Meeting Minutes

Reminder: Our yearbook picture will be taken Wednesday, March 5th at 15:00 on the South Oval.

• Elections are next month. The following members have been nominated:
  • John Patrick KC5VEI, President
  • Jared Bostic KB5PSP, Vice-President
  • Seth Noble KC5OPQ, Secretary
  If you can't attend the the meeting, please send a written proxy.
• We currently have over $300 the bank, $150 in the autopatch fund, and about $360 in UOSA funds.
• John KC5VEI presented a list of items that we could spend our money on. The list was discussed and some items added. The list will be posted to an unlinked URL on the web page and discussed on the ouarc-discuss group.
• Seth KC5OPQ will be flying to the LA area in June and can (finally) arrange for donated equipment to be shipped. Cost may be between $100 and $200.
• Field Day will be June 28th and 29th. Our location was discussed. The Energy Center roof is fun for contests, but strictly limits our public exposure. The Sooner Fashion Center mall would make crowd control and setup tough, plus permission might be difficult to obtain and keep. Consensus was reached on the Duck Pond.
• Other ARRL contests are comming up. Contact John KC5VEI if you want to participate.
• The no-code tech class ended Monday with the license exam. 21 of the 22 students passed at least part of the test with 15 people licensed. The rest will try again on Saturday. Thanks to everyone who helped out with the class!
• Jared KB5PSP will write some press releases about the class for submission to the Daily and the Transcript.
• Project kits for receiving W1AW code practice transmissions are cheap and easy to build. The club should arrange a kit building session.
• The weather spotting class on Saturday was attended by about 25 people, at least half of whom stayed for the SKYWARN meeting afterwards. Appologies for the bad video quality, due to the transparent window blinds in the EC plaza rooms.
• Peter N5UWY distributed handouts containing a draft plan for local SKYWARN spotting and net control activities, including sample scripts and other information sources. (The club consented to paying for the copies as well as for the donuts and coffee served at the class.) The biggest need is for lead operators to be on call to run the net. There seems to be an ample supply of would-be spotters. Contact Peter N5UWY if you want to participate.
• The SKYWARN net will be coordinated with local emergency managers. Details are still being worked out.
• Mark N5HZR says he can build EMWIN decoders for under $20. EMWIN is a 1200 baud VHF weather data feed with alerts from across the country. All you need is a computer, a receiver, a decoder, and software. Freeware is available for Windoze. Mark will try to get source so we can port it to real operating systems.
• We should do a project meeting to build the kits. Arranging a building session at a local high-school would be a good service effort.
• The Cleveland County chapter of the American Red Cross will hold a shelter exercise on Saturday, March 29th at 09:00. Meet at their building near Robinson and Berry. Amateur Radio operators who want to help out with disaster communications are welcome. To become an official RC communications TECH, you just need your ham license and to take a three hour course on what the Red Cross is and does.