Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120619
Committee members present: Dave KJ4KFJ, Dave K8WPE, Joe N8OUZ
Others Present – Chris KD8MTT, Joe W8TVT, Dave N8CN, Harry KB8RIV
Agenda Items
Action Assignments:
Adjourned
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120612
Committee members present: Dave KJ4KFJ, Dave K8WPE, Joe N8OUZ
Others Present – Chris KD8MTT, Joe W8TVT, Dave N8CN, Harry KB8RIV
Agenda Items
- Duplexers have arrived 3 days early. Discussion of installation date.
- Proposal reviewed, would like to see competitive numbers.
- Money – discussion of details on funds available for materials and climb.
- Added item – 440 repeater controller. CAT-300 controller had died. CAT-200 currently operates the repeater, no PL required to use the system.
Action Assignments:
- Joe E, Dave H – Procure additional quotes for climb and materials.
- Joe E – get pricing on modules for the CAT-200 to enable PL decode. Also look into simply replacing the controller altogether.
Adjourned
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120417
Committee members present: Dave KJ4KFJ, Dave K8WPE, Joe N8OUZ
Others Present – Don N8QX, Chris KD8MTT, Joe W8TVT, Dave N8CN, Jon N8UL, Ernie K8RCT, Harry KB8RIV, 3x?
Agenda Items
- (no additions)
- Talk of email, calls, communications, and general committee happenings; some of the committee members voiced concerns.
- Reviewed TBARG meeting conflict – Ernie is flexible to change, although no specific notion was voiced other than the potential for this meeting 7-8, TBARG from 8-9, but no changes motioned on.
- Don N8QX to inventory
- Duplexer information presented. Recommended TPRD-1486 Telewave. Presented dossier of materials reviewed. $3274.00. 30% gives us 2292. Motion will be for not to exceed $2600 for purchase of new duplexer array.
- ID on Repeater.
Action Assignments:
- Joe to update serial number on the CSI tone panel at the 86 site.
Adjourned
AGENDA FOLLOWS
HI , Repeater Committee and Repeater Committee Friends.
With Project night coming it is once again time for a Committee meeting. This Tuesday the 17th 7:00 pm.
If you have some agenda items please let me know .
I have the following items that need discussed at this time.
Agenda
1. additions to the agenda.
2. Member Communications
3. Seeing how Tbarg is set on having their meetings during our meetings do we need to change ours?
4. Do we need to inventory the Club equipment at the salvation Army?
5. What do we want to present to the board for purchasing some Cans.(please bring some Cost figures with your ideals)
6. Any additional commits
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120410
Committee members present: Dave KJ4KFJ, Dave K8WPE, Brad W8QPO, Joe N8OUZ
Others Present – Don N8QX, Chris KD8MTT, Joe W8TVT, Dave N8CN, Paul K8HIB, Ward N8WK, Harry, Vandenberge, ?Friend, ?Friend, ?Friend.
Agenda Items
- no action
- Policy Changes and Farm Inventory introduced
- Joe N8OUZ updates on status of the repeater – bugs worked out. Operating normally with 114.8 and 100.0 PL tones.
- logbook to be procured and installed at the repeater site.
- Call Sign Changes. Currently the club call W8TCM is on the 145.39 repeater. W8SGR is on 146.86 and 442.5 repeaters. Actions: W8TCM to go on primary club repeaters 146.86 and 442.5. W8SGR call (or another, Chuck W8SGR’s discretion) will be put on 145.39. (the 145.39, 147.1, and 146.66 repeaters are not CARC repeaters)
- On 4/17, we will be prepared with duplexer specs, recommendations, configurations and pricing options in a spreadsheet.
- Dave raises coverage issues / concerns with 146.86. Currently the repeater is using one antenna, the lower ( ~280ft) antenna, not the top antenna which is problematic at best.
- Discussion of club inventory in shack and at farm – What can we sell, who owns what, what has been committed to whom.
Action Assignments:
- Joe E, Dave H to explore duplexer options for #6 above.
- Joe E to check into callsign changes. Brad notes that Chuck is ready to change callsigns, committee gives go-ahead.
- Joe to check into our presence at WIAA in interlochen. Should be an isopole at ~150ft or so. Brad W8QPO notes that we have a written permission to occupy tower space. Need to find that.
AGENDA FOLLOWS
From: Dave <>
Subject: Agenda for Repeater Committee
Date: April 8, 2012 9:29:17 PM EDT
To: John Martin <>, N8OUZ <>, Don Strazynski <>, David Wilcox <>,, Brad Mellberg <>, John Martin <>, joe Novak, Chris Parrish, KD8MTT <>
HI , Repeater Committee and Repeater Committee Friends.
With Project night coming it is once again time for a Committee meeting. This Tuesday the 10th 7:00 pm.
If you have some agenda items please let me know .
I have the following items that need discussed at this time.
Agenda
1. additions to the agenda.
2.Discuse results of the Board Meeting.
Policy Changes
Inventory at Farm
3. update on changes to the repeater.
4. get at logbook up to the repeater site.
5. procedure to change the call on the club repeaters.
6. Discuss what we need for Cans We need to make this decision with en the next two meetings so come prepared with what want to use so, we also need prices so we can present it at the general meeting for a vote. For the money
7. any commits
Attached are two Emails from John Martin. On what he has found for Cans. For information on what we need.
I want to thank Joe Erlewein and John Martin thy have put in a tremendous amount of time into getting the Clubs Repeater reinstalled.
Thanks
David Hanchett
KJ4KFJ
20320 Cedar Run Road
Traverse City, MI 49685
Home 231-275-6175
Cell 231-409-3282
From: John Martin <>
Subject: dupes
Date: April 8, 2012 1:39:42 AM EDT
To: Dave <>, Joseph R. Erlewein Joseph R. <>
I just spent a few short minutes perusing duplexers…. Egads— not a whole lot of selection for ‘full sized’ (600khz spacing or better) vhf-hi duplexers out there… It seems the world has moved along…
At least there are items…
TX-RX systems appears to now be part of Bird… see:
http://birdtechnologies.thomasnet.com/item/all-categories/duplexers-2/28-37-11e?&bc=100|3001006
Then theres Telewave (see two attached pdf’s)…
RFS (Cellwave) from first blush appears to just have mobile/compact VHF duplexers— great for commercial 3 and 5 mhz, but not for us.. harumph… Perhaps (and likely) they still do make the full sized narrow-split duplexers we need, but it’s not immediately evident.
Tessco appears to sell what looks to be a clone of either the TX-RX(Bird) unit or Telewave… $2000-3000
The 100db units should be fine… the 80db units would be no better than what’s already on hand. While I (and most rf-geeks) prefer the larger diameter cans, I’m not sure if that’s really all that necessary… Of course, bigger is better… except when you weigh in at the doctors office… (in this case, the larger cavities would allow for a narrower split– NOT likely to be useful here– but with that, the expectation is that at 600khz the notches aren’t quite as narrow/sharp, allowing for some temp drift to not affect the specs, etc..) Again, I”m not sure if the larger diameter cans are worth extra $$… perhaps a little, but not a whole lot IMHO.
Oh well… food for thought…
73
John
Here’s another outfit— they seem to have the quite a selection… (and handy prices)
http://www.hol4g.com/ac/search.aspx?sc=3783&sv=duplexer&sort=mfg&Page=1&PerPage=20
(that opens to a base duplexer search)
73
John
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120320
Members Present: Don N8QX, Dave KJ4KFJ, Dave K8WPE, Joe N8OUZ
Others Present: Harry, Joe W8TVT, Dave N8CN
Agenda Items
- Joe Erlewein N8OUZ donates CSI-32 for use in the CARC 146.86 repeater as a secondary tone decoder panel. Unit tested power on OK. Joe W8TVT cleaned faceplate. Unit to be installed in MSR2K and installed with repeater.
- Additions to Agenda
- Harry asks about cavities when he saw the cost margins.
- eBay refurb is an option.
- Prices presented are new prices, not used/refurb
- Review of Action Assignments
- MSR2K coming back supposedly tonight.
- (2) Is this the best time for the meeting?
- Apparently.
- (3) MSR2K status. What steps are necessary to R&R before reinstall?
- Tone board to be installed.
- Verify RC-85 controller interconnections
- Verify MSR2K connections – Manual?
- Committee Membership
- Three members have skipped 2 crucial meetings. Are these to be reassigned?
- Now tracking attendance at committee meetings in minutes headers.
- Check local for cavities, etc.
- John as a resource
Action Assignments:
- Joe to price cans pursuant to item 6 discussion.
- Need to present total cost of project to club. Needs to be all-inclusive, but we can itemize by phase.
- Antenna 800
- Feedline 4500
- Climb 4000
- Cavities 4000
- Materials 500
$13,800
- Joe to bring digital camera and begin equipment inventory. Don Parker has keys. Chuck may also.
- Dave K8WPE and Dave KJ4KFJ to come along
- Record equipment / SN info. Pictures.
- Bring a 100’ tape
Bring to board:
- Recommendations to Board:
- Asset Tracking – Spreadsheet on Google Docs etc. Also local copy at times.
- Policy change to present to club board – at least 2 people from CARC to be required to visit the site for keeping better track of changes and status.
- Logbook at the site.
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120313
Agenda Items
- completed
- discussed, completed
- tabled, due to lack of member presence
- status on repeater changes. removed stubs, changed to top antenna for receive, etc. we need to make a decision soon.
- Brad was to reinstall repeater. He aborted, and MSR2K is at Mellberg’s.
- Necessary Funds discussed. Details skimmed. Notes below.
- Ideas discussed for fundraising. Ads in directory, website, newsletter.
- Open Comments – Comments were made.
- Meeting Closed.
Action Assignments:
- Don to facilitate return of the MSR2K to the club work bench for analysis.
- Joe to price cans pursuant to item 6 discussion.
- Need to present total cost of project to club. Needs to be all-inclusive, but we can itemize by phase.
- Antenna 800
- Feedline 4500
- Climb 4000
- Cavities 4000
- 13300
- Suggestion of membership committee (welcoming, etc)
- Joe to bring digital camera and begin equipment inventory
Items for next meeting:
- Need to implement asset tracking before purchases made. Need to inventory our current manifest.
- Policy change to present to club board – at least 2 people from CARC to be required to visit the site for keeping better track of changes and status.
- Logbook at the site.
Repeater Committee Meeting minutes – 20120221
Members Present: Dave KJ4KFJ, Brad W8QPO, Chuck W8SGR, Joe N8OUZ, Don N8QX
Others Present: Chris KD8MTT, Joe W8TVT, Paul K8HIB
Discussion of goals, short-term and long-term.
Short Term:
- Fix antenna situation
- Antenna
- Feedline
- Climb
- R&R MSR2000 (original repeater) and get Brad’s repeater returned to him, thanking him for saving the club’s repeater presence in the event of our issues.
- Need to get dual-tone decoding working on the MSR2000. 114.8 is the “official” tone and 100.0 is the “current” tone that we should keep on the repeater for some period of time so as to allow people to migrate back to the “official” 114.8 tone.
Long Term:
- Assemble a cold-standby “spare repeater” setup that can be used during a failure.
- MSR2000 unit
- controller
- tone decoding capabilities
- Remote control of the two repeaters
- could perhaps be achieved using 440 to control 86 and vice-versa.
- could be achieved using local receivers simply as a dedicated control point.
Short Term 1a
Antenna: Suggested using “northern michigan standard antenna” that IRA uses, etc. It is a DB224. Cost is $695 plus shipping, and rounds out to about $800.
Short Term 1b
Feedline: Brad has contact that is offering 1000ft of New ⅞” hardline on a spool for $2500.
Brad mentioned donating the cost of terminating the feedline with connectors. To provide an amount to receive credit for donation. (www.davisrf.com/heliax.php has comp pricing on ½” and ⅞” hard line coaxes)
Chris mentioned affixing the feedline to the tower, and cost for the hardware.
It was mentioned that the 1000ft spool would be adequate for replacing the hardline feeding the 440 repeater antenna at 200ft. We should price an antenna for this as well as it is 20yrs old. This could be a dual-purpose climb to save on additional climb costs in the future.
Short Term 1c
Climb: This can range from $2k to $4k or higher. This is really up to what TV 7&4 will allow us to use as a climber, though we know we will at least have to have an insured climber. It was mentioned that the Bob FM installation was supposed to clean up our old hardline and antenna, but this might not have happened. It was mentioned we ought to offer to clean up this and possibly other outstanding “simple” clean-up items.
Action Items:
- Don to contact Jim Marco WB2LHP at WPBN and hopefully arrange a meeting with him, Joe N8OUZ to accompany. Goals of meeting:
- Express thanks and appreciation for many years of use of the facilities for our repeater.
- Communicate our changes with respect to creation of a committee to plan for repairs, upgrades, and maintenance of our repeater systems, and that newly formed committee’s desire to bring our operations into compliance and to ease our workings with WBPN so as to be the least noticeable and most helpful as is possible.
- Communicate our desires to make repairs to our systems, the necessity of a climb to replace antenna and feelines, and inquire about any work they are aware of that needs to be performed, perhaps to combine objectives to a single maint climb window.
- Express that since we’re considering a very large (to our club) monetary dispersement into our systems at the WPBN site that we are hoping to have some sort of officiated guarantee of presence for a period of time.
- Present Club with projected costs for repairs necessary to restore 146.86 to operating capacity.
- Assuming able to procure 1000ft of ⅞” hardline for $2500.
- Assuming cable clamps and connectors not to exceed $300.
- Price for antenna is $695 plus shipping, to be almost exactly $800.
- Cost of Climb subject to WPBN Terms, acceptance, and approval. Ranges from $2000 to $4000
- Note that cost could actually be reduced if WPBN currently plans to do a clean-up climb or other install. To be determined in action item 1 as noted.
- Final figures would be in the $5600-7600 range. $3600 is material cost at minimum.
- If we are to also replace the 20yr old 440 repeater antenna, the one climb we get is the time to do it. Need pricing on this antenna.
- It is noted that we need to price a duplexer that contains an actual bandpass cavity and has two ports, not a single-port BPBR type, and not just reject as it’s really just an expensive “notch”