The monthly business meeting of the KSU Amateur Radio Club was called to order by President James Copeland at 6:38 P in 135 Ward Hall on Wednesday, April 26, 2017.

club officers in attendance:
President: James Copeland, KDØICP
Secretary-Treasurer, David Yoder, KAØJPM
Station Manager: Earl Watkins, KEØASI
Activities Manager: Max Nager, W2MAX

members:
Cheyenne Canterbury
Larissa Oshimo
Dr. Douglas McGregor, KEØHSH
Tyler Tryon, KEØJUT

Presentation by Earl Watkins, KEØASI

In his last KSUARC meeting, station manager Earl Watkins, KEØASI and senior in electrical engineering, presented a fine introduction to APRS, Automatic Packet Reporting System.

APRS was developed by the U.S. Naval Academy. It often operates on 144.39 MHz. To use APRS, you need GPS, a radio with AX.25 TNC and APRS software, and digipeater within range of your current location.

Others, for example, family, can view your data and position on APRS.fi. Users can share a link on social media. (When your secretary brought up the link, the geographic location was somehow resolved automatically, and a local map came up. It's pretty amazing!)

Radios that are being used include: Kenwood TH-D72, TM-D700 and TM-D710A. Yaesu radios the FTM-4 and the FTM-100DR. Earl mentioned a cell phone adapter, the BTech APRS-K2.

Earl recently journeyed to Hays, I believe. He brought up a map of Kansas with his route highlighted... very impressive results.

Readers who are interested in learning more about APRS (or in fact-checking these minutes) may want to get a start with Wikipedia.

Earl's presentation was much appreciation, and members spontaneously thanked him for his many contributions as our station manager, including major hands-on work in getting our HyGain TH6DXX beam back on the tower.

Our station license trustee, Dr. Dave Soldan, NØIN, recently donated a Kenwood TS-830S to the club. Vern Wirka has purchased the 830 after repairing it, but will leave it in our station for a while. The club received $400 in payment for the radio. Thanks very much, Vern!

In addition, Vern has recently contributed a rotor, an antenna tuner and SWR meter. The club appreciates his countless contributions to the KSUARC, including equipment, donations and his expertise as adviser.

We recently had some fireworks from a power strip on the operating console. We received a large container of brand new power strips, and a group from the club will shop on Saturday for some corner pieces, so we can do a proper installation of the new strips.

The club has received $800 toward purchase of a new ICOM IC-7300. In March, we sold a donated IC-451A for $85, which resulted in a net gain of $52.13 after shipping. David Yoder has recently been communicating with the Foundation, in hopes of learning our current balance, which is $1,086.28, as well as procedures for expenditures. In short, we have enough funds to buy the IC-7300, which will be somewhere between $1,300 and $1,500.

David Yoder moved that we begin the process of buying the radio. The motion was seconded and passed.

The meeting was adjourned at 7:25 P, and everyone lived happily ever after.

submitted by:
David Yoder, KAØJPM
Secretary-Treasurer