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I’m not sure if it was the pizza or the gift exchange or the election of officers for 2025 (yeah, right…), but we had a great turnout at our December meeting. The agenda included:

• Eating pizza. (Thanks, Don!)
• Recapping our 2024 activities
• Looking ahead to 2025
• A “mystery” activity
• “Electing” next year’s officers. There were no contested elections this year, so someone moved that we approve the slate presented by acclamation, and after a second, we did just that.
• Holding the annual “white elephant” gift exchange.

2024 was a good year

2024 was a very good year for ARROW. We’re now up to 160 paying members, we participated in a number of activities, including:

• WOTO Site Repeater Upgrades
• ARROW Equipment/Property Insurance through ARRL
• Updating and Improving ARROW financial and membership records
• Getting our ARRL special service club award renewed
• Relationship with Toledo Mobile Radio Association (TMRA, W8HHF.org)
• Finding new general meeting location (Maker Works
• Supported Switch Fixer Program (repaired dozens of assistive devices for disabled people)
• Weekly 2-meter club nets.
• AMPTeam outings each month. AMP stands for ARROW Mobile and Portable and they’re kind of like POTA activations and mini Field Days, but people bring all kinds of different stuff to them. The crazy people in our club even meet in the winter months.
• Monthly breakfasts at local greasy spoon.
• Communication support for two bike tours: One Helluva Ride and Tour de Cure.
• Bus to the Dayton Hamvention. For more than ten years, our club has rented a bus and taken members and others to Dayton.
•  Two one-day Tech classes in 2024, with a total of 50 students.
• 14 VE test sessions that tested 99 candidates who earned 54 Tech licenses, 18 General Class licenses, and 11 Extra Class licenses.
• Great showing in the Summer ARRL Field Day. In 2024, our club finished first in class 4A in Michigan, and nationally, we ranked 43 out of 4,319 entries overall regardless of class.
• Participation in community tech events, including the Ann Arbor Library Creativity and Making Expo and the Maker Works Open House.
• Participated in Jamboree on the Air (JOTA)

Scenes from our very successful 2024 Field Day operation.

Looking ahead to 2025

We’re not resting on our laurels, though. The club leadership is planning some new initiatives for 2025, including:

• Review of Groups.io General mailing list.
• Moving to electronic license testing through the ExamTools platform.
• Building relationship with other clubs in Southeast Michigan.
• Name/Callsign Badges for ARROW members.
• Supporting Kiwanis to test and repair electronics for their rummage sales.
• One-day tech & electronics classes at Maker Works.
• 220 MHz antenna build session.

Election of officers

The folks nominated to be our officers for 2025 included:

• President: James Forgacs, AE8JF
• Vice President: Steve Szafarek, AC8YA
• Secretary: Don Winsor, AC8TO
• Treasurer: Steve Rogacki, AC8GO
• Technical Coordinator: Jay Nugent, WB8TKL
• Public Information Officer: Edward Vielmetti, W8EMV
• Activities Coordinator: Dinesh Cyanam, AB3DC

There being no nominations from the floor, these nominees were declared the winners by acclamation!

What’s a white elephant, anyway?

The final item on the agenda was the white elephant gift exchange. As is our custom, those who have been licensed the longest get to choose first. That honor has gone to Paul, KW1L, for the past five years or so. He was followed by John, WA8TON; Mark, W8FSA; Jay, WB8TKL, and Dan, KB6NU.

There were lots of good items in the gift exhange this year. I spotted a nice parts organizer, a 100 W dummy load, and a couple of HTs. Of course, they weren’t all so useful. One fellow got a couple of older Ethernet switches, including one that had at least 50 ports!

The meeting was adjourned after the sale. Happy holidays to all!

Yesterday, four ARROW members met at Maker Works to fix assistive devices. Shown below is Paul, KW1L; Rick, K8BMA; and Ron, K8RCF. Yours truly is taking the picture.

The devices we worked on are devices used by people who have difficulty communicating. Typically, they consists of a big switch that the user presses to play a pre-recorded message.

The problems are generally easy to diagnose, and the repairs are generally simple repairs. Rick, for example, replaced the plugs on several of the devices, and Paul and Ron replaced the speakers in several of the units.

One of the devices that I tackled came with a note that read, “Won’t play or record, even with a new battery.” 

As we all know, the first step in troubleshooting is to verify the problem. So, I obtained a new battery and opened the battery compartment. As shown in the photo at right, it was clear that the problem was a defective battery clip. Somehow, someone managed to tear the negative contact off the clip. I replaced the battery clip and brought the device back to life! 

Overall, we probably fixed close to ten devices, including the pushbutton switches. We probably could have fixed more, but it took us some time to learn how to disassemble and then reassemble the devices.

And, while the fixes are usually simple, they can also be a bit frustrating. For example, the device that I replaced the battery clip on wouldn’t go back together very easily. It looked to me as though the screws holding the device together just aren’t long enough. Other devices had similar design issues.

Even so, it was an interesting and fun exercise, and we will be doing this again. There are many more devices to fix. I asked Dale, our contact at Maker Works, if we might schedule an evening session so that those of you who are working can join us. Stay tuned for that.

2:00 PM Saturday June 22 – 2:00 PM Sunday June 23
On the soccer field – just north of Ann Arbor Municipal Airport
801 Airport Dr, Ann Arbor, MI 48108

Field Day, an amateur radio event that takes place on the last full weekend of June every year, is an emergency communications exercise, public outreach event, and social event all rolled into one. Since 1933, radio amateurs—also
known as “hams”—have set up temporary amateur radio stations in public locations to showcase amateur radio technology and have invited the public to join them. Hams operate round-the-clock from tents and RVs using emergency power supplied by gas generators, solar panels, and batteries. At Field Day, you can:

• Get on the air and talk to others via amateur radio.
• Find out more about how you can get a license
• Have fun with amateur radio.
• Talk about all things radio and technology.
• Sit back, relax, and have fun!

Our Arrow general membership meeting will be this Wednesday, March 9.  We will continue with our virtual meeting format on Zoom.

Zoom details for the Arrow meeting:
Wednesday March 9, 2022, 6:30 pm US/Eastern standard time
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/92284436755?pwd=cG1uSlFCbU9xUDJIVjNHZ21YZE1Qdz09
Meeting ID: 922 8443 6755
Passcode (all lowercase): arrow

Our Arrow general membership meeting will be this Wednesday, February 9.  We will continue with our virtual meeting format on Zoom.  We will keep our usual timing; informal gathering starting at 6:30 pm, and our program will start at 7:00 pm.

Zoom details for the Arrow meeting:
Wednesday February 9, 2022, 6:30 pm US/Eastern standard time
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/92284436755?pwd=cG1uSlFCbU9xUDJIVjNHZ21YZE1Qdz09
Meeting ID: 922 8443 6755
Passcode (all lowercase): arrow

This month, our featured presenter will be our own Jay Nugent, WB8TKL.

Jay’s title and description:

“Providing the Power needed to run Emergency Communications”
-or-
“When All Else Fails…Or at least until your battery dies”

This presentation will cover station power needs for long-term communication deployments (or Grid down), determining your Power Budget, various battery chemistries, discharge curves, charging profiles, generator backup, and we go in depth into Solar Power, PWM-v-MPPT, PV technology, the myth of “Excess Energy”, how to ‘Rack Up’ some PV, and how to do 12VDC on a more massive scale.

This presentation is being produced for the upcoming DHS/FEMA/MSP Interoperability Conference scheduled for early March, in Traverse City.  You fine folks will be my first victims..err…audience to see this presentation. Your feedback will be used to polish up any rough spots.