Member Meeting Minutes for July 6th, 2022

Attendees

• Alisa Grishman
• Becky Zajdel
• Brian “Beebo” Esch
• Chris McCann
• Chris Napolitano
• Geno Soroka
• Quara’e Canady
• Rex Coughenour
• Rob Bedel
• Spencer Zacher
• Steve Owens

Call to Order

• Meeting was called to order at 19:39

Announcements

Moving second monthly meeting

• Starting this month, the second meeting of the month will be on the third Sunday rather than the third Tuesday
  • The first meeting of the month will remain on the first Wednesday
  • Already corrected in the calendar

Treasurer’s Report

• Bank account: $13,443.78
  • Dale just cashed rent, we just paid electricity, we just paid insurance, and we just bought several pieces of software

Old Business

Tustin Tot Lot

• There haven’t been people coming forward to volunteer
  • The one person who did got COVID
• The Board has decided to move the clean-up a month out to August 13th
• If no one volunteers to help out, it’s just going to be a quick clean-up instead of a proper block party with burgers and whatnot
  • We don’t just need volunteers for the day-of clean-up work – we also need people to sit down in advance and sort through supplies, make posters, etc
• Becky will be reaching out to Uptown Partners and the Tustin Tot Lot group
• Alisa has a sign-up sheet that will be distributed once she changes the dates on it
• Alisa will go in advance with Adam Longwill to check on all of the electronic components, during which time Alisa will record Adam’s descriptions of what to do to have for posterity

Classes – we need more!

• Good form of revenue for the shop
  • More classes = less fundraising
• Jeremy has a line-up of several classes involving the mill and the metal lathe (plus metal shop basics)
• Jim Keener wants to do Arduino classes and perhaps soldering (if Geno isn’t free to do them)
  • Already has a kit lined up and has written a syllabus
• Welding class this weekend
• There have been inquiries from people about various classes
  • Soldering
  • Adam’s computer-building class
• Sometimes it’s fun to just throw out ideas and have some random fun classes
  • In the past Chad taught a stamp-making class
  • Origami, crocheting, knitting, etc
  • If you think you have the proficiency to teach something, you can do it at Hack

Laser cutter update

• Software has been purchased!
• Preliminarily aligned and rudimentarily operational
• This weekend
  • Still some fine tuning that needs to be done that Rob will be working on
  • Rob will verify and validate that it is firing correctly
  • Trainings will be happening all weekend
• Will take a while for the new alignment to properly wear in
  • Will drift a little in the first couple of weeks
• Sean and Rob will do a monthly check on the system
• At the moment there will not be a physical controller system on the front of the machine; that will be installed once the RFID system is finished
  • For now we’re sticking to the old record-on-paper, cash-in-box system
• There’s already a software timer in the new software that will predict how long the burn is likely to run

New Business

Resin printer

• There was a heated debate on the Resin channel on Slack regarding people leaving their finished projects in the printer after they’re finished
  • Since there’s no heating element in the resin printers, it’s OK for them the be run while no one is here and so people will go home before their print is finished
• Often people leave their prints running over long stretches of time and then aren’t available to clean their stuff off first thing when it’s done
  • So far there’s been an unwritten policy of people cleaning up each other’s prints because there’s a very small number of people who use the resin printers
• A person made a complaint about how he’s come in and found finished prints just sitting there so he can’t go and use the print
• A lot of fine-tuning of a print is done at the very end, so cleaning off another person’s print can be a problem if you don’t know what that person wants done for the curing process
  • There’s also a risk of breaking the other person’s print
• We acknowledge that it’s not really viable for a lot of people to guarantee that they can be back at the shop to clean up their print as soon as it’s done or before the next person wants to start their print
• Suggestions
  • Writing on the channel in advance that you’d like to use a printer or letting people know that you’ve got a print on the plate and you won’t be back until a particular time to clean up
  • Make a formalized policy of cleaning each other’s prints up for each other (a la taking turns to buy dinner for each other) if someone wants to use a printer before the print’s owner can come back and clean it
    • If a person posts on the channel that they have a print going and won’t be back until a particular time, they can post the settings that would be needed to finish the print so the next person can clean off their print for them if need be
  • Make a rule that if you’re using a printer overnight, leave the other one open
    • Not going to work if there’s two people who have long prints
  • Calendars
    • Possibility of using a calendar to “sign out” the printer for long prints
    • We used Skedda for things like this during lockdown and still use it on the laser cutter
    • No longer use Skedda
      • (We don’t use the paid version of Skedda anymore. We technically still have the free version but we’ve not yet explored its functionality)
      • Need a new option – Google calendar accessible by everyone?
      • Need to include clean-up time in the thing
        • Resin printer can take 45-60 minutes to clean up
• Cleaning protocols
  • Ultrasonic cleaner training
  • Have a cleaning kit for emergencies/spills
    • Have a UV light handy for things like the inside of the trash can if there’s a spill
• Alisa’s training idea
  • Making a checklist of things that need to be covered during trainings of each tool
• Spencer has suggested finding a better place to put the resin printer where it isn’t in a major pathway between the clean and dirty sides
  • Ventilation is an issue
  • Possibility of putting up signs to remind people not to put stuff down on the counters

Internet issues

• Metamesh is cutting off our outgoing ports on July 22
  • No outside camera access, no services accesses from outside, kills our internal servers, etc
• Two options from Verizon
  • Business account
    • Can forward any ports
    • $250/mo
  • Residential account
    • Cheaper
    • $100/mo
• Rob recommends going for the business account; Board members present at the meeting agree with this
  • We don’t just provide internet access to our shop, we also push it through to the Tot Lot
• Divorcing ourselves from Metamesh will help with the weird backwards network issues we’re having
• Rob has a FIOS router he can donate to the space

Requirement to read minutes

• It’s not written down in any of our rules or policies that people who miss the meetings are actually required to read the minutes afterwards
• Alisa wants there to be a requirement not as an enforceable policy but so that when people ask questions that were already answered in the meeting telling them “It’s in the minutes, go read them” isn’t seen as passive aggressive
  • By not requiring members to read the minutes, many announcements and other important business are missed which can cause problems with the smooth operation of the shop
• In the last minutes Alisa put an easter egg telling people to leave a blue heart if they’ve read the minutes; there were six hearts as of two weeks later
• We will update the new member handbook to say that people who miss meetings are required to read the minutes
  • Already people on tours are being told all of this
• Wiki
  • Normally the minutes for past meetings are put on the Wiki
  • With all of the server issues we’ve been having it’s impossible to upload new minutes
  • Alisa has been posting Word docs directly to the Slack and updating the “topic” to be a link to the most recent upload
    • She will update this now to show all of the most recent meetings that haven’t been put on the Wiki

Member Questions

• Becky wants to put out a personal plea on the Random channel
  • Her dog had a cancer scare today and spent half of her month’s money today on going to the vet
• Because of supply chain issues Rob can’t do the original version of the keyboard-making class until around 2028
  • He’s designing a Raspberry Pi-based keyboard that can be taught as a class

Motion to Adjourn

• Meeting was adjourned at 20:45

Minutes by A.Grishman (talk) 15:15, 23 August 2022 (PDT)