[FCARC] July 20 Meeting Notes

[Craig Szczublewski]

Hello everyone, here are notes from the Monday night Club meeting:

The meeting was called to order at 7:30pm with 14 members in attendance. The 
Finance Report was read and accepted.

Membership: The club currently has 54 members

Committee reports follow:

Education: The re is renewed interest from several people on taking a tech 
class.  KE8RU has indicated a Autumn session would be possible but no date has 
been set at this time.

Hamfest:  Bryan released the revenue numbers from the summer hamfest which did 
show a loss of revenue for the event, but not by a significant amount.  The door 
prizes and food purchases, combined with a slightly lower turnout contributed to 
this.  Despite the revenue loss, we received correspondence from one of the 
prize winners at the quality of the door prizes and how well we conducted the 
function.  This type of positive feedback has been reflected by many over the 
past month, which we are hoping will lead to an uptick in attendance for next 
years summer hamfest, as well as the upcoming December hamfest.

Field Day: Field Day was extremely challenging this year, all due to less then 
ideal weather conditions.  A separate email was sent out summarizing our 
results, which can also be found on the club website in the Field Day section. 
We are drafting a thank you letter to Jim for the use of the out building, along 
with a donated gift card as a thank you for helping us run surprisingly 
successful Field Day despite conditions.

Repeater Committee: The club is currently planning on deploying the Yaesu DR-1X 
as a 440 machine, currently standalone from the 147.195+, borrowing the 
frequency pair from KB8GOM.  The plan is to put the repeater on air at the 
backup site, to give us some time to break it in.

There was also much debate on putting 103.5 PL onto the 147.195+ machine, no 
decision has been made at this time, but we are encouraging club members to 
prepare feedback for the August meeting were we an discuss this further.  In the 
meantime, the repeater committee will investigate toggling tone on anf off 
through DTMF codes, or possibly setting a schedule through the CAT controller to 
enable it during late evening hours when band conditions tend to be up.

EC Report: Jim and Bryan gave us a recap of the meeting with County officials 
last week.  All attending the County meeting had positive things to say about 
the club and our abilities.  We are currently working with our EMA to obtain ID 
badges for Amateur Radio operators who could be assisting during a crisis. 
Pictures for those interested and participating in the EC efforts were taken by 
KB8ELG.

As reported in recent emails, the club EC practice net has moved to 7:30pm on 
Wednesdays on the 147.195+ repeater.

Related to club EC activities, Bryan (KB8ELG) brought up a suggestion of the 
club obtaining their own generator for not only emergency purposes, but also for 
use at events like Field Day and OSPOTA.  A model suggested was a 8KW dual 
LP/Gasoline capable unit for under $1000.  The topic was tabled until next 
meeting where Bryan will present information on the Generator and final expected 
costs.  The idea would be to mount the generator on the triband/mast trailer.

Good of Amateur Radio:

We received correspondence from GOBA (Great Ohio Bicycle Adventure) thanking us 
for access to the repeater and monitoring the frequency for any trouble with 
their participants.  Enclosed was a donation of $50 to the club as a token of 
their gratitude.

Members in Distress:

Ralph Smith continues to struggle with health issues, and Grant (KC2RCU) 
reported he will be going back in routine testing.  Please keep both in your 
thoughts and prayers.

As most know, Howard Slemp (N8VHX) passed away this past month.  The funeral 
service had a large number of amateur operators in attendance, even outnumbering 
family.  But we realized with dropped the ball on sending out flowers to the 
funeral home.

This brought us to the realization that we do not have a named person to head up 
the memorial committee.  We would like to have one of the club members take the 
responsibility for seeing that flower arrangements are ordered and delivered 
accordingly.  There are a few florists which we have used in the past and are 
very easy to work with.  We would see that you were reimbursed promptly.  The 
individual should be well connected with email/cell phone so we can inform them 
of silent keys.  If this is something you might want to help the club with, 
please contact myself or KB8ELG to let us know.


Upcoming Hamfests:

08/08/2015 Angola, IN
09/06/2015 Findlay, OH
09/13/2015 Adrian, MI

Next Meeting:  The next regular club meeting will be July 20 at the County 
Administration Building (same as the Drivers License Bureau), 152 S. Fulton St, 
Wauseon.  The club meeting will be at 7:30pm.

Club Nets:

Weeknights at 10:30pm Bud's Midnight Madness Net -- 147.195+
Wed at 7:30pm EC Practice Net -- 147.195+
Wed at 8pm Informal Two Meter & ARES Net -- 147.195+
Wed at 9pm 6M Net -- 50.400 AM on the first Wednesday of the month
Wed at 9pm 6M Net -- 52.525 FM Simplex

That's good for now...

Craig Szczublewski - KD8KBU