2025-03-05 Transcript

Roll Call: Aaron, Eddie, Nick, Shane, BobW, Ian, Malcolm, Martin, Keith S, Colette, Mark, Edgar

Announcements and Events

• Combat Robotics - May be something at some point, see Discord.
• Radio Group - 2nd Wednesday of every month, 12th March.
• One Shot Wonders - Will be announced on Discord.
• Film Night - Something will be planned. Robot Dreams, sometime?
• Coffee and CAD - Third Wednesday of each month. 19th March.
• WikiCleanup - Third Wednesday of each month. 19th March.
• Hack the Space day - Sunday after Members' Meeting, 9th March.
• Long Shots - 23rd March - First long shot (which is like One Shot Wonders but longer)

Members from Daybrook Men in Sheds will be visiting on the 20th of March (between 10:00 and 15:00) - it might be a bit busy.

There's a "Build an Arduino" workshop on the 30th - it's already fully booked, but there will be more.

Mark is planning to run an "Introduction to Sewing Machines" workshop - build a basic bag, help become comfortable with the machines we have in the space. Covering things like swapping needles etc. May be quite regular until people are feeling more comfortable. Probably no more than 2-3 people at a time.

Eddie is planning to get in touch with the "Boomerang Guy"

Ian mentions that we should start thinking about another Open Day. We originally said we'd do them roughly twice a year, so we better get cracking. Bob suggests it should be at the beginning of the "warm season" 🌞

Actions

Nothing as far as we can tell.

Happenings

Steve ran a robot building workshop today for a work thing. It sounded like people were having fun.

Team Updates

Woodworking

Pallet wood? We'll try and continue this discussion from last time.

Rather than saying it shouldn't be used at all, perhaps we should list the tools pallet wood should not be used.

Bob says we should (in his view) do as much as possible to allow the use of old floor boards and pallet wood. Bob suggests that the new planer should be "decent wood only", and that if we can get the old thicknesser working then it would be appropriate for pallet wood.

Ian mentions that the new thicknesser has individual and replaceable blades, so it is less of an issue in the new thicknesser, but also mentions that he uses a metal detector and a pinpointer - he'd be unhappy if we banned old wood.

Bob says with the circular saw, he doesn't recall there being chipped teeth (an indication of hard foreign objects) - screws is much more of a concern though. There was handheld metal detector at some point in the dusty area.

Bob doesn't recall it working. Ian says we should reiterate that wood should be checked carefully.

Is the issue with sanders breaking etc an issue with foreign objects. Ian would like to run a monthly getting started type workshop. Some ranting about misuse of tools which is too fast to actually minute. In summary though having a quick run-around to show people how to use the machines would be very handy.

Re the pledge drive: It's all setup and working.

Electronics

Pledge drive for new bits went well and everything is setup and working

Membership Team

We still need more people to help out with tours.

Insurance

Shane has made a small presentation.

Last year: 338 This year: 379

That's a 12% insurance, not bad.

Same level of liability. We are unsure as to whether it's a renewal or a new policy. The difficult goes to show it's getting harder to get insurance.

Same protections as before. Only really covers someone getting hurt and taking legal action.

For this to work, we need risk assessments for each activity performed at the space - this is difficult.

It assumes that members are "competent" to perform the activities they are doing.

The insurance does not cover the building, business failure / revenue loss, computer / security risks, and certain legal risks.

If something goes horribly wrong, we would probably close.

It is important for members to think about the risks of the activities they are performing. You should do your risk assessment if it's something not covered by the existing ones.

A couple of things which are new:

• Portable heaters are specifically mentioned. We might install a few more IR heaters which have a card reader and also covers the cost of running them. The IR heaters are allowed because they are all wall mounted.
• If there's welding happening, there has to be a one hour cool down period. The area has to be monitored by "someone" (your responsibility though) for at least one hour.

We are also looking into trustee insurance "Directory and Officer Insurance" - this is because trustees are liable to an extent. This insurance would help cover legal costs if that ever became necessary. That doesn't mean we can get away with anything, but it does reduce the individual risk. It's a decent amount, £112. The board thinks this is worth it though.

The only other official member of the "team" is the treasurer (Hi Matt), which may not be covered by the trustee insurance.

(Emily has joined)

We also spoke a bit about our new Lone Working policy.

Financial Update

Generally things are ok. Membership payments alone do not cover our outgoings - snackspace credit helps support this, but for example with paying for insurance this month, we have likely made a loss. Average membership payment is roughly £8.50 and this needs to be a bit higher really.

Ian asked about whether this is due to membership falling, or increased in costs, and this is definitely the latter. Rent went up, cleaning fee went up, blah blah blah. Lots of things have gone up unfortunately.

Any Other Business

Downstairs - is there an update on downstairs metalworking? There is a draft plan, hopefully we will know more soon.

Is there an update about the Warco? We haven't heard yet, they are probably on a ship somewhere.

Meeting Closed