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July MASA meeting – Science
Museum of Minnesota, August 4, 2011
The July MASA meeting was held at the Science Museum of Minnesota
on Thursday, August 4, 2011. A total of 7 people attended.
Introductions:
New member Chris Feld attended.
Welcome to the club, Chris!
Launches:
The next regular club launch will be on Saturday, August 27, at the
Nowthen sod farm. The theme is “Come On Out To The Races.” We’ll
be holding the 13th annual Great UFO drag race, the 10th annual
Commanche-3 drag race, and the 2nd annual Back-to-School Crayon
race.
Meeting:
The next meeting date is Thursday, September 1, at the Science
Museum. We need a presenter for the September meeting; please let me
know if you’re interested.
Reminders:
- Outreach events: None planned at this time.
- National Events for 2012 - NARCON is not confirmed, but will
likely be in Kansas; NSL is in Geneseo, NY; and NARAM is July 28
through August 3 in Muskegon, MI.
-
If you’re planning a high power
certification attempt, please notify Carol in advance so we can
make there’s a cert team available. Also, if you’re planning an
L2 attempt, please contact Carol to make arrangements to take
the L2 exam.
- The picnic was held on Saturday, July 16th. We had a great
turn-out, despite the high heat and humidity.
- Reminder that Jeff needs articles for the MASA Planet! We
really need contributions from across the club, and no
contribution is too small! Ideas include kit reviews, build
articles, techniques and tips, new products, old products with a
new use, etc.
- Treasury – club funds and membership levels remain in good
shape.
Show ‘n tell:
Carol Marple brought along a few of the kits she acquired
(purchased and freebies) at NARAM 53, including a Semroc Moonglow,
Semroc Arcas, and an Estes QCC Explorer (with NARAM 53 decals).
Recognition:
Congratulations to MASA members Ray King, Todd Schweim, Alyssa
Stenberg, and Zackary Stenberg, who competed at NARAM. They all did
very well and brought home some impressive hardware!
Meeting Topic:
The group discussed NARAM 53, including the auction, launch,
scale viewing, banquet, competition results, etc.
We also reviewed Trip Barber’s “What’s Happening in Our NAR”
report, which was presented at the NAR Town Hall meeting at NARAM.
The full presentation is available on the NAR website.
Highlights include:
- NAR Membership levels are going back down. - Reached 5150 in
March 2011, but losing ground since then despite continuing the
$5 per new member recruiting bonus. - Still not attracting and
retaining enough young NAR members to sustain the future. Junior
membership is only ~600 (used to be 1000), and there are not
enough 25-40 adults to move into key positions in the future.
- NAR finances are very good, with about $300K in unrestricted
funds.
- Sport Rocketry is excellent, but Tom Beach needs more “how
to” article submissions - Begin offering $250 payment for 1-2
substantial “feature” articles per issue on “how to” and/or
technical topics
- NAR Outreach programs such as TARC, NASA SLI, and 4-H
partnership are doing well.
- Plan to restructure the NAR website
- The NAR needs volunteers! - Every committee is just 1-2
people deep and needs more people to share the work
- Igniter issue with BATFE is not an immediate threat - NAR
met with them in March, and the meeting went well. The BATFE
near-term plans to not include detailed regulation.
- Insurance coverage has been increased as of April 2011 - $2M
limit vs $1M - $300K for fire damage to launch site vs $100K -
TARC and SLI teams are covered when participating in section
launches
- Recent NFPA 1125 changes in effect as of June 20, 2011 -
Raised propellant mass limit for “model rocket motor” to 125
grams; 160 N-sec and 80N average thrust limits remain - Added
major labeling requirements to “sparky” motors and other G and
below motors that are considered HPR - Clarified that only solid
propellant motors can be “model rocket motors”; all hybrid and
sparky motors are HPR
- NFPA 1122 and 1127 changes are in draft form, with one more
review before final update takes effect mid-2012 - Greater
standoff range for mass launches (such as drag races) - For HPR
with onboard pyro systems, must only be armed when in launch
position, then only minimum people at the pad
[Carol Marple]
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