Armidale & District Amateur Radio Club
ABN 66 142 315 938
VK2RAD
146.725Mhz Echo Link Node 872907
438.650Mhz (-7Mhz)
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Armidale & District Amateur Radio Club |
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Annual General Meeting 5th October 2019 Minutes Welcome- The President, Rick Rodgers, opened the AGM at 11am. Apologies:- Maurie VK2MOZ, Gordon VK2UB, Mike VK2XW, Noel VK2IWT, Megan VK2FMEG, Julie VK2FJUL. Email submitted from Noel VK2IWT apologising for absence from AGM. Attendees:- Rick Rodgers VK2RR, Brian Peasley VK2BLP, Richard Katsch VK2EIK, Ken Michell VK2UQ, Kerry Black VK4LKB, Sharon Black VK4FSRB, Wayne Memphis VK2KWM, Dave Ritchings VK2RP, Dean Davidson VK2DJD, Peter Seifert VK2MKG, Steve Lisle VK2SL Minutes:- Minutes of the 2018 AGM were submitted for club acceptance. Ken moved to accept the Minutes and Sharon seconded. Presidents Report:- The President Rick Rodgers delivered his report on the previous 12 months. Now well into its sixth year, our club continues to prosper with an enthusiastic membership participating and supporting club activities. Recently club members had an excursion to club repeater site where a “Show n Tell” event was conducted by Dave VK2RP. This very impressive array of club equipment was demonstrated by Dave who explained the intricacies of our repeaters and antenna arrays. I think all who attended now have a good overall understanding of how it all works and also the considerable amount of work that Dave has put into the installation and regular maintenance to our system. It is with sadness that we remember club member Maurie Evered VK2AVO who became a Silent Key recently. Maurie was a resident at Autumn Lodge and although not able to make it to club events, he was a regular listener to our Sunday night nets. Maurie was a foundation member of the club and always renewed his membership each year as it was his way of being part of something good he told me. After Maurie passed away, his son contacted me and advised that Maurie had a considerable amount of radio gear that he wanted to have donated to the club. I was in Qld at the time and I contacted club secretary Brian VK2BLP who was able to quickly pick up the equipment and document it all and deliver it to the club house. Some of the equipment has been purchased by club members at our regular Sausage Roll Saturday events and some is yet to be processed. Thanks to Brian for his efforts in processing the equipment and also to Dave for checking over the Yaesu FT-101B and FL-2100Z amplifier. Some of that equipment is on display here today if anyone is interested in purchasing it. Well a big ripple was sent through the VK Amateur community this year. When a bunch of newbies from Armidale club took on the might of the larger clubs in Australia and blew them all out of the water with a resounding win in the 2019 John Moyle Field Day Contest. ADARC competed in the 24 Hour, HF only, Multi Operator, All modes section and amassed a score of 1872 points compared to second place getters of 260 points. Great effort from a first time entry for our club. There is a copy of the certificate for your perusal here which will be proudly fixed to the wall in the club radio room. Well done all who competed. Also a HUGE thank you to Richard VK2EIK and Megan VK2FMEG for the use of their wonderful property at Wollomombi and who can forget the huge catering effort by Megan who made sure all contesters were topped up with food n drink the whole weekend. A new slant on Meals on Wheels. This was a great club activity with a great result. With a very comprehensive equipment register and a healthy bank balance, our club is certainly something to be proud of. Our Sausage Roll Saturday is held nearly every Saturday and has become very popular for local hams to come together for a social chat and catch up with the latest happenings at the club. Our weekly club net has operated successfully every Sunday night and these can quite often go for an hour or so with many topics discussed and ideas passed around and added to. The nets really do add to our knowledge base and can bring about further experimentation by members. In conclusion, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank the entire membership for their support and involvement in growing our club and helping to take it forward to new successes in the coming years. David moved to accept the President’s report and Brian seconded. Treasurers Report:- Dean ran an explanatory precis of the annual financial statements (attached) highlighting the importance of donations to the ongoing welfare of the club. He also warned, after questions from Richard, that the club needs to improve its financial position as expenditure is currently exceeding income. The main sources of income were membership fees, donations and ‘Sausage Roll Saturday’ fund raising. The major expenditure is rental of club premises. The lease needs to be reviewed prior to renewal. Richard moved to accept the Minutes and Kerry seconded.
Secretary’s Report:- Correspondence received has been predominantly invoices/statements from Armidale Regional Council. There has also been renewal of licences and insurance on an annual basis. The majority of other communication has come in the form of emails to the president and the secretary. Most outgoing correspondence is handled by email. On Rick’s way up North last July, the he was contacted by the son of Maurie Evered VK2AVO and told of his passing. Maurie had been a financial member of the club since the Club’s inception. Maurie wished that the club benefit from the donation of his ham gear and Brian collected the gear and took it to the club.
David moved to accept the Secretary’s report and Richard seconded. General Business 1. ADARC Annual Repeater overview 1/ Overview Our site currently has two repeaters, one on 2 metres and one on 70cm. A common PSU drives both repeaters. We have power surge protection on all feed-lines including mains connected to our equipment. We have a power consumption meter so as/when ’discussions’ happen regarding site power bills we can fully justify our usage - we use around 3% of the 2ARM transmitter site power. 2/ Two metre system Our two metre machine is a Yaesu DR1X operating at full power (50 watts) with a single ½ wave folded dipole. The repeater outputs a 123 Hz tone, and due to the requirements of NORTHLINK we have locked this unit to analogue only. It currently has an eight cavity duplexer that takes up significant rack space and as/if surplus parts become available it is planned to exchange this to a smaller unit that may incrementally improve performance. The NORTHLINK connection has settled down well and we now have spare link transceivers in case they are needed. There is a 15 element yagi and associated feed line for the NORTHLINK connection. We have a remote control receiver on the NORTHLINK transceiver. This allows the link to be disabled if required. The 2m repeater has had no outages in the last 12 months. NORTHLINK has had a transmitter failure and has been repaired at no cost to the club. 3/ 70CM system Our 70 CM repeater is a Yaesu DR2X again running 50 watts into an 8 folded dipole (over 6DBD gain) array via a duplexer. This unit also outputs a 123HZ tone so if digital users utilise the machine, analogue users don’t have to listen to the ‘interference’. Our 70CM unit is a ‘simple’ straight forward 7Mhz offset unit. We have an Echolink connection at Ricks place and this is simply a standard transceiver that is connected to a PC and ultimately the WWW. Our Echolink connection was upgraded and subsequently we have suffered no outages. When the interference on 433.650Mhz became unmanageable, it necessitated a change to 7Mhz offset. Our duplexer would not properly tune to 431.650Mhz, so this was replaced and the removed unit modified so it is now retuned and available as a spare. We also had a dodgy piece of coax (commercially produced) on the 70cm RX port. This made the RX about 30Db ‘deaf’. This was replaced with a “Dodgy Dave special”. If anyone has any comments/criticisms, problems or contributions around the repeaters, please bring them to the club, either through official channels or directly to me. I’m most happy if someone knows better and/or is willing to assist. Knocking our club publicly is an excellent way for those with nothing better to do to invent stories that tear down rather than build up. I have personally heard on air “I can’t get into the Armidale 70cm repeater, there is something wrong with it”. Isn’t it funny Richard VK2EIK can ‘get into it’ till virtually his home with a hand-held inside his car with a rubber ducky antenna, Rick VK2RR can ‘get into it’ mobile with a modest antenna north of Guyra. I can ‘get into it’ till the top of the range on the Bingara road! I can ‘get into it’ with a one watt crappy Chinese handie from my lounge room at home with a rubber ducky antenna. Before we advertise how crappy our group is, perhaps we should ensure our individual contribution is up to par!? Certain individuals advertising the ‘fact’ that “Armidale have nothing but problems, and they can’t seem to ever get their act together”, is simply knocking for knockings sake. This ‘inside knowledge’ of ‘all the problems’ our club has, comes from people who have nothing positive to contribute but to sit back and espouse their great wealth of experience and expertise. My response is “what have you contributed?”, and “why don’t you show us how much better you could do ‘it’?”, RESPONSE CRICKETS!!!!
We are AMATEURS (or
at least I am) enjoying a HOBBY and learning/enjoying our areas of
interest 2. Licence Examination. Advice has been received that the Club’s examiners/assessors are no longer able to perform their roles because of ACMA’s policy changes. The club will not pursue this matter. 3. Equipment donated by Maurice Evered (SK) was displayed and described by the President. Proceeds from the sale of this equipment will assist the club’s activities. 4. John Moyle Field Day Contest 2019. A debrief of the John Moyle Field Day was conducted to improve the club’s efforts next year. Whilst the club achieved excellent results – First in their category, we can do better. 5. Any other General Business from the Floor. An extended discussion on the future direction of the club took place. This will be ongoing with possible new venues and revenue raising initiatives considered. 6. Election of Office Bearers & Committee. All positions were declared vacant and nominations for the vacant positions were invited. Results of the election were: President – Rick Rodgers Vice President – Richard Katsch Treasurer – Dean Davidson Secretary – Brian Peasley Julie Rodgers – Membership Education & Training – Wayne Memphis Technical Officer/Repeater Coordinator – James Goodwin Technical Coordinator – Dave Ritchings
7.
Close Meeting
& Adjourn for Lunch at 12.40pm
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