IARCHS Meeting Minutes 1/13/18

A regular meeting of the Iowa Antique Radio Club convened at 10:15 at the home of Rob Tracy in Des Moines.   Those attending included Rob, Al Bailey, Bob Elbert, Dwight Baker Keith Lowe and, thanks to Keith, some new, younger members Joe Arling, Thomas Logan, Brodie Miron, Preston Peddicord and Stone Widder.

The minutes of the last meeting as posted on the website were briefly discussed and accepted as is.
There was no treasurer’s report available, however, as there had been no significant club activities since the last meeting the likelihood is that the current account balance is about the same as reported last time plus a little earned interest.

Under new business, the status of the upcoming auction was the major topic.  It is important for members to note that the web site is now up to date and ready to accept pictures of consigned items .   Please get all pictures of items you will be offering for sale to Craig Huseboe at cmhusebo@marshallnet.com.  You will also need to request a lot number for your items, so please also get that from Craig.

In a related note, Craig has said that this will be his last year acting as the auction coordinator as he & his wife plan to become snow birds beginning next winter.  (…. and given how THIS winter has been so far, who can blame him !).  I asked if anyone present would consider taking on the job, Dwight Baker said he was willing to continue assembling the item spread sheet but did not want to expand beyond that role and no one else stepped forward.  So please give it some thought and contact me if you’re willing to help your club out.  It would be a very good idea to get involved sooner rather than later so whoever takes over can benefit from what Craig has learned doing it for the last several years.

Craig has been in contact with Brent Wears and it’s been agreed that all of the fees will be the same again as last year.  The auction is set, again this year, for the last Saturday in April, as stated on the club calendar.  However due to some feedback from attendees we will probably be moving it back to the 1st Saturdayin May.

In other business we discussed the need for everyone to make better / more use of the club’s online resources, especially the website as a place to seek and ask for assistance and parts for a restoration project.

One of the most frequently requested services directed at the website is from someone seeking repair services.  While we do have some contacts for repairs in central and eastern Iowa, there is a need for someone closer to Nebraska, so if any member knows of a person or if YOU are willing to provide restoration services in western Iowa or in Nebraska, please contact me with the information.

I’ve also noticed that our Facebook page gets relatively little traffic – please keep in mind that, that’s also available as a place to share information and, perhaps, request help with a specific problem.

Finally, we need a volunteer to host our next meeting.  As this will be the last one before the auction earlier would be better than later.  Around March 24thwould be a good day, but a week either side would probably serve too.  As this meeting was in Des Moines, for the benefit of our members in Cedar Rapids, Iowa City , Dubuque, etc,  it would be good to meet somewhere east of Des Moines this time.

With that, the meeting was called to a close and we rolled into a repair / training session.  In relatively short order we were able to identify the source of noise in a set brought by one of the new members and point another to the cause of a dead spot in the tuning range of a radio he’d been working on.

As there is always a desire to learn & develop repair skills, Rob set up a good assortment of test equipment to demonstrate how to use a signal injector, a signal tracer and an oscilloscope. He also provided a carefully ‘broken’ radio to use as a teaching challenge for any and all that wanted to do some troubleshooting thereby demonstrating in a very practical way how to approach it for the newer, less experienced members.

It was a good, productive training/ repair session and we wrapped up around 3 PM.
Be on the lookout for a notice of the location, date and time of our next meeting and, again:

Please contact me to host it and take on the job of auction coordinator in 2019 – your club needs you !

Editor’s Note: I have posted Dave Perkin’s minutes, basically unedited, and added Bob Elbert’s photos without captions as I was unable to attend.  Doug Spyrison