The CRES Amateur Radio Club held its second-quarter general meeting of the 2006 calendar year at the New Albany Library on Wednesday, 08 June 2006. Those in attendance were: President Bill Erwin/N9CX, Vice President David Brown/K8AX, Secretary/Treasurer Rob Stampfli/ KD8WK, Trustee Mike Rauh/W8GT, Contest Coordinator Carl Yaffey/K8NU, Past President Tricia Kovacs/KC8HIH and members N4DLR, K8LJ, WD8EBS, K8RSP, W3CRZ, K8TX, K8ON, KC8DJR, WA8LBZ, K8KJ, and guest Tom Foy/ N4HAI. Bill Erwin called the business portion of the meeting to order promptly at 7:00 PM. The minutes from the previous meeting were approved. The Treasurer reported a balance of $297.39 in the cash account, $1643.45 in the checking/savings account, and $5390.56 in CDs, including a $1000 CD which was just purchased in April. Dave Woolf/K8RSP reported for the repeater committee: Dave was not able to locate a suitable replacement for the repeater's power amp at Dayton, as he had hoped to do this year, but he cascaded two of his own amps to temporarily replace the motorola unit which has only been producing about half its rated output power. The temporary setup is in place and working well. In fact, its power output is estimated at 130 watts -- the most we've ever run on the repeater. The moto amp is on the bench, but Dave has not delved into it yet. The CW receiver-IDer that Bill Erwin designed to allow W8ZPF users to determine via the reset beep which site they are predominantly getting voted into is now in place and functioning well. In fact, it is pointing out what we believe is a problem with the link not being voted to as often as it should be. Dave also reported the link remote receiver is not currently running a preamp. Finally, believing it to be the Dublin receiver, the control link receiver was inadvertently removed during our last service visit, but we'll use the mistake to verify the receiver is operating within specs, and it will be returned to service shortly. Bob Kenyon/K8LJ spoke for the club in expressing what a great job Bill Erwin had done with the receiver-reset-beep-IDer circuit. The next VE exam session is expected to be at the Columbus Ham-"OH"-Rama hamfest on August 5th, although we have not yet heard from the hamfest organizers. Bob Cartwright reported for the Field Day committee: Bob first presented Mike Rauh/W8GT with Field Day T-shirts from the club, for him and his wife Viodelda, for their hosting of our Field Day event at their house for the past three years. Bob said he is looking for a food chairman and a CW chairman. Mike agreed to take the CW chair position. Bob told the club he anticipates operating class 3A this year, with a phone station, a CW station, and a roving third station to handle the odd stuff like 160m, packet, etc. He anticipates a breakfast meeting on Saturday, June 24th, to be followed by an antenna erection party. The combined FD/club picnic event will take place Saturday evening, and Mike Rauh promised a bacon and egg breakfast for the diehards Sunday morning. As with last year, we intend this to be more of a fun event than an hard-fought contest. Bob indicated he'd like to have $100 to use for Field Day expenses. A motion was made by Dan Merrick/ K8TX, for up to that amount to be allocated for this year's Field Day expenses, and the motion carried. Al Mecozzi/WA8LBZ offered to bring his camera and tripod to the next meeting take quality photos of each club member for our web site. It was recommended that this be done during the dinner period preceding the next general meeting. Those desiring to have their pictures made should arrive early enough to allow Al ample time to do this. Rob Stampfli/KD8WK pointed out that the pictures he used to populate the new member web page come from a variety of sources and he concurred some leave something to be desired. However, the purpose is only to allow members to identify other members they may not know by sight. Rob will gladly replace anyone's picture with another of that individual's choosing if they send their preferred picture to him. Rob has been emailed a few pictures from folks for this purpose, and had also taken a few snapshots prior to the meeting tonight to use on the web site. David Jeffords/K8ON suggested Bill Erwin might consider giving a talk on the design of the CW-Receiver-IDer sometime, and Dave Woolf offered to talk on the capabilities of the repeater controller. Rob suggested we schedule these talks at an informal dinner meeting on a month we do not have another activity planned. The meeting was adjourned promptly at 7:30 PM. Dave Brown/ K8AX then introduced Carl Yaffey/K8NU, who gave an interesting and informative talk on the many aspects of amateur satellite communications. Respectfully submitted, Rob Stampfli/KD8WK CRES-ARC Secretary