January 2023 - Board Meeting
1/11/2023 - Area 515 Board Meeting
1/11/2023 - Area 515 Board Meeting
Attending:
President: Dave
Vice President: Jake
Secretary: Brad
Director: Carlin
Director: Ryan
Director: Tom
Absent:
Treasurer: Meg
Approval of Minutes from Previous Meeting
Vote to Approve Minutes of December Meeting
Yes: 6
No: 0
Result: Passed
Financials
Carlin submitted receipts for reimbursement via email. He's requesting payment via PayPal. Brad said he would take care of that.
Tom said he would scan and email his receipts for the front sign for reimbursement.
Current Members: 99
The prospect of having a 100th member reignited the idea of giving them a free toaster when they join. (See google group discussion here.) Discussion naturally progressed to alternative ideas, such as making a toaster that makes an image of Bob Ross on the toast.
Discussion then continued to the ElectroBOOM guy on YouTube and why he doesn't wear proper eye protection. Most members generally felt that he should.
A member recently paid by check and emailed the board, as is appropriate. It was discussed that the check should be collected from the lockbox.
A member who inappropriately used the Metal Shop was also discussed.
Space Updates
Heat Teat Oven
The new heat treat oven arrived early. Carlin initially had some trouble with it, but the company has great phone support and now it's working really well. Jake also made a heavy duty extension cord for it.
The Metal Shop currently has two 50 amp circuits. The plan is to take one of those 50 amp circuits and add two 20 amp outlets to it. One to power the surface grinder, the other to power the heat treat oven.
Jake had a suggestion to prevent people slamming the heat treat oven door.
The oven came with a $75 gift certificate to US Knife Makers which Carlin plans to use to buy quench plates for stainless steel. He plans to raise the rest of the money for it from space members.
Other Space Updates
Caroline said she found a rotary CNC machine that requires "a lot of work." It needs an electronics upgrade (and we have an extra controller), it's already on a cart and has a tool turret. (Ryan noted he has 3 of these.)
The right hand laser will soon need a new laser tube. It's to the point where it's not reliably cutting through 1/8" plywood.
The idea of purchasing a new laser was discussed. Jake said most of the lasers he's seen on the market have either been junk or gone really fast. In general, it's better for the space to have single purpose lasers rather than multi-purpose ones which are easier to break.
Ryan is donating some gauges to the space.
Our landlord doesn't seem to be using his plasma CNC machine very much. We'd love to have access/use of that. Perhaps we can talk Jerry into putting that where the wood storage is now, just to the east of the garage door. (The wood storage is getting moved at the next space work day.)
Jake suggested we take a poll of what kind of sodas people like, and then maybe do a recurring Hy-Vee delivery of those sodas. All agreed that regular Mountain Dew is quite popular and that the various Mountain Dew varieties are just awful.
It was noted that the Tool Fee payment automation needs some fixing. Extra columns were added to the Tools spreadsheet which means payments are being recorded in some incorrect columns.
Meeting Adjourned
All agreed that 5 star reviews on Amazon that say things like, "This is awesome! They shipped it to me!!!" are less than helpful.
After the President projected his screen overhead and opened his (single) browser window: "Hey! Don't make fun of my tabs! You can still see the icons so it's not too many yet."
Questions were asked concerning the design of the Variable Frequency Drive (VFD) ordered a few months ago. "Your warranty is void if you push these 2 buttons together, and the buttons are on the outside." "Plus, when you do that there's no wire connecting to one of the switches."
A sign was proposed for the Metal Shop. It would say "Carlin is" and next to it would be hooks that you could hang smaller signs on that would say "happy" or "angry" or "confused" etc., with pictures of his face on them.
Last updated