Harry Maylor VE6HRY, Vice President

Hello Members. Well it’s my turn to send out the monthly Key Klix message, so I put away the Halloween gear and sent in an actual photo of my mug. Preparing these messages is a challenge for us Directors and I will share with you my cheat. Thanks to people like Ken Oelke, VE6AFO and his predecessors, Key Klix archives go back nearly sixty years to 1964. I cull through the archives of a decade or two for March and see a common theme which helps inspire me in which direction I should go. March is the cusp of spring and often people engage in spring cleaning which is my direction for March 2021.

As a club we need spring cleaning in so many ways. We the Board Members have been spring cleaning since last March when the lockdown hit. Over this past year different groups in the club have been working at cleaning their projects and plans. Cleaning is not always physical cleaning but can be cleaning up plans or just decluttering.

One of our Boards most puzzling cleaning tasks has been the clubs tube bank. Yes the club has a tube bank and it’s huge. There are thousands of tubes in about 45 boxes that we keep for members to use if needed. Jerry Spring VE6TL for some time now has been our tube bank curator and did a great job storing the collection. At one point we thought we should just purge the tubes but what if they have value? How does one go about sorting so many tubes? We have had a few opinions on the value of the tubes and due to the fact there could be value in those boxes nothing has been done with the tubes. The problem however is storing these tubes, which President Cason has temporarily taken on.  Storing things goes hand in hand with spring cleaning.

Just before lockdown the members came together and cleaned out the storage locker the club rents. We purged a large amount of antiquated and outdated gear then moved even more gear to the clubhouse. Unfortunately the lockdown hit and we had placed the valued stuff upstairs which is not our space. Many months later we finally got all the stuff under the stairs thanks to Dave our President. Some of the treasures we store are things like struts for a car?? Regardless we pay $1200 a year for storage and the board is working on many fronts to try and eliminate that expense. If we did some spring cleaning again perhaps we could truly empty the locker once and for all. The locker currently is in great shape as I stopped by and was relieved to see how tidy things are there. I’m sure the state of the locker is in no small part due to our new lifetime member Robert Wilson.

We as HAM radio folk are pack rats it’s just in our nature. I as a mechanic have the pack rat bug very badly. It kills me to need a part and think oh I had one of those but threw it out just the other day. The real problem comes when storing things for someday uses cost more money than the thing is actually worth. I have had to harden my resolve when it comes to purging stuff and I think Rob relies on it for the disposal end of our clubs cleaning.

Perhaps there are treasures in the pile and we should save them but we would end up with this for a storage locker.  Another light at the end of the tunnel for our clubs storage is the work going into the disposal process guideline. 

Thanks to Jack and Rob a great number of items were moved on to new homes. Jack and Dave sorted out the process guidelines and it looks like future estates donated will be dealt with quickly and fairly. 

I recommend each member and group take on the task of spring cleaning and searching for those things that just are taking up space. Once you have purged the old junk you will have so much room for new junk. NOT! Well I hope you get the idea and look forward to one day when we can get together again in person and have a flea market to sell stuff and find new stuff to store.