares-lf-beacon/
We all know on April 15 1912 in the early morning hours the Titanic hit an iceberg and sank. This is a picture of the Titanic radio room, it has been colorized but other then that it is a real picture.
Can you identify ANY of the radio equipment ?, not looking for brand names but what its function was would be interesting I think.
If you have some ideas just click on the contact button up top and I will share your ideas here as they come in.
8/18/2019 K4CAE, David points us to a very interesting article written by Rhonda Berenson. What we are looking at in this picture is the “Marconi Room” very interesting reading indeed. Click HERE for the article.
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/rms-titanic-radio-room/
FT4 is an experimental digital mode designed specifically for radio contesting. Like FT8, it uses fixed-length transmissions, structured messages with formats optimized for minimal QSOs, and strong forward error correction. T/R sequences are 6 seconds long, so FT4 is 2.5 × faster than FT8 and about the same speed as RTTY for radio contesting.
Further information on FT4 is at
http://physics.princeton.edu/pulsar/k1jt/FT4_Protocol.pdf
http://www.southgatearc.org/news/2019/april/new-digital-mode-ft4.htm
Permanent link to this article: https://w4cae.com/ft4/
