Minutes of ERPS General Meeting #243 05 September 2002
The President called the meeting to order at 8:20 PM. Members present were Kevin Bollinger, Randall Clague, Rick Eversole, David Masten, Alex Mikhailov, Pierce Nichols, Dan Solvin, Michael Wallis, David Weinshenker, and Chris Winter. Andrew Bond became a participating member at the meeting. Ben Zarzycki also attended. Reports and discussion on agenda items were as follows: CMT --- Kevin Bollinger Nothing to report DOCUMENTATION ------------- Chris Winter In order to facilitate the sharing of CAD drawings, John Carmack offered to supply several copies of TurboCad 8 (Standard Edition). After discussion online, this offer was accepted. Dave M reported that six copies are on the way. Phase 2 of the Web site reorganization is getting under way with discussions of design concepts among the people responsible. Chris has prepared an alternate letterhead design. A PDF of this will be uploaded to the Web site for evaluation as soon as a suitable place for it exists. All copies of the original brochure went away with attendees at our WorldCon panel and party. The new design is ready for printing when the need arises. Work on a soft copy of the Rocketdyne document proceeds. All the text has been entered, and some of the tables. Rick and Chris will collaborate on getting the remaining tables and the figures into the document. Permission to reproduce it is still pending. Using some reference materials he acquired at ConJose, Kevin will begin putting together a set of Web pages on basic rocketry. At his convenience, Michael will work on concepts for a membership card. There are several ways to approach this: black-and- white printing on perforated sheets, with members filling in their own names; cards on which the names are printed, then laminated; and on up to more expensive options. LIAISON & PAO ------------- Michael Wallis Our ConJose party at the Fairmont Hotel on Sunday night went very well. Plenty of soda and snacks were on hand, and the panel presentation looped on Dave's laptop. Things stayed lively until about 4 AM. We got seven new memberships as well as some donations. We were able to get an ERPS panel on Sunday afternoon. It was well attended, and good questions were asked. (Naturally -- it was a WorldCon audience.) KISS Beta was on display. (One of the highlights of the Con for your Secretary was shoulder-toting the middle section of the rocket along San Carlos Street to the convention center. I only wish I had a video tape of it.) Randall conferred with NSS officers at their party and confirmed the invitation to next year's ISDC (International Space Development Conference) on the topic of "Alternatives to NASA", as previously reported by Adrian. Dave M advised that his talk on "Teaching Penguins to Fly" for the Silicon Valley Linux User Group went well. Other Linux groups, notably the one in Davis, have asked for this presentation. LOGISTICS --------- Sean Lynch Nothing to report TREASURER --------- Michael Wallis Chris Winter Disbursements were made to members for party supplies and rocket parts they had purchased. Our "take" from ConJose was four participating memberships and $180 in donations, plus $4.50 in pun taxes. CHIEF SCIENTIST --------------- Kevin Bollinger Two motors for the filament winder are on hand, and the structural material is en route. Kevin estimates the device will be capable of producing composite tanks of 30-40 gallon capacity. FLIGHT CONTROLS --------------- Bill Clawson Dave M reported that a switch from the standard Linux 2.4.18 kernel with real-time patches to RTLinux was made, in order to resolve some latency issues, and a total rewrite of the guidance code is on CVS. PROPELLANTS ----------- Pierce Nichols Construction of Pierce's sparger proceeds. Dan is making progress toward freezing his project. REGULATORY AFFAIRS ------- Randall Clague Nothing to report SAFETY ------ Dave Masten The state of safety was diminished slightly when someone suffered a minor cut while working on Gizmocopter. There remains no incident calling for invocation of the ERPS tradition that respondee buys a dinner for the responder. TESTING ------- Dave Masten Dan will contact Chuck for a verdict on repairs to the Ranch water system. A static test of KISS 3 is tentatively scheduled for Sunday, 22 September, with prep at CDI the preceding day. The flight tests are still planned for October at Mojave. SMARTFLIGHT ----------- Dave Weinshenker XPRS launches will take place at Black Rock on 28-29 September. Other launches at Fresno 2 weeks before that. KISS ---- Mark Blair Nothing to report. Spike ----- Sean Lynch Nothing to report. POGO ---- Dave Masten Selection of alloys for the engine is still under way. Meeting #243 adjourned at 9:20 PM. The next meeting will take place on Thursday, 19 September 2002. Respectfully submitted, Chris Winter Secretary, ERPS +++ PLEASE ADVISE THE SECRETARY OF ANY ADDITIONS OR CORRECTIONS TO THESE MINUTES +++ _______________________________________________ ERPS-list mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://lists.erps.org/mailman/listinfo/erps-list
