YRARC General Meeting Minutes - 2016-10-04

Meeting held in the Sharon Temperance HallMeeting held in the Sharon Temperance Hall. Called to Order at 19:30 by Chris VE3NRT. Total members and guests attending: 39 including 5 guests and 2 new members.

1. Welcome & Introductions – Chris VE3NRT
   
2. Coax Connector Tips – Doug VE3VS. Doug passed on preparation tips to make perfect connections with RG8 or RG213 type cables and PL259 connectors.
   
3. Adoption of Minutes from 2016/09/06 general meeting. Moved by Bill VA3QB, seconded by Jack VA3UU. Carried
   
4. Treasurer’s Report – John VA3JI
   
   • Opening Balance 2016/09/01 [Available to members upon request to secretary]
     
   • Income: Hamfest vendor fees: $325.00
     
   • Membership dues: $610.00
     
   • Expenditures: Name plates for awards: $10.00
     
   • Repeater link antenna: $75.00
     
   • Post Office box rental: $240.69
     
   • Liability and Directors insurance: $1112.48
     
   • Bank charges for PayPal: $4.56
     
   • Closing Balance 2016/10/04 [Available to members upon request to secretary]
     
   • Additional income to be deposited: Hamfest vendor fees $42.00; Membership dues (tonight) $185.00
     
   • Moved the treasurer's report be adopted, by John VA3JI, seconded Jack VA3UU. Carried
     
5. Public Service Report – Eric VE3EB. Past public service events include: Sunday Sept 18, 2016 Sharon Temple wedding (parking), Saturday Oct 01, 2016 Sharon Temple 2 weddings (parking), Sunday Oct 02, 2016 Run for the Cure
   
6. Hamfest Report – Geoff VA3GS. We need MANY volunteers, for setup on Friday, the event on Saturday morning and for teardown after the event is over. Bob Heil's attendance should be confirmed 2 weeks before the Hamfest. Community service hours for high school students are available when helping with this event.
   
7. EmComm Report – Don VE3IXJ. There is an EmComm meeting the second Thursday of each month in the Newmarket Community Centre, 200 Doug Duncan Dr. The meeting will look at transmitting data digitally for IMS213 (ICS213) forms with DMR radios.
   
8. Repeater Report – Steve VE3UT
   
   • The new link antenna was installed at the hospital site, aimed at the VE3YRA site, and the power of the link radio has been reduced, to reduce propagation toward a repeater in Western Pennsylvania. In addition the time-out timer has been removed in the link radio.
     
   • On the same visit, the 6m antenna was raised.
     
   • At the VE3YRC-V site the 100w PA was installed, and it failed shortly after installation. A second 100w PA was then installed and is stable.
     
   • Recently a cross-band radio at the EOC was causing interference with VE3YRC-V, resulting in the YRC-V repeater being shut down overnight. The cross-band radio, normally on EmComm “Channel 90”, was for some unknown reason, transmitting on the input to VE3YRC-V.
     
9. Winter Field Day – Steve VE3UT. It has been proposed that we participate in Winter Field Day this year, held on January 28 and 29, 2017. We participated in 2015, however the noise floor at the site (Sharon Temple) was extremely high, but did disappear later in the evening. We will try to determine the noise source before returning to the Sharron Temple. Steve would welcome suggestions for an alternate site. As in past winter and summer field days, those wishing to be fed will need to purchase a $10 meal ticket, which will include breakfast, lunch and dinner.
   
10. YRLAB – “RJ” from YRLAB noted that after the first amateur class last year, the antennae have been re-installed at the David Dunlap Observatory, and a second class is now underway.
    
11. Membership Report – Barry VA3LLT, John VA3JI. 36 members have paid or renewed their membership to date. John is looking for missing information for 3 life members VE3SLM, VE3WHY and VE3ATO to be included in the new membership database.
    
12. Fox Hunt – John VE3IPS. John is interested in holding a fox hunt on October 22.
    

Guest Speaker – Grant VE3XTV / VA3XTV / ZL1WTT

Grant spoke on developments in Amateur TV, and the use of DATV repeaters. The key points in operating a DATV repeater are achieving maximum gain, minimum losses, keep to broadcast standards, use horizontal polarization, employ cross-band, Rx high, Tx low, always use Rx and Tx filters to eliminate interference to and from other users, and operate amplifiers extremely linearly to avoid splatter and interference.

ATV broadcasts real-time video and audio, and uses bands above 70cm. Both analogue and digital signals can be used and adhere to NTSC, PAL for SD, 480i 576i for MD and 1080i for HD broadcasts.