July 11,2002       Willow Crossing              Attendance 11

led by Joe, KA9OPL

Secretaries report was read for the June meeting by Steve, KB9QFT.
A treasurer's report was unavailable in Lois's absence. (She had emailed at
least a couple in attendance but no one had remembered to bring a copy to the
meeting.

Those who had helped with communications support of the Honeysuckle bicycle tour
reported the event a success.

Our Field Day site was moved to the county fairgrounds after testing increased
concerns for possible interference to the Willow Crossing intercom system.  No
final contact count or F.D. score is yet available.

Fire works parking (Our barter agreement for free use of the fairgrounds on
Field Day) was met by five club members.  We were assigned posts at locked or
limited access gates while other parking veterans (the Corvette Club, F.O.P.)
handled the chore of more actively parking the masses who attended.

New business:

Scottie, KB9WCQ, brought a request from a group of Amateur Radio operators known
as the "DJ (Doctor 'J') net". Doctor 'J' is Meredith Osborne Jr. , KB9HSE A "DJ"
number is assigned after you have checked in to the net three times.  . This
group used to meet on C.B. frequencies and now that many are licensed amateurs
continue to hold a regular net. They wish to make the CARC repeater their
regular meeting place, Monday's @ 7pm.
Discussion.

A "wordy" motion was made that permission be granted to the group for the use of
the 146.790 repeater as requested that is Monday evenings at 7pm local time for
the "DJ" net.  Motion 2nd and passed.

Alvin, KA9QLQ, informed the group that the popular Franklin based repeater,
146.835 has had its antenna elevated 90 feet.  An improvement has been made in
its signal locally. Currently the repeater is transmitting on only 3watts. Are
further improvements to be expected?

Alvin also brought up that during our local Field Day an ARES (Amateur Radio
Emergency Service) meeting was held.  A Simulated Emergency Test (S.E.T.) will
be held a weekend (Date and other details to be announced) in September. 


Discussion concerning possible Field Day locales for next year.


Joe, KA9OPL:  There have been several inquiries and requests for amateur radio
licensing classes.   Mike, N9LTT, proposed that the club have Monday evening
classes at Columbus North High School (home of KC9BPW !!!)  The club would
provide a group of volunteers willing to present the lesson plan.  Mike has a
written plan he will present at the August meeting. More discussion will be held
at that time and on our weekly nets.  A goal might be to run classes during
October/November.

A new member was welcomed to the group, Ron Wade, KB9ZSJ.

Mike , N9LTT: Requests for help moving a 440 repeater donated by William Witt,
K9JEE, to Columbus North High School's radio club. Meet at Willow Crossing at
9am, July 13.

Mike was rather humble when asked to tell about a recent visit to ARRL
headquarters in Newington, Connecticut.  He operated from their station, W1AW.  
http://www.arrl.org/
Ask him to show you pictures!

Mike presented a demo of EchoLink.  The software is described by the website
http://www.echolink.org as "...software which allows Amateur Radio stations to
communicate with one another over the Internet, using voice-over-IP (VoIP)
technology.  The program allows worldwide connections to be made between
stations, from computer to station, or from computer to computer." 
Communications may be made from radio to internet to radio.  This allows even
HT's to communicate worldwide.  Mike actually made us believe he made a call to
Minnesota over his HT while sitting at the meeting. 

Meeting adjourned at 9pm.