| NIHRAC (K3YGG) NIH Building 13 Room G-903 Bethesda, MD 20892 |
Emergency Communications Center NIH Building 11 Room 308 phone: 301 496-5311 |
NIHRAC Web site http://nihrac.od.nih.gov
NIHRAC Email address nihrac@k3ygg.ampr.org
The meeting was called to order by Vice President Larry Martin at noon at the Center for Devices and Radiological Health (CDRH/FDA) in Rockville, MD. A brief business meeting was held before touring the labs and hearing about the activities of CDRH. The minutes of the December 3, 1998 meeting were accepted as distributed.
Members attending the meeting included Ed Gordon KB3DBX, Bill Hook W3QBC, Larry Martin W3IBO, Frank Putnam N3ZPQ, Dan Reggia N3ENT, Chuck Sherman N3WTO, Trent Smith KQ6ID, Al Taylor KN3U, Tom Vegella K1FEX and Bryan West K2BW.
Following a mention at the December 3 meeting an expression of interest was received in hearing a recording of the various types of digital and other strange sounding signals heard on the ham bands. Bill Hook volunteered to attempt this and will use a video camera to make the recordings. The tape will be played at a future NIHRAC meeting.
Another topic suggested for discussion at future meetings was a review of the equipment and facilities available to NIHRAC. To assist in cataloging these, the listing of NIHRAC Projects that was distributed in 1997 has been updated through 1998 and will be posted on the NIHRAC Web site. This document also lists club activities planned for 1998.
Albert Lock has advised that during a recent safety inspection of Building 11 it was noted by Wayne French, DES Safety Officer, that one or more of the ropes used to guy our new R-7000 vertical HF antenna presented a hazard to persons working on the roof. Albert, Chuck Sherman and Tom Vegella are looking at ways to solve the problem. No action is presently planned to straighten the slight bowing of the vertical element. It was suggested that the assistance of an antenna professional be sought to do this. Ways to fund the work were discussed.
Tom Vegella announced that a temporary storage space has been made available at the CDRH for certain DMAT equipment. This presently includes the PHS-1 DMAT 2 m packet station and a YAESU FT-8100R 2 m/70 cm FM transceiver.
According to the NIHRAC Constitution, "Candidates for election of officers shall be placed in nomination at the February meeting and shall be elected at the March meeting". In the absence of the President the Vice President appointed Dan Reggia, Andy Mitz and Bill Hook to serve as a Nominating Committee to provide a slate of candidates to be presented at the February meeting.
Al Taylor is looking for someone who can mimic the voice of a parrot for a recording to be part of a for-fun electronic project. Call Al at home (301) 762-7798 for an audition.
The NIHRAC President has been contacted by the Emergency Planning Coordinator who asked for our help in updating their Disaster Preparedness Plan and our participation in a major NIH Disaster Planning Exercise to be held later this year. Andy Mitz has volunteered to assist in coordinating NIHRAC’s efforts for the event.
We are sad to report the death at age 85 of past member Sarah Knutti N3CGZ who was an active member of NIHRAC and the Coast Guard Auxiliary during her career at NIH. She retired from NICHHD in 1974 as the Assistant Director for Program Planning and Evaluation.
The meeting was adjourned at 12:20 p.m. After the meeting Don (Skip) Witters, CDRH Biomedical Engineer and Physicist, presented an informative talk about RF interference to medical devices and led a tour of the Rockville facility.
Sources of RF under consideration are cellular telephones, HTs, mobile radios, UHF digital TV signals, anti-theft devices and computers (including furbies!). Potential targets for interference include hearing aids, ventilators, automatically firing defibrillators and motorized wheelchairs.
Stops on the tour included three different types of anechoic chambers used to eliminate RF reflections during testing. Most measurements are being made in the 80 MHz to 2 GHz portion of the spectrum. Effects from 150 and 450 MHz signals have been found to be especially troublesome. Differing characteristics of the electromagnetic (primarily near-field) vs. the electrostatic components of RF were mentioned.
NIHRAC members expressed their thanks to Don Witters for an excellent introduction to the subject in a way that was of special interest to radio amateurs. Tom Vegella was thanked for arranging our visit.
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