Minutes of the Leicestershire Repeater Group AGM held 9th May 2013 at 8pm at The Brant Inn, Groby.
The Chairman welcomed everyone
Present: M1GPO, G8DKC, G6RRJ, M1NAS, M0CJW, G1UOZ, M3DVE, M3WZV, 2E0WLR, M6PTO, M0HEL, G0DMB, G3TQF, G0ATR, G7LRS, G7DPU, G4AFJ, M6BYL, M6CBM.
Apologies for absence: G1OJQ, G3HYH, G4AGN, G7RXS, G8OBP, M1EWH, M1EXO.
Minutes of the 2012 AGM were taken as read as they had been published in LENS.
It was proposed that the minutes be adopted as a true record of the meeting by G0ATR and seconded by M1NAS.
Matters Arising
G80BP had been made an honorary life member of the Group and wished to pass on his thanks to the Group.
Treasurer's Report (M1GPO)
M1GPO invited members to look at the balance sheet.. He reported that there had been little expenditure during the year for maintenance and repairs which was down to the engineering team who not only gave of their time freely but also supplied items for maintenance FOC too.
Although the subscription had been increased during the year there had been little change in membership income. The electricity bill continues to rise at regular intervals.
M1GPO proposed that the accounts be accepted. Seconded by G4AFJ and carried nem con.
Membership Report (M1GPO)
At present there were 44 paid up members, 7 life members and 8 subs outstanding. It was hoped that all 8 would renew which would bring the membership back to the same level as the previous year.
Engineering Manager's Report (M1NAS)
He reported that GB3's CF, LE and UM as well as GB3GV were all working to specification. As usual when there had been problems during the year steps had been taken to remedy the problem as quickly as possible. It was hoped to add internet linking to GB3GV and GB3LE. Investigations were taking place to find the most cost effective means of accessing the internet from site.
G4AFJ proposed a vote of thanks to the engineering team for their continued hard work. Seconded by G0ATR and carried.
Site Manager (M0CJW)
He apologised for not getting to site, this year as he had been very busy organising 9 UKIP candidates.
Chairman's Report (G4AFJ)
It had been a fairly uneventful year as the various repeaters and beacons had continued to give sterling service although it had to be remembered that they are under the watchful eye of the various engineers. Without their vigilance and attention to detail the service would have deteriorated. We owe them a big debt of gratitude for their dedication to our various units. We have had one or two complaints about the lock up problem on the GB3CF logic which is the GD4HOZ design.
Our solution was to reset the logic every so often by using a time clock to switch the repeater off for a minute. We have tried to reset it at times when we hope use is at a minimum although it’s bound to cause inconvenience to someone occasionally as it is set to reset 4 times per day. Opinion is divided on what causes the problem. The similar logics on LE and UM have never locked up. One school of thought believes the problem centres on the lack of immunity to noise of the ctcss decode chip whereas others blame the board layout and yet others to a programming quirk in the coding of the pic. If it was a simple problem it would have been solved by the combined brains of the UK amateurs who use this logic. We originally bought 4 sets of the logic but as the others have performed so well it has never been thought a priority to try it out. We are going to get Liam as Assistant Engineering Manager, if re-elected to committee, to construct the 4th unit and commission it to see if this solves the problem.
Solar Power
As reported in LENS one of the regular users of the repeater may be in a position to sell us a second user solar system at a favourable price and the committee will be looking at this proposal very carefully.
GB3GV TV Repeater
As reported in LENS we are extremely fortunate that we have found a new TV Repeater Keeper Peter, G8DKC. He and Dave have been very busy revamping, modernising and implementing new facilities on GB3GV including live internet streaming. A couple of weeks back thanks to Liam we were able to install the new aerial for the 70cm digital TV input. As a result of the modifications and improvements GV goes into sleep mode during the night which means less power consumed and thus a lower electricity bill!
Internet Access at site.
This facility is key to a number of projects including IRLP and the TV streaming. We have had discussions during the year with a local Markfield amateur about using his domestic internet connection but at the end of the day it turned out that the bandwidth available would not be sufficient. However more recently through the auspices of Liam we have discovered that a former member of committee has a business unit on the Markfield Industrial Estate and has high speed broadband. He has agreed to let us have a wireless link from his unit to our site. We hope to progress this fairly quickly now the better weather is here.
APRS
Tests have shown that more filtering will be needed on the rx input of CF in order to avoid problems with the APRS system. It is likely that some of our spare cavities will be used for this purpose.
Beacons
UHF Beacon GB3LEU
Since the Emley Moor and Sutton Coldfield 70cm beacons closed down due to the high costs of site rental there has been no real service available in this area and as a result we have made a proposal to the RSGB Beacon co-ordinator to host a beacon, GB3LEU, at our site. This is now waiting the approval of the primary user of 70cm which is the MoD. We are in the process of sourcing components and modules for the beacon. It looks like we have a case, pa and exciter modules as well as feeder and aerials. The plan will be to have two aerials one pointing up the UK and one pointing down the UK.
We still don't have the 3.4GHz beacon working but we are hoping that will be done this year. The other beacons continue to work well although GB3LEX had a spell out of service recently due to a psu problem.
SK Sales
We did quite a bit of successful trading with our surplus equipment and components at the Junction 28 rally and at the Princethorpe (Rugby) rally.
Thanks to the Outgoing Committee
Once again I have to thank all those who have supported the Repeater Group by being members and especially those who have served as members of the committee. This year Richard, G6RRJ, has decided that he can no longer continue as Secretary of the Group. Otherwise the various members of the committee are prepared to stand for re-election.
Election of Committee for 2013-14
Chairman: G4AFJ proposed by G6RRJ seconded by M0CJW. Carried.
Secretary: no nominations
Treasurer: M1GPO proposed by G4AFJ seconded by M6BYL. Carried
Engineering Manager: M1NAS proposed by M3DVE and seconded by M3WZV. Carried.
Site Manager: M0CJW proposed by G4AFJ and seconded by M1GPO. Carried.
Three committee members:
The outgoing committee members were: G0ATR M0HEL and M6CBM.
The following were proposed and seconded for the committee:
2E0WLR proposed by M1NAS and seconded by M3WZV;
M0HEL proposed by 2E0WLR seconded by G4AFJ;
M6CBM proposed by M1NAS seconded by M1GPO.
M0HEL, M6CBM and 2E0WLR were elected.
G0ATR,(web & GB2RS newsreader), G3TQF (Beacon Co-ordinator and G8DKC (TV Repeater Engineer) will be coopted by the new committee.
Vote of Thanks
The accounts had been inspected by M1EXO and the Treasurer proposed a vote of thanks to her. G4AFJ seconded it and the proposal was carried.
The Chairman closed the formal part of the meeting at 9:00pm.
Open Forum
Abuse on GB3CF
The Chairman had received a message via the web site of abuse on GB3CF which he wished to discuss with members to see if the culprit(s) could be identified.
The message read as follows:
“I was at my club on Friday 26th April listening to GB3CF when an unusual ammount of disgraceful language was used on that evening by what appears to be licenced amateurs, one of which was? who did not use offensive language but was party to the conversation.
While I appreciate it is not possible to stop repeater abuse by policing it all the time, I feel that one of the keepers should notice these events, and in this case should have switched the repeater off as it continued to relay the offensive comments for a couple of hours.
I myself have heard every offensive term you could imagine being ex services HM forces Army, but I do have young persons wishing to take up amateur radio, or at least be short wave listeners, and as such have to have a hand hovering over the off switch of radios just incase a young person may hear offensive language or comments. I accept some abuse of the system is by non licenced people, but on the odd occasion call signs were used, and this is totally unaceptable.
Please enforce the rules pertaining to repeater operation, since I know Ofcom most times do nothing about such
matters.”
G4AFJ had responded to the complainant requesting more information and had mentioned that he would seek more information at the AGM of LRG. As a result of the discussion two call signs were identified but there was a discrepancy of dates!
G4AFJ advised members of how to conduct themselves especially if someone who is licensed became abusive or used swear words, etc on air. The more responsible participants in a qso should warn the less responsible one(s) and then leave the net if the behaviour was not amended. If you are unwilling to comment on the language or feel that it will only aggravate the situation make an excuse and leave the repeater. If all the participants in the net do that the perpetrator will have no-one to talk to! For persistent incidents report it via our web site or direct to me and I will take it up with the person concerned.
IRLP
M0CJW asked for information on the progress with IRLP. This was awaiting the sorting out of an internet connection at site.