HacDC Wiki - User contributions [en]

Regular Member Meeting 2018 12 18

2018-12-19T00:56:46Z

Summakor: /* Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique */ asdf

Regular Member Meeting 2018 12 18

2018-12-19T00:55:38Z

Summakor: /* Project CRISPR -Enrique */ asdf

Regular Member Meeting 2018 12 18

2018-12-19T00:54:11Z

Summakor: Created page with "Category:Meeting Minutes {{TOCright}} == Time and Location == :Date :Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx :Members present: :Members remote: :Others present: :[[Quorum]..."

Items Borrowed from the HacDC Space

2018-12-08T14:54:43Z

Summakor:

''Add new entries to the top of the list!''

December 2018 - [[User:Summakor]] 
Borrowed the FLIR One for Android infrared imager. Should be returned by mid/late December.

March 2018 - [[User:l_wl]] 
Borrowed Hacdc posters (now returned). Borrowed the thermometer gun (now returned, with new batteries no-less). Borrowed several slack lines (will return these after I take a few cool videos of me slack lineing).

January 2018 - [[User:l_wl]] 
Borrowed Power Mac G5 to conduct repairs on. Will share a video on its current state and improvments.

8 December 2017 - [[User:tom|tom]] 
I've borrowed the dolly and the heatgun, need to return them both.
returned by May 2018 -t

March 2017 - [[l_wl)]] 
Borrowed an LCD screen for use as an additional monitor at home. I took one LCD screen (that had VGA inputs) and replaced it with another LCD screen (quite similar to the one I took, but possibly lower in quality) (as this one had HDMI inputs - that my PC can't handle.). I have also brought an additional small monitor to the space (March 2018). [Could some let me know if this suffices?]

30 August 2017 - [[User:mirage335|mirage335]] 
Biosignal amplifier was returned a long time ago, hopefully it will be treated well. Non-flyable quadcopter, legos, high-power audio amps were also returned long ago, though the seem not to be in the space at present. Also, have been borrowing stick welder, both in hopes of testing it, and to keep it out of the way of basement cleanup projects. Need for high-current 240V service has held up that project.

27 September 2016 - [[User:ewaldo|Ethan Waldo]] 
USRP1 for Spaceblimp communications experimentation

1 July 2016 - [[User:Tom|Tom Iddings]] 
Borrowed a Dell D620 to put GNU/Hurd on it because it seemed like a good use for it. Maybe we can use it for an experimental OS development project?

17 May 2016 - [[User:ewaldo|Ethan Waldo]] 
Borrowed Altera DE2-115 to assist in further developing [[:Category:OpticalTableRobot|OpticalTableRobot]]

10 February 2016 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Borrowed T43 laptop used to drive pen plotter and remaining biosignal amplifier development components.

14 October 2015 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Borrowed miniVNA and extender to calibrate and optimally point a moderately-directional wideband antenna. EDIT: Returned a long time ago.

16 September 2015 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Temporarily storing a bunch of stuff from HacDC, to relieve some of the temporary storage pressure during the move. Most prominently,our biosignal amplifier, a bunch of high-power audio amps, a couple non-flyable quadcopters, a RC hovercraft toy, a telescope, some more legos, some toy night-vision goggles, the NI myDAQ/myDSP, and some IP cams. Will return upon request, hopefully sooner. Hopefully most of this stuff (ie. biosignal amplifier audio amps, IP cams, myDAQ/myDSP, etc) will be immediately integrated into the new classroom soon after the move. EDIT: NI myDAQ/myDSP returned along time ago. Returned the telescope, night-vision goggles, and IP cams.

11 June 2015 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Returned label printer, which is not useful without a special adapter cable among other things. Borrowed a bag of legos and empty microscope head for optical prototyping and photolithography experiments. Most Legos will probably be returning after replacement by 3D printed parts. Will return upon request.

27 March 2015 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Long-term borrowed amphibious RC car, power-line monitor, and label printer. Will return upon request.

17 March 2015 - [[User:Wa1ivd|wa1ivd]] 
Borrow Tektronix 2212 ser. H701215 from basement for Ultimate3S project, will return if needed.

10 March 2015 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Returned remaining screwdrivers and such. Borrowed an average oscilloscope, and low-end function generator long term, will return upon request or when tolerance for their existance at the space improves (eg. for a class event). Also borrowed one of the several wire-wrapping tools recent discovered.

3 March 2014 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
USRP, related radio gear (some of which was built by me), wire, low-quality soldering iron, 2.4GHz R/C transmitter/receiver pair. Attempting to set up ham radio antenna at new QTH. Additionally, going to try repairing a model R/C plane with the R/C transmitter/receiver pair. Will return unused radio gear and supplies to HacDC when done, and donate for anything used. EDIT: Have returned some of the supplies as of 3/28/2014. Still borrowing USRP and soldering iron. RC plane may be able to use R/C transmitter/receiver pair if given new servomotors. Also borrowed a pair of decent pilers and wire cutters. EDIT: Borrowed SMT tweezers as of 4/14/2014, since my own set may not be adequate for an urgent project. Also borrowed M3 screwdriver bit. EDIT: Also borrowed soldering iron tip, while waiting on RMA from two other tips. Will probably bring back with some of the other materials within a week or two, time-ultra-critical project still underway. EDIT: Have returned almost everything. Still occasionally borrowing a few screwdrivers and other non-critical items, as some of my own have failed.

30 December 2013 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Prusa Mendel, and associated hardware. Minor repairs in progress, ETA return Thursday, January 2, 2014. EDIT: Returned Saturday, January 4, 2014. Performance and reliability vastly improved.

12 November 2013 - [[User:Nootrope|nootrope]] 
hackerspaces.org banner for Smithsonian X 3D Conference 2013

October 20, 2013 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
<del>Level and steel railing, for construction evaluation.</del> Returned.

14 August 2013 - [[User:Drwho|The Doctor]] 
* <del>Macbook Pro (for Byzantium development)</del> (returned Nov 2013)

April 21, 2013 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Prusa Mendel, PLA feedstock, M3 screws, some tape, some tools. Emergency maintenance in progress, ETA return Thursday, April 24, 2013. EDIT: Returned a while ago, seems the information was lost on wiki.

April 4, 2013 - [[User:Nocko|nocko]] 
Diligent Spartan-3E Starter Board (Labeled HacDC #12). I want to see if the SUMP logic analyser HDL can be modified and installed on this board.

December 18, 2012 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Project Salvage components. Most should become valuable electronic test equipment at HacDC and absolutely must not be trashed. EDIT: Returned a while ago to the test cart. Connectorization of some parts (eg. mixers) still progressing.

July 21, 2012 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
Borrowing Ham radio gear this weekend, as described in the previous struck through entry. EDIT: Returned. Awesome data obtained.

June 29, 2012 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
<s>Borrowing Ham radio gear tomorrow. Specifically, IC-718 radio, antenna tuner, RF power meter, balun (if available), PSU, some feedline, some wire, and a measuring tape (if >12'). Will also borrow some of my own objects at the space, specifically a UPS (for its 12V battery) and a magnetic loop antenna. Leaving my name and number on the ham radio cart in case anyone needs the radio or has questions. This is exclusively for the purpose of diagnosing HacDC's ham radio issues as documented on the mailing list.</s> Postponed due to severe weather and power disruption. Radio not borrowed yet.

May 30, 2012 - [[User:Mirage335|mirage335]] 
- Ancient (20 years+) semi-working AM/FM/WB/CB radio.
Found in basement. AM function never worked, in sorry shape, needs repair, so I'm going to try repairing it as far as possible. Will be back at the space in ~2 weeks. EDIT: Returned. After mostly mechanical repairs, AM, FM, CB functions work well.

April 2012 - [[User:Tslagle]] 
- IBM Thinkpad T43 laptop from David Whiteis. Wiped, installed Windows 7 and MATLAB on it, used it for USA Science & Engineering Fest booth demo ("Mug Plot")

18:00, 29, January 2011 (PST) - [[User:Williamgibb|Williamgibb]]
- Stanford Research Systems DG535 Pulse Generator

20:30, 1314, November 2010 (PST) - [[User:Williamgibb|Williamgibb]]
- Digilent FX2 Expansion board for Spartan3E FPGA Starter Kit.

17:20, 13 July 2010 (UTC) - [[User:DLotts|DLotts]]
- One OLPC XO with charge cord. It calls itself HacDC OLPC #3.

December 15, 2009 - [[User:timball|timball]]
- one black soldering iron + stand

[[User:DLotts|DLotts]] 08:41, 29 October 2009 (UTC)
- A230 Micro Game Station with labeled problem: "Raster screen" AKA white screen of death with stripes.

June 2, 2009 - Derek Cooper - 
- Infrared night vision goggles 

June 2, 2009 - David Lotts - 
- Infrared night vision goggles (EyeClops) 

June 2, 2009 - [[User:Drwho|The Doctor]] - 
- Infrared night vision goggles 
'cause, you know, all the cool kids were doing it. 
I discovered that the unit I borrowed is flaky - after a few seconds of wearing it while powered up the display flickers and goes dead. I think that the cable leading from the power pack to the visor has a bad connection. When I get time I'll tear this one down and see if I can repair it. 

January 13, 2009 - Derek Cooper - 
- CEN-TECH Digital Multimeter (red) Item#90899 

December 22, 2008 - [[User:Myself|Nate]] - 
JC Penney component stereo cassette deck 

 Nov 13, 2008 Mac G4 usb keyboards (x2) - member28 

August 7, 2008 - [[User:Ben|Ben]] 
- Beginning Electronics book

July 25, 2008 - Q (andrew@i11industries.com) - 

June 30, 2008 - Q (andrew@i11industries.com) - 
- 1x Digital Multimeter (Yellow) 

June 19, 2008 - Richard Bewley (rbewley@gmail.com) - Not Returned / Outstanding 
- 1x Lineman's handset

June 1, 2008 - Tino (oberoc@yahoo.com) - 
Small Form Factor PCs book 

<h2>Items Returned to the HacDC Space</h2>

June 15, 2008 - Tino (oberoc@yahoo.com) - 
Small Form Factor PCs book 

July 25, 2008 - Q (andrew@i11industries.com) - 
- Reflow Station 

[[Category:Materiel]]
[[Category:EverydayPolicy]]

Workshop Lessons Learned

2018-09-18T23:53:33Z

Summakor: added a period as a test of the wiki edit

This page was started by [[User:Katie]] after [http://hacdc.org/content/soft-circuits-led-cuff-workshop the LED Cuff workshop] to record her thoughts about potential improvements, but anyone is welcome to contribute to it.

== General Lessons Learned. ==

These tips apply to any workshop held at HacDC or a similar hackerspace.

* If attendees need to register, make it more than obvious that they do.
* Limit participation to about a dozen people so as not to overcrowd the space. Hold multiple sessions if needed to accommodate people.
* Bring extra materials and tools -- participants will lose track of things, especially small things, or want to start over with a fresh whatever-it-is.
* Signs posted in the building directing people to HacDC are a good thing.
* Only give kits to folks who registered.
** Was there anyone who registered and showed up who didn't receive a kit? I thought I had struck a good compromise between fairness and efficiency by giving no-shows' kits to walk-in participants a little while after the workshop started. - [[User:Katie|Katie]] 02:20, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

== LED Cuff-specific Lessons Learned ==

These tips apply specifically to the LED Cuff workshop.

* The [http://www.sparklab.la/bracelet/tutorial_wearablelight.pdf instructions] could use a good diagram of the layout of everything in and on the cuff.
* Ditch the velcro, which is too hard to sew by hand, in favor of snaps or something like that.
* Bring a seam ripper for fixing mistakes.
* A standard hole punch will jam and possibly break when you use it to abuse leather or other leather-like material.
* [http://www.lc-led.com/View/itemNumber/129 These LEDs] may be cheaper.
** For the workshop we got the LEDs for $.65 each through Digikey. Looks like the ones above are actually more expensive. - [[User:Katie|Katie]] 18:28, 23 September 2009 (UTC)
* Turning the legs of the battery holder out away from the center of the holder seemed to hold them to the fabric better than turning them in. Cutting off the plastic posts on the bottom of the battery holder kept it closer to the fabric. These [http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/product_info.php?products_id=8822 sewable] battery holders may have been more expensive but easier for this project.

[[Category:Event_Planning]]

Regular Member Meeting 2018 06 12

2018-06-19T23:42:38Z

Summakor: /* Member Reports */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==

=== Group equipment purchase proposal from District Makers' Collective ===

LIZ Dombrowski, Board President of the [http://www.districtmakerscollective.org/ District Makers Collective] writes:

: So we heard from JBG Smith that they're selling Techshop's equipment. Here's the message they sent one of our members:

:: ''"Given the sheer amount of equipment in the space and the challenge of administering a piecemeal disposition to various buyers, we are only accepting bids from firms who can purchase and remove the equipment."''

: We're not in the position to buy that much equipment financially, so we're setting up a coalition of local makerspaces to see if we could pool our resources. We're also planning to work with our members to do an aggressive fundraising blitz. '''We know we need to move quickly.'''

: Would you be interested in joining with District Makers Collective? It would be awesome to see Techshop's equipment split among the DMV's local makerspaces.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) - Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
Ten words: "This kit includes everything you need to genetically modify frogs."
Also, no.
Spoke to Sarah from BUGSS and they might be interested in building DIY bio equipment at/with HacDC. For example, the gel electrophresis imager to compare DNA strand lengths, maybe a PCR machine to multiply/amplify DNA. Not sure who at HacDC is really interested though - let me know. No other progress to report. The existing CRISPR fridge is not cold enough to store reagents, although it can store fresh petri dishes and some reagents.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===
Our Global Space Balloon Challenge entry did not win the prize but it's pretty nice. Here's the document:
[[Media:Spaceblimp7_HackersSLS_GSBC-Report.pdf]]
Several key team members are busy until later in July so no launch plans for SB 8 (might be 7B, long story). Please let us know if you'd like to join the group at spaceblimp@hacdc.og

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==
Enrique. Note that our CFC application was denied due to some discrepancy in the number of board or voting members on the form. We have until Thursday to appeal. I'll help or work on this but will need to get in touch with Tayeb or Karen to get it submitted.

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

Regular Member Meeting 2018 06 12

2018-06-19T23:40:33Z

Summakor: /* Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==

=== Group equipment purchase proposal from District Makers' Collective ===

LIZ Dombrowski, Board President of the [http://www.districtmakerscollective.org/ District Makers Collective] writes:

: So we heard from JBG Smith that they're selling Techshop's equipment. Here's the message they sent one of our members:

:: ''"Given the sheer amount of equipment in the space and the challenge of administering a piecemeal disposition to various buyers, we are only accepting bids from firms who can purchase and remove the equipment."''

: We're not in the position to buy that much equipment financially, so we're setting up a coalition of local makerspaces to see if we could pool our resources. We're also planning to work with our members to do an aggressive fundraising blitz. '''We know we need to move quickly.'''

: Would you be interested in joining with District Makers Collective? It would be awesome to see Techshop's equipment split among the DMV's local makerspaces.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) - Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
Ten words: "This kit includes everything you need to genetically modify frogs."
Also, no.
Spoke to Sarah from BUGSS and they might be interested in building DIY bio equipment at/with HacDC. For example, the gel electrophresis imager to compare DNA strand lengths, maybe a PCR machine to multiply/amplify DNA. Not sure who at HacDC is really interested though - let me know. No other progress to report. The existing CRISPR fridge is not cold enough to store reagents, although it can store fresh petri dishes and some reagents.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===
Our Global Space Balloon Challenge entry did not win the prize but it's pretty nice. Here's the document:
[[Media:Spaceblimp7_HackersSLS_GSBC-Report.pdf]]
Several key team members are busy until later in July so no launch plans for SB 8 (might be 7B, long story). Please let us know if you'd like to join the group at spaceblimp@hacdc.og

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

Regular Member Meeting 2018 06 12

2018-06-19T04:56:26Z

Summakor: /* Project CRISPR -Enrique */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==

=== Group equipment purchase proposal from District Makers' Collective ===

LIZ Dombrowski, Board President of the [http://www.districtmakerscollective.org/ District Makers Collective] writes:

: So we heard from JBG Smith that they're selling Techshop's equipment. Here's the message they sent one of our members:

:: ''"Given the sheer amount of equipment in the space and the challenge of administering a piecemeal disposition to various buyers, we are only accepting bids from firms who can purchase and remove the equipment."''

: We're not in the position to buy that much equipment financially, so we're setting up a coalition of local makerspaces to see if we could pool our resources. We're also planning to work with our members to do an aggressive fundraising blitz. '''We know we need to move quickly.'''

: Would you be interested in joining with District Makers Collective? It would be awesome to see Techshop's equipment split among the DMV's local makerspaces.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) - Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
Ten words: "This kit includes everything you need to genetically modify frogs."
Also, no.
Spoke to Sarah from BUGSS and they might be interested in building DIY bio equipment at/with HacDC. For example, the gel electrophresis imager to compare DNA strand lengths, maybe a PCR machine to multiply/amplify DNA. Not sure who at HacDC is really interested though - let me know. No other progress to report. The existing CRISPR fridge is not cold enough to store reagents, although it can store fresh petri dishes and some reagents.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===
Our Global Space Balloon Challenge entry did not win the prize but it's pretty nice. Here's the document:
Spaceblimp7_HackersSLS_GSBC-Report.pdf
Several key team members are busy until later in July so no launch plans for SB 8 (might be 7B, long story). Please let us know if you'd like to join the group at spaceblimp@hacdc.og

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

Regular Member Meeting 2018 06 12

2018-06-19T04:54:37Z

Summakor: /* Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==

=== Group equipment purchase proposal from District Makers' Collective ===

LIZ Dombrowski, Board President of the [http://www.districtmakerscollective.org/ District Makers Collective] writes:

: So we heard from JBG Smith that they're selling Techshop's equipment. Here's the message they sent one of our members:

:: ''"Given the sheer amount of equipment in the space and the challenge of administering a piecemeal disposition to various buyers, we are only accepting bids from firms who can purchase and remove the equipment."''

: We're not in the position to buy that much equipment financially, so we're setting up a coalition of local makerspaces to see if we could pool our resources. We're also planning to work with our members to do an aggressive fundraising blitz. '''We know we need to move quickly.'''

: Would you be interested in joining with District Makers Collective? It would be awesome to see Techshop's equipment split among the DMV's local makerspaces.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) - Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
Ten words: "This kit includes everything you need to genetically modify frogs."
Also, no.
Spoke to Sarah from BUGSS and they might be interested in building DIY bio equipment at/with HacDC. For example, the gel chromatography thing and imager to compare DNA strand lengths, maybe a PCR machine to multiply/amplify DNA. Not sure who at HacDC is really interested though. No other progress to report. The existing CRISPR fridge is not cold enough to store reagents, although it can store fresh petri dishes and some reagents.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===
Our Global Space Balloon Challenge entry did not win the prize but it's pretty nice. Here's the document:
Spaceblimp7_HackersSLS_GSBC-Report.pdf
Several key team members are busy until later in July so no launch plans for SB 8 (might be 7B, long story). Please let us know if you'd like to join the group at spaceblimp@hacdc.og

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

File:Spaceblimp7 HackersSLS GSBC-Report.pdf

2018-06-19T04:53:00Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 (teams Hackers SLS) Global Space Balloon Challenge report.

Spaceblimp 7 (teams Hackers SLS) Global Space Balloon Challenge report.

Regular Member Meeting 2018 06 12

2018-06-19T04:48:20Z

Summakor: /* Project CRISPR -Enrique */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==

=== Group equipment purchase proposal from District Makers' Collective ===

LIZ Dombrowski, Board President of the [http://www.districtmakerscollective.org/ District Makers Collective] writes:

: So we heard from JBG Smith that they're selling Techshop's equipment. Here's the message they sent one of our members:

:: ''"Given the sheer amount of equipment in the space and the challenge of administering a piecemeal disposition to various buyers, we are only accepting bids from firms who can purchase and remove the equipment."''

: We're not in the position to buy that much equipment financially, so we're setting up a coalition of local makerspaces to see if we could pool our resources. We're also planning to work with our members to do an aggressive fundraising blitz. '''We know we need to move quickly.'''

: Would you be interested in joining with District Makers Collective? It would be awesome to see Techshop's equipment split among the DMV's local makerspaces.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) - Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
Ten words: "This kit includes everything you need to genetically modify frogs."
Also, no.
Spoke to Sarah from BUGSS and they might be interested in building DIY bio equipment at/with HacDC. For example, the gel chromatography thing and imager to compare DNA strand lengths, maybe a PCR machine to multiply/amplify DNA. Not sure who at HacDC is really interested though. No other progress to report. The existing CRISPR fridge is not cold enough to store reagents, although it can store fresh petri dishes and some reagents.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===

- Report and updates

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-05-07T02:18:54Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ no accel

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

'''For all plots below, Flight Time (sec) was obtained by dividing evenly among all timestamps between 15:00:00 and 18:00:00 UTC. However, 18:00 UTC should actually read 18:30 UTC (see glitch below). In addition, this method hides the uneven distribution of data collection especially in accelerometer data. In reality this was acquired in bursts at 40Hz.'''

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.'''

At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script. The glitch matches an unusually turbulent segment in the accelerometer data but the readings don't seem harmful (+/-0.1g at 1Hz). Far more turbulence occurred several minutes later during the ascent (+/-0.2g 1Hz), during the descent (+/-0.5g >2Hz) and during the landing (+/-2.0g) with no corresponding malfunctions.

The most turbulent part of the ascent (+/-0.2g at 1 Hz) occurred several minutes later and during the decent

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

'''Temperature'''

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC* (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

'''Illumination'''

Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

'''Blueishness'''

I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''

In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

=Accelerometer Data=
The ascent phase was gentle with excursions of +/- 0.2g. There's no indication of an acceleration anomaly just prior to the glitch. The balloon pop occurs near 17:12:19* UTC where the total acceleration suddenly drops from 1.0g to below 0.1g for several seconds. Terminal velocity is approached very quickly as within 10 seconds the payload registers an average of about 1.0g again.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1* UTC.

Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7* UTC.

Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5* UTC.

First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.**

*Timestamps after 164737 are slow by 30 minutes due to a glitch (see glitch discussion above). 171200 corresponds to 17:42 UTC.

**Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

=System Logs=

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-05-07T02:18:24Z

Summakor: logs

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

'''For all plots below, Flight Time (sec) was obtained by dividing evenly among all timestamps between 15:00:00 and 18:00:00 UTC. However, 18:00 UTC should actually read 18:30 UTC (see glitch below). In addition, this method hides the uneven distribution of data collection especially in accelerometer data. In reality this was acquired in bursts at 40Hz.'''

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.'''

At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script. The glitch matches an unusually turbulent segment in the accelerometer data but the readings don't seem harmful (+/-0.1g at 1Hz). Far more turbulence occurred several minutes later during the ascent (+/-0.2g 1Hz), during the descent (+/-0.5g >2Hz) and during the landing (+/-2.0g) with no corresponding malfunctions.

The most turbulent part of the ascent (+/-0.2g at 1 Hz) occurred several minutes later and during the decent

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

'''Temperature'''

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC* (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

'''Illumination'''

Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

'''Blueishness'''

I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''

In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

=Accelerometer Data=
The ascent phase was gentle with excursions of +/- 0.2g. There's no indication of an acceleration anomaly just prior to the glitch. The balloon pop occurs near 17:12:19* UTC where the total acceleration suddenly drops from 1.0g to below 0.1g for several seconds. Terminal velocity is approached very quickly as within 10 seconds the payload registers an average of about 1.0g again.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1* UTC.

Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7* UTC.

Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5* UTC.

First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.**

*Timestamps after 164737 are slow by 30 minutes due to a glitch (see glitch discussion above). 171200 corresponds to 17:42 UTC.

**Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

=System Logs=

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T23:38:32Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ timestamp warning

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

'''For all plots below, Flight Time (sec) was obtained by dividing evenly among all timestamps between 15:00:00 and 18:00:00 UTC. However, 18:00 UTC should actually read 18:30 UTC (see glitch below). In addition, this method hides the uneven distribution of data collection especially in accelerometer data. In reality this was acquired in bursts at 40Hz.'''

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.'''

At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script. The glitch matches an unusually turbulent segment in the accelerometer data but the readings don't seem harmful (+/-0.1g at 1Hz). Far more turbulence occurred several minutes later during the ascent (+/-0.2g 1Hz), during the descent (+/-0.5g >2Hz) and during the landing (+/-2.0g) with no corresponding malfunctions.

The most turbulent part of the ascent (+/-0.2g at 1 Hz) occurred several minutes later and during the decent

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

'''Temperature'''

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

'''Illumination'''

Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

'''Blueishness'''

I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''

In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

'''Accelerometer Data'''
The ascent phase was gentle with excursions of +/- 0.2g. There's no indication of an acceleration anomaly just prior to the glitch. The balloon pop occurs near 17:12:19 UTC where the total acceleration suddenly drops from 1.0g to below 0.1g for several seconds. Terminal velocity is approached very quickly as within 10 seconds the payload registers an average of about 1.0g again.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1 UTC.

Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7 UTC.

Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5 UTC.

First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.*

*Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T23:31:11Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ da

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script. The glitch matches an unusually turbulent segment in the accelerometer data but the readings don't seem harmful (+/-0.1g at 1Hz). Far more turbulence occurred several minutes later during the ascent (+/-0.2g 1Hz), during the descent (+/-0.5g >2Hz) and during the landing (+/-2.0g) with no corresponding malfunctions.

The most turbulent part of the ascent (+/-0.2g at 1 Hz) occurred several minutes later and during the decent

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''
In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

'''Accelerometer Data'''
The ascent phase was gentle with excursions of +/- 0.2g. There's no indication of an acceleration anomaly just prior to the glitch. The balloon pop occurs near 17:12:19 UTC where the total acceleration suddenly drops from 1.0g to below 0.1g for several seconds. Terminal velocity is approached very quickly as within 10 seconds the payload registers an average of about 1.0g again.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1 UTC.

Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7 UTC.

Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5 UTC.

First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.*

*Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T23:18:39Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ asdf

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script.

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''
In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

'''Accelerometer Data'''
The ascent phase was gentle with excursions of +/- 0.2g. There's no indication of an acceleration anomaly just prior to the glitch. The balloon pop occurs near 17:12:19 UTC where the total acceleration suddenly drops from 1.0g to below 0.1g for several seconds. Terminal velocity is approached very quickly as within 10 seconds the payload registers an average of about 1.0g again.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1 UTC.

Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7 UTC.

Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5 UTC.

First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.*

*Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T22:50:23Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ accel

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script.

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''
In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30.5 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

Minimum Pressure: 1685Pa at 17:11:56.1 UTC.
Peak Temperature: 36.25C at 17:12:10.7 UTC.
Last '~1G' Data: 1.07g at 17:12:18.5 UTC.
First 'Zero-G' Data: 0.1g at 17:12:19.1 UTC.*

*Note the the sequence is 1.07, 1.75, 1.70, -0.06, 0.10g in a span of 0.6 seconds.

[[File:Sb7Accelg_pop_ftime.png]]

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

File:Sb7Accelg pop ftime.png

2018-04-27T22:50:02Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Accelerometer data (total XYZ) at Balloon Pop

Spaceblimp 7 Accelerometer data (total XYZ) at Balloon Pop

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T22:26:13Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ asdf

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script.

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

'''Delay between measurements'''
In principle all measurements should take the same amount of time, although some scatter is expected from the script swapping between fast accelerometer data (about 10 seconds worth) and environmental sensor data (measured every few seconds). The Raspberry Pi Zero was also tasked with photographing another payload every 60 seconds or so, an operation that could hog the CPU or the microSD card momentarily. These should be regular, consistent delays throughout the flight.

The timestamp differential between measurements is largely binomial; the measurements are either 21 or 27ms apart although there's significant scatter even up to 55ms.

The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

The '''glitch''' is visible in this data as well, as a statistical change in the measurement delay times: the fastest measurements (20.1-20.5ms) became more common than they were before. This changed lasted the remaining duration of the flight. The increased measurement delays exactly at the glitch time (6336 flight seconds or 16:48:30 UTC) are consistent with the script running while boot processes are still momentarily running after a reboot.

[[File:Sb7Delay_ftime.png]]

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

File:Sb7Delay ftime.png

2018-04-27T21:58:44Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Accelerometer Measurement Delay Flight Time

Spaceblimp 7 Accelerometer Measurement Delay Flight Time

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T21:52:45Z

Summakor: /* Environmental & Accelerometer Data */ fx

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script.

[[File:Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

Delay between measurements
The timestamp differential between measurements is binomial; the measurements are either 1.9 - 2.1 seconds apart or 42 seconds. The latter is an analysis artifact as the minute rolls over (jump from 60 to 02) that I need to fix. Besides that, beginning at 4,076 seconds some measurements are much closer together, as close as 0.06 seconds apart, with a clear and weird trend… This may be correlated to the light intensity data. I don’t really have an explanation. The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T21:51:33Z

Summakor: asdf

[[Image: Sb7_peak.jpg | 800px ]]

=Flight Summary=
[[Image: Sb7_flight_path.jpg | 750px ]]
{| {{Prettytable|width=557px}}
!align="right"| Date of launch:
| Saturday, April 14, 2018
|-
!align="right"| Time of launch:
| 11:08
|-
!align="right"| Time of landing:
| 14:30
|-
!align="right"| Time of recovery:
| ~17:15
|-
!align="right"| Flight duration:
| 3:22:00
|-
!align="right"| Peak recorded altitude:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Location of launch:
| Strasburg VA, (38 59'48.77"N 78 21'03.27"W)
|-
!align="right"| Location of landing:
| Manchester MD, (39 40'33.6"N 76 44'03.9"W)
|-
!align="right"| Distance (launch to landing):
| 98.3 mi, (158.2 km)
|-
!align="right"| Balloon type:
| 1500 g Kaymont
|-
!align="right"| Payload weight:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Balloon lift:
| TBD
|-
!align="right"| Net lift:
| TBD
|}
----

=Project Description & Status=

Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

=Project Goals=
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

=Flight Summary=

After two weather-related postponements, launch took place on Saturday April 14, 2018, at Strasburg VA. Spaceblimp 7 was launched from Shopping Center Drive in Strasburg, VA and was recovered just outside of Pretty Boy Reservoir in Manchester, MD, just south of the Pennsylvania border. As indicated by the recorded track above, GPS coodinates were lost near Harper's Ferry, WV at an altitude about 30,000ft and regained during the descent. At the moment the cause for both GPS receivers to lose their lock at roughly the same time is unexplained. Possibilities include interference from the Raspberry Pi Power Supply DC-DC Converter or jet stream turbulence rocking the payload, causing loss of line-of-sight to GPS satellites. However, the GPS lock was reliable at first, and was regained during the more turbulent descent phase.

=Logistics=
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

=Environmental & Accelerometer Data=

A nearly-complete record of sensor measurements was obtained from the Raspberry Pi Pimoroni Enviro PHAT sensor board. These divided into two data logs, one for pressure, temperature, illumination, illumination color and one for 3-axis acceleration and compass heading. The former acquired data several times per minute while the latter was acquired at about 40Hz. These were acquired and analyzed using Python scripts and plotted in gnuplot.

The pressure drops as expected from atmospheric (101kPa) to 1.68kPa. The minmium pressure recorded corresponds approximately to 94,000ft altitude according to some online calculators. Since we lack a GPS log of altitude at high altitudes, this is an important estimate. However, the sensor component on the Enviro PHAT is only rated down to 30kPa and readings far below this range may be untrustworthy. We may perform additional tests of the EnviroPHAT board in a vacuum chamber to establish a calibration. In addition the timestamp for the minimum pressure (171156 UTC) may be incorrect due to an unexplained glitch (see below).

[[File:Sb7P_ftime.png]]

'''Glitch at 164737 UTC.''' At 16:47:37.75 an unexplained glitch occurred: the timestamps in the environmental sensor log jump backwards almost 30 minutes to 161717. The pressure log drops suddenly from 8.388kPa to 7.042kPa, a drop of 1.346kPa. Note the Pi Zero doesn’t have an onboard clock so timestamps represent the running time of the script rather than the real absolute time. Extrapolating from the rate of pressure drop just before and after that point, the drop should have taken about 6 minutes. This is a reasonable delay for the Raspberry Pi to shutdown, reboot and complete a file system check and resume the measurement script.

[[File::Pglitch_ftime.png]]

Temperature readings fall steadily from ambient ground temperature about 29.7 C to -39.9C at 16:20:19 UTC when the pressure reading was 17,568 Pa or about 40,300 ft calculated altitude. It then rises again to 36.3 C at 17:12:10 UTC (the payload is in the sun and there’s less convective cooling with less air). That’s roughly the peak altitude. Then the temperature falls more steeply as the payload descends into cold (-40C) air, and then warms near ground altitude where the air is warmer.

[[File:Sb7T_ftime.png]]

Illumination
Direct sunlight maxes out the illumination sensor (at 65,535 bits) and most of the data is thus this value. But some data points are lower, possibly measurements taken randomly in the shade of the nylon strap as the payload rotated. These would be measurements of the sky brightness not including direct sunlight, and they show a trend. They begin hear 60,000 and fall steadily to 15,000, i.e the sky transitions from bright to relatively dark. Illumination includes light scattered from the balloon and rigging. Large deviations from the max value (i.e. dark measurements) stop abruptly near the peak altitude. I’ll guess the payload was spinning too fast in descent to acquire a complete measurement in the shade.

[[File:Sb7Lux_ftime.png]]

Blueishness
I calculated blue saturation by taking the Blue/RBG ratio in the RGB sensor data. Again, most of the time the sensor is maxed out by direct sunlight, setting the Blue/Red ratio to 1.0. However in the shade the measurement is meaningful. The sky illumination becomes more blue for about 2000 seconds (35-40 minutes) and then becomes less blue. At the highest altitudes the illumination is actually slightly reddish (the latex balloon color?).

[[File:Sb7Blue_fltime.png]]

Delay between measurements
The timestamp differential between measurements is binomial; the measurements are either 1.9 - 2.1 seconds apart or 42 seconds. The latter is an analysis artifact as the minute rolls over (jump from 60 to 02) that I need to fix. Besides that, beginning at 4,076 seconds some measurements are much closer together, as close as 0.06 seconds apart, with a clear and weird trend… This may be correlated to the light intensity data. I don’t really have an explanation. The PiZSensor was also tasked with photographing the Tesla payload, which it did every 1:05 until 16:47 UTC (7,474 sec).

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

<noinclude>
{{Template:Spaceblimp}}
</noinclude>

File:Sb7Blue fltime.png

2018-04-27T21:51:13Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Sky Blueishness (B/RBG) Flight Time

Spaceblimp 7 Sky Blueishness (B/RBG) Flight Time

File:Sb7Lux ftime.png

2018-04-27T21:49:07Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Illumination Flight Time

Spaceblimp 7 Illumination Flight Time

File:Sb7T ftime.png

2018-04-27T21:47:49Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Temperature Log Flight Time

Spaceblimp 7 Temperature Log Flight Time

File:Pglitch ftime.png

2018-04-27T21:46:46Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Pressure Log glitch

Spaceblimp 7 Pressure Log glitch

File:Sb7P ftime.png

2018-04-27T21:45:39Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 Pressure Log vs Flight Time

Spaceblimp 7 Pressure Log vs Flight Time

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T19:23:52Z

Summakor: asdf

File:SbPressure glitch.png

2018-04-27T19:23:18Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 pressure log glitch

Spaceblimp 7 pressure log glitch

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-04-27T19:05:47Z

Summakor: /* Flight Summary */ asdf

File:Sb7Pressure index.png

2018-04-27T19:04:52Z

Summakor: Spaceblimp 7 pressure log

Spaceblimp 7 pressure log

Regular Member Meeting 2018 04 10

2018-04-10T14:22:22Z

Summakor: /* Project CRISPR -Enrique */ asdf

Regular Member Meeting 2018 04 10

2018-04-10T14:19:53Z

Summakor: /* Old Business */ asdf

File:CFC App Payment 2018.png

2018-04-10T14:17:56Z

Summakor: Statement showing payment of 2018 Combined Federal Campaign application fee by Enrique on 1/31/18 on card x8694. Receipt from CFC would be sent to treasurer@hacdc.org.

Statement showing payment of 2018 Combined Federal Campaign application fee by Enrique on 1/31/18 on card x8694. Receipt from CFC would be sent to treasurer@hacdc.org.

Regular Member Meeting 2018 03 13

2018-03-14T00:09:43Z

Summakor: /* Project CRISPR -Enrique */ asedf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at xxxx pm by xxxx
:Members present: Julia, Tom, Bobby, Ken, Kevin, Nic
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==
- Nancy = Membeship renewal

Discussing USASEF participation:
Requested two tables from Gary Maulin for lockpicking/3D printer setup/other members projects
We need a schedule for participation from HacDC members:

Friday: Kevin, Tom (morning on Friday to help bring things), maybe Ben, Enrique (probably not)
Saturday: Tayeb, Ben, Kevin, Julia, Enrique
Sunday: Julia, Kevin, Ben (if low staff), Nic, Enrique, Bobby (teardown)

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

Stalled for last month, we have new seals except for the one we know is damaged.
We need to find the information about the damaged seal and then replace it

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) -Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
No update; too busy with Spaceblimp lately.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===

- Report and updates

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

No IT needs this month.

== Member Reports ==

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

I've been making a bunch of new computers for the space. New lasercutter driver, new Classroom TV, new basement TV.

Also got access to the phone system recently. I've setup a voip phone in the basement, which can be rung from the main menu.

I've created a roadmap for work to be done on the lasercutter.

I got somebody to come pick up some of our trash, with the potential to come pick up more trash in the future.

I'm trying to create a wiki for reverse engineering in general. I think I've purchased a domain, ikiw.io, and will provision a server for it eventually.

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====
* Set up a meeting with Open Technology Institute, with Ken, Julia, myself and Karen in attendance. More follow-up needed but positive response from OTI and offers to help.
* Met with a PSA-702 in SE to establish relationships with potentially interested parties. Most notably, the Ward 8 liaison from the Mayor's Office of Community Relations and Services, who spoke about a technical training center for job training.

==== Ken ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at xxx by xxx

Annual Meeting 2018

2018-03-10T20:34:38Z

Summakor: /* Member Reports */ Enrique

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}
== Purpose ==

From the HacDC Bylaws, Article III, Section 2:
:''At the annual meeting, the voting members shall elect the Board of Directors, review and vote on the standing rules and policies of the corporation, receive reports on the activities of the corporation, approve the budget and determine the direction of corporation in the coming year.''

== Time and Location ==
Date: 2018.13.10 (March 10, 2018)
Location: HacDC

Meeting called to order at
Time: 15:30

== Participants ==

* Members Present:
** Kevin
** Julia
** Matt Zand
** JP
** Karen
** mirage
** Nic
** Tayeb
** Ken
** Tom
** Enrique (virtually)

*Others Present:
** Aden

[[Quorum]] met?
Yes

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== Director Reports ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Matt ====

==== Kevin ====

For the most part, my year has consisted of trying to network HacDC with other groups and represent HacDC at events. To that end, I:

* offered 3D printing services, along with Julia, at the two-day Smithsonian Institute's [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/2017/ Earth Optimism Summit] [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/calendar/2017/events/make-planet-pitches/ "Make for the Planet"] hack-a-thon
* represented HacDC for the [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/community-makerspace-day-tickets-39168856103# Community Makerspace Day] event at Mary McLeod Bethune Day Academy PCS
* supported Ken's [[DC Community Hackerspaces|Neighborhood Opportunity Centers]] (NOCs) proposals by:
** participating in two meetings with DC government officials and Nation of Makers executive director
** arranged a meeting between HacDC and the New America Foundation's Open Source Institute
** established a wiki page for collecting, coalating and coordinating potential NOC resources

In lesser news, I've been:
* recreating a passport stamp
* working on a brief [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CINyLSA3x984h7JMWaxRRfdgh0C0v81g/view OpenSCAD rotate_extrude tutorial video]
* futzing around with the teleconferencing system, and continue attempting to document progress on the wiki (See [[La Fonera]] and [[OBi110 VoIP setup]].)
* doing this, that and the other thing
* occasionally restocking the fridge
* kept the tunes going a la [https://www.radioparadise.com/ Radio Paradise]

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SPACEBLIMP ===
We postponed our March 3-4 launch due to winds out in Strasburg, despite everything being ready to go otherwise. Sad! We're currently deciding on a new launch date but the weekends of March 24 and March 31 are likely. We've also entered the Global Space Balloon Challenge under the team name Hackers SLS (Space Lunch System) and plan to launch another Spaceblimp for that competition in later April (not to far away). Enrique

=== Project HAMRADIO ===

=== Project SEM ===

=== Project SUPPLIES ===

=== Project EXPANSION ===

== Audit Committee Report ==
Nobody bothered to form a committee so there's no report.

== Member Reports ==
Enrique - This year I hosted events on Lockpicking (TOOOL came), Software Defined Radio, Cryptocurrencies and the Metasploit Workshop put on by Beltway Hackers. Also lots of Spaceblimp meetings, especially lately. Spaceblimp 7 was postponed from the Eclipse date to early 2018 and just postponed again due to weather but we're ready to go very soon.

== Old Business ==

=== Bylaws Amendments ===
"Bylaws amendment proposal: Change the threshold for future bylaws amendments from "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of voting members," to "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of member votes cast 90 days from the proposal approval date," and from "Notice of such petition must be submitted electronically to all members," to "Notice of such a petition must be submitted to all members electronically and, where electronic means produce no response, all other available means." (petition approved April 2017) http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/Regular_Member_Meeting_2017_04_11)

== New Business ==

== Board of Directors Elections ==
Results of the elections are as follows:

President: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Vice President: ''??? and ??? stand for VP.
''??? won with ??? votes to ???

Treasurer: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Secretary: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

At large seats: ''???, ???, and ??? stand for at large seats.
''??? and ??? won the ranked choice vote.

== New Members ==

== Adjournment ==

Adjourned at
Time: Change me

Annual Meeting 2018

2018-03-10T20:30:23Z

Summakor: /* Audit Committee Report */ not treasurer this year

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}
== Purpose ==

From the HacDC Bylaws, Article III, Section 2:
:''At the annual meeting, the voting members shall elect the Board of Directors, review and vote on the standing rules and policies of the corporation, receive reports on the activities of the corporation, approve the budget and determine the direction of corporation in the coming year.''

== Time and Location ==
Date: 2018.13.10 (March 10, 2018)
Location: HacDC

Meeting called to order at
Time: Change me

== Participants ==

* Members Present:
** Kevin
** Julia
** Matt Zand
** JP
** Karen
** mirage
** Nic
** Tayeb
** Ken
** Tom
** Enrique (virtually)

*Others Present:
** Aden

[[Quorum]] met?
Yes

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== Director Reports ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Matt ====

==== Kevin ====

For the most part, my year has consisted of trying to network HacDC with other groups and represent HacDC at events. To that end, I:

* offered 3D printing services, along with Julia, at the two-day Smithsonian Institute's [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/2017/ Earth Optimism Summit] [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/calendar/2017/events/make-planet-pitches/ "Make for the Planet"] hack-a-thon
* represented HacDC for the [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/community-makerspace-day-tickets-39168856103# Community Makerspace Day] event at Mary McLeod Bethune Day Academy PCS
* supported Ken's [[DC Community Hackerspaces|Neighborhood Opportunity Centers]] (NOCs) proposals by:
** participating in two meetings with DC government officials and Nation of Makers executive director
** arranged a meeting between HacDC and the New America Foundation's Open Source Institute
** established a wiki page for collecting, coalating and coordinating potential NOC resources

In lesser news, I've been:
* recreating a passport stamp
* working on a brief [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CINyLSA3x984h7JMWaxRRfdgh0C0v81g/view OpenSCAD rotate_extrude tutorial video]
* futzing around with the teleconferencing system, and continue attempting to document progress on the wiki (See [[La Fonera]] and [[OBi110 VoIP setup]].)
* doing this, that and the other thing
* occasionally restocking the fridge
* kept the tunes going a la [https://www.radioparadise.com/ Radio Paradise]

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SPACEBLIMP ===
We postponed our March 3-4 launch due to winds out in Strasburg, despite everything being ready to go otherwise. Sad! We're currently deciding on a new launch date but the weekends of March 24 and March 31 are likely. We've also entered the Global Space Balloon Challenge under the team name Hackers SLS (Space Lunch System) and plan to launch another Spaceblimp for that competition in later April (not to far away). Enrique

=== Project HAMRADIO ===

=== Project SEM ===

=== Project SUPPLIES ===

=== Project EXPANSION ===

== Audit Committee Report ==
Nobody bothered to form a committee so there's no report.

== Member Reports ==

== Old Business ==

=== Bylaws Amendments ===
"Bylaws amendment proposal: Change the threshold for future bylaws amendments from "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of voting members," to "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of member votes cast 90 days from the proposal approval date," and from "Notice of such petition must be submitted electronically to all members," to "Notice of such a petition must be submitted to all members electronically and, where electronic means produce no response, all other available means." (petition approved April 2017) http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/Regular_Member_Meeting_2017_04_11)

== New Business ==

== Board of Directors Elections ==
Results of the elections are as follows:

President: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Vice President: ''??? and ??? stand for VP.
''??? won with ??? votes to ???

Treasurer: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Secretary: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

At large seats: ''???, ???, and ??? stand for at large seats.
''??? and ??? won the ranked choice vote.

== New Members ==

== Adjournment ==

Adjourned at
Time: Change me

Annual Meeting 2018

2018-03-10T20:29:37Z

Summakor: /* Project SPACEBLIMP */ !

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}
== Purpose ==

From the HacDC Bylaws, Article III, Section 2:
:''At the annual meeting, the voting members shall elect the Board of Directors, review and vote on the standing rules and policies of the corporation, receive reports on the activities of the corporation, approve the budget and determine the direction of corporation in the coming year.''

== Time and Location ==
Date: 2018.13.10 (March 10, 2018)
Location: HacDC

Meeting called to order at
Time: Change me

== Participants ==

* Members Present:
** Kevin
** Julia
** Matt Zand
** JP
** Karen
** mirage
** Nic
** Tayeb
** Ken
** Tom
** Enrique (virtually)

*Others Present:
** Aden

[[Quorum]] met?
Yes

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==

== Recognition ==

== Director Reports ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Matt ====

==== Kevin ====

For the most part, my year has consisted of trying to network HacDC with other groups and represent HacDC at events. To that end, I:

* offered 3D printing services, along with Julia, at the two-day Smithsonian Institute's [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/2017/ Earth Optimism Summit] [https://earthoptimism.si.edu/calendar/2017/events/make-planet-pitches/ "Make for the Planet"] hack-a-thon
* represented HacDC for the [https://www.eventbrite.com/e/community-makerspace-day-tickets-39168856103# Community Makerspace Day] event at Mary McLeod Bethune Day Academy PCS
* supported Ken's [[DC Community Hackerspaces|Neighborhood Opportunity Centers]] (NOCs) proposals by:
** participating in two meetings with DC government officials and Nation of Makers executive director
** arranged a meeting between HacDC and the New America Foundation's Open Source Institute
** established a wiki page for collecting, coalating and coordinating potential NOC resources

In lesser news, I've been:
* recreating a passport stamp
* working on a brief [https://drive.google.com/file/d/1CINyLSA3x984h7JMWaxRRfdgh0C0v81g/view OpenSCAD rotate_extrude tutorial video]
* futzing around with the teleconferencing system, and continue attempting to document progress on the wiki (See [[La Fonera]] and [[OBi110 VoIP setup]].)
* doing this, that and the other thing
* occasionally restocking the fridge
* kept the tunes going a la [https://www.radioparadise.com/ Radio Paradise]

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SPACEBLIMP ===
We postponed our March 3-4 launch due to winds out in Strasburg, despite everything being ready to go otherwise. Sad! We're currently deciding on a new launch date but the weekends of March 24 and March 31 are likely. We've also entered the Global Space Balloon Challenge under the team name Hackers SLS (Space Lunch System) and plan to launch another Spaceblimp for that competition in later April (not to far away). Enrique

=== Project HAMRADIO ===

=== Project SEM ===

=== Project SUPPLIES ===

=== Project EXPANSION ===

== Audit Committee Report ==
Nobody bothered to form a committee so there's no report. All financial statements including receipts for all purchases are at the space, in the BOD locker, treasurer's folder. The Dwolla statements include member names, the rest don't. -Enrique

== Member Reports ==

== Old Business ==

=== Bylaws Amendments ===
"Bylaws amendment proposal: Change the threshold for future bylaws amendments from "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of voting members," to "more than three quarters (3/4ths) of member votes cast 90 days from the proposal approval date," and from "Notice of such petition must be submitted electronically to all members," to "Notice of such a petition must be submitted to all members electronically and, where electronic means produce no response, all other available means." (petition approved April 2017) http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/Regular_Member_Meeting_2017_04_11)

== New Business ==

== Board of Directors Elections ==
Results of the elections are as follows:

President: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Vice President: ''??? and ??? stand for VP.
''??? won with ??? votes to ???

Treasurer: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

Secretary: ''??? stood for election unopposed.

At large seats: ''???, ???, and ??? stand for at large seats.
''??? and ??? won the ranked choice vote.

== New Members ==

== Adjournment ==

Adjourned at
Time: Change me

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-02-11T15:34:51Z

Summakor: asdf

'''Project Description & Status'''
Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

Launch date is set for Saturday March 3, 2018 with a rain date of March 4. Launch site will be decided based on weather and track forecast the week before launch but will be two hours west or northwest of Washington, DC to avoid no-fly zones. The next subsequent launch is expected in April as part of the Global Space Balloon Challenge where our team name is Hackers SLS (Space Lunch System).

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

'''Project Goals'''
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

'''Logistics'''
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

HacDC Spaceblimp 7

2018-02-11T15:34:08Z

Summakor: asdf

'''Project Description & Statys'''
Spaceblimp is an educational and exploratory stratospheric balloon project that lofts various payloads to near-space (about 100,000ft). The sixth launch, Spaceblimp 6, reached 104,000ft. Spaceblimp 7 is being done in collaboration with Rockville Makerspace [http://rockvillesciencecenter.org/programs/studio-i-makerspace/] and Unallocated Space [https://www.unallocatedspace.org/].

Launch date is set for Saturday March 3, 2018 with a rain date of March 4. Launch site will be decided based on weather and track forecast the week before launch but will be two hours west or northwest of Washington, DC to avoid no-fly zones. The next subsequent launch is expected in April as part of the Global Space Balloon Challenge where our team name is Hackers SLS (Space Lunch System).

The project has Technical, logistical and Educational goals which are described below. Spaceblimp 7 looks to add new components that weren’t part of HacDC’s previous six Spaceblimp launches. By forming a partnership with several other area makerspaces, volunteers, hackers and educators we are expanding our team and pooling resources. By expanding the project we aim to increase its visibility and benefit all the organizations involved as well as and increase fund-raising opportunities to help sustain all the partners/organizations and the project Spaceblimp in the long-term. This will also expose high school students to educational and technical resources outside of the school environment as well as giving all the participants the opportunity to share skills and interests to work together and learn from one another to achieve shared goals. Local area hackers and space enthusiasts will also benefit by being able to actively participate and develop skills in the design and launch of the payloads. So come and join us!

'''Project Goals'''
Baseline '''technical goals''' are the safe and successful launch, tracking and recovery of a stratospheric balloon and its payloads. These goals involve exploration of concepts of buoyancy, basic electronics and energy storage, triangulation and timekeeping, radio propagation, weather prediction, FAA regulations and stratospheric environment conditions. In addition to these baseline goals, the project will welcome additional technical goals from volunteers and students primarily in the form of payload experiments suggested, designed and built by them. Spaceblimp will encourage use of CubeSat geometry payloads to give students experience with the CubeSat design constraints and to foster discussion with future other CubeSat missions.

The '''educational objective''' is primarily to provide an engaging, multi-day hands-on educational experience for students and volunteers heavily focused on STEM. Students will be engaged in a hands-on lesson by disassembling, reassembling and testing the basic tracking module components (GPS, radios) and other payloads. The nature of the balloon flight will naturally lead to discussion of scientific subjects like buoyancy, atmospheric composition and density, radio propagation, weather prediction and technical topics like power consumption and energy storage. Students will have first-hand exposure to a team working environment with delegation of responsibilities and the necessary communication and coordination. Critically, students will be allowed to suggest, design and build their own balloon payloads to be launched into near-space. This kind of self-directed educational approach uses students own natural curiosity and motivation to increase engagement and their sense of ownership of the resulting project.

'''Logistics'''
Project logistics include those necessary to achieve the technical goals, but also networking of area makerspaces and volunteers, outreach to local governments, funding sources and potential sponsors, coordination of project documentation and public exhibition of the project. This may include informational booths at relevant area events, compilation of video and publication of a project wiki. All new partners (including students) will be able to add or edit our project plan and proposed new topics for the meeting’s agenda.

Points of Contact:
HacDC: Enrique C, Technical Manager and Funding POC, enrique@hacdc.org
HacDC: Nancy W, Project, Logistics and Student Outreach Manager
Rockville RSC: Sam C, Technical Manager
Rockville RSC: David D, Logistics and Outreach Manager
Unallocated Space: Buddy, Technical and Logistics Manager

'''Useful Links'''
Working documents on Google Drive: [https://drive.google.com/open?id=1Lw55HiaDk5GbLUFwuXcTWeM44eYJ7sq1]

Regular Member Meeting 2018 02 13

2018-01-31T04:29:17Z

Summakor: /* Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date February 12, 2018
:Called to order at by
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==
http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/Regular_Member_Meeting_2017_12_12

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

Need an annual meeting and board election date.

== New Business ==

Enrique - I'd like to be reimbursed for the $340 CFC application fee.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===
Enrique - I purchased a vacuum valve, tee and other minor hardware. We could 1) mount the gauge on the rough pump to see how low that pressure goes, 2) blank off the gauge flange and tee the gauge between the pumps to measure turbo backing pressure.

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) -Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===

Our last experiment was a failure: the unmodified bacteria thrived on the antibiotic-free plate but not the antibiotic plate. Of note, we failed to culture the bacteria properly to start with, although the growth on the plain plate shows lots of bacteria were present in the CRIPR'd solution. Also the single run used up all the Cas9 protein and templateDNA; the free sample the vendor sent was unexpectedly one-fifth of the regular amount.
Nancy C. Wolfson and Enrique Cobas

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===

We're having biweekly meetings in anticipation of February launch date, also a big work-meeting on a Saturday to work building payloads. We've incorporated Unallocated Space so this is now officially a three-hackerspace launch. Nancy went to SilverSat to see how far along they are building CubeSats. For many more details, subscribe to spaceblimp@hacdc.org

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

Enrique - the CFC campaign is in the Fall. Federal employers host 'fairs' where charities are invited to set up booths that their employees can peruse and hopefully donate money to. We need to find out about these and get invited. I can do NRL and maybe NASA. There are many other labs and agencies in DC that might have amenable employees: NIST, NIH, NASA, NSA, ARL, FDA, EPA, DoD, etc. If you know federal employees, try to remember to ask them about their CFC coordinators. We'll also need volunteers to staff such booths at each fair.

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

=== Kevin ===

==== Matt ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at by

Regular Member Meeting 2018 02 13

2018-01-31T04:19:52Z

Summakor: asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date February 12, 2018
:Called to order at by
:Members present:
:Members remote:
:Others present:
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met?

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==
http://wiki.hacdc.org/index.php/Regular_Member_Meeting_2017_12_12

== Recognition ==

== New Members ==

== Old Business ==

Need an annual meeting and board election date.

== New Business ==

Enrique - I'd like to be reimbursed for the $340 CFC application fee.

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Julia ===

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) -Julia ===

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===

Our last experiment was a failure: the unmodified bacteria thrived on the antibiotic-free plate but not the antibiotic plate. Of note, we failed to culture the bacteria properly to start with, although the growth on the plain plate shows lots of bacteria were present in the CRIPR'd solution. Also the single run used up all the Cas9 protein and templateDNA; the free sample the vendor sent was unexpectedly one-fifth of the regular amount.
Nancy C. Wolfson and Enrique Cobas

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===

We're having biweekly meetings in anticipation of February launch date, also a big work-meeting on a Saturday to work building payloads. We've incorporated Unallocated Space so this is now officially a three-hackerspace launch. Nancy went to SilverSat to see how far along they are building CubeSats. For many more details, subscribe to spaceblimp@hacdc.org

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

Enrique - the CFC campaign is in the Fall. Federal employers host 'fairs' where charities are invited to set up booths that their employees can peruse and hopefully donate money to. We need to find out about these and get invited. I can do NRL and maybe NASA. There are many other labs and agencies in DC that might have amenable employees: NIST, NIH, NASA, NSA, ARL, FDA, EPA, DoD, etc. If you know federal employees, try to remember to ask them about their CFC coordinators. We'll also need volunteers to staff such booths at each fair.

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

=== Kevin ===

==== Matt ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at by

DC CRISPR Initiative at HacDC

2018-01-27T02:08:30Z

Summakor: /* Sample Inventory */ asdf

==Project Description==

* Organizers: Enrique C., Nancy C. Wolfson, Bobby B.
* Contact: crispr@hacdc.org
CRISPR-Cas9 is a groundbreaking new (2012 vintage) gene editing technique. While gene editing is not a new concept, previous methods were far more expensive, slow and restricted in capabilities than CRISPR. Further, whereas previous methods only successfully edited a few percent of the exposed cells, CRISPR's efficiency approaches 100%. This is particularly important for gene editing in living multi-cellular organisms. The new technique is dramatically accelerating the pace of genetic engineering since its invention in 2012.

CRISPR is an acronym that describes a genetic curiosity observed several decades ago: Clusters of Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. A few years go it was recognized that these odd DNA sequences in bacteria are deactivated virus DNA and make up a kind of Virus Definition Database. Finally, it was discovered that a protein exists which goes around scanning bacteria DNA searching for matches to virus DNA sequences and, when a match is found, cuts the gene in the bacteria DNA very precisely and efficiently. This protein was termed Cas9. In effect, bacteria and other organisms already have an excellent built-in gene-editing mechanism, and scientists have since learned to hijack that mechanism using engineered RNA sequences that direct the Cas9 protein to cut DNA in any desired location in the genome.

The Cas9 mechanism only cuts the DNA in one location, leaving DNA repair mechanisms to fix the double-strand cut. Repair mechanisms for such a serious double-strand break are so imperfect as to incapacitate the gene with errors most of the time. Thus the Cas9 protein deactivates genes rather than removing them. However, by programming two custom RNA target strands, two Cas9 proteins can be used in tandem to excise part of a genome altogether. To add a new gene, there must be enough of that gene floating around during the CRISPR process that it becomes incorporated into the genome via the repair mechanisms.

These are the best videos we've found so far:
Genome Editing with CRISPR-Cas9 by McGovern Institute for Brain Research
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pp17E4E-O8

What is CRISPR? by Bozeman Science
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnYppmstxIs

Read more here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR

Read more here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR

In the ODIN kit experiment, bacteria (E. coli HME63 strain) are modified to add resistance to the antibiotic streptomycin. The kit provides the vulnerable bacteria, the resistance gene, and growth media with and without antibiotic. The original unmodified bacteria can only grow on the plain agar media whereas bacteria with a successfully edited genome will also grow on the streptomycin-laced agar. This is similar to Wenyan Jiang, David Bikard, David Cox, Feng Zhang and Luciano Marraffini, RNA-guided editing of bacterial genomes using CRISPR-Cas systems, Nature Biotechnology 31(3), pp.233 (2013). http://zlab.mit.edu/assets/reprints/Jiang_W_Nat_Biotechnol_2013.pdf

==Financial Support / Sponsors==
HacDC - 8/2016 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit.
Enrique C - 11/2016- purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR Kit.
Nancy W - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit.
Enrique C - 5/2017 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR Kit Refill.
Nancy W - 2017 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit refill.
Nancy W - 2017 - purchased temperature-controlled water bath.
Nancy W - 2017 - loaned 1600X Optical Microscope with USB camera.
Enrique C - 2017 - purchased supplies and gram staining kit.
The ODIN - 01/2018- provided free sample of next-gen CRISPR kit.

==Activities and Goals==
DC CRISPR Initiative is our effort to learn about, perform, and teach CRISPR genetic editing at HacDC. To begin the project, we’ve ordered a Do-It-Yourself CRISPR Kit, which includes (supposedly) all the tools and ingredients needed to perform a CRISPR procedure a few times. We’ll hold a few events at HacDC to go through the procedure and document our experience. Eventually we’ll create a guide that older high school kids can follow. This project also explores interest in molecular biology and genetics at HacDC. We're just starting! Keep an eye out for CRISPR events in our MeetUp page, on the mailing list, and our Blabber discussion forum.

==Project Team Members==
Enrique C. - Project Manager and Point of Contact
Nancy W. - Project Development Lead
Bobby B. - Molecular Biology Advisor
Sophia M. - Scientific Advisor

==Worklog==
July 30, 2016
We received the CRISPR kit purchased with Project EXPANSION funds (thanks!).

August 2, 2016
Nancy and Enrique inventoried the ODIN kit and designated the small classroom fridge as the "NO FOOD" Project CRISPR fridge.

August 5, 2016
Nancy and Enrique prepared four Petri dishes (two plain agar, two streptomycin-agar). The agar and antibiotic(streptomycin)-laced agar are gel-like substances similar to gelatin. They come as powders which must be mixed with water and heated to dissolve. The recipe is proportioned for seven Petri dishes but we scaled down to one of each, scaling the agar powders and water by one-seventh. Even so we were able to coat two dishes with each growth medium. We didn't have distilled or deionized water and used bottled purified drinking water in a pinch. The mixture (agar gel only, no bacteria!) was heated in the microwave 7 seconds at a time. It took 4-5 cycles until the powders were fully dissolved and the liquid transparent, then another 5 minutes until they were cool enough to handle and pour into the plastic Petri dishes. The dishes cooled at room temperature for an hour to remove some condensation (the covered hot liquid creates condensation on the lid), then placed in the fridge. Two are agar (no antibiotic) and two are streptomycin/Kan agar (antibiotic laced).

August 10, 2016
Ken, Bobby, Nancy, and Enrique. We streaked some of the original E. coli HME63 bacteria onto two plain agar plates. Plate 1 was left out tonight (the bacteria need to grow). Plate 2 was immediately refrigerated and will be taken out to grow just before the actual experiment.

August, 2016
Nancy, Ken and Enrique. We performed the CRISPR experiment, but realized we don't have a constant-temperature water bath. We used an IR thermometer and the microwave to prepare and maintain a water bath of approximately 42C. The incubation period post-CRISPR is also quite long, up to 4 hours at room temperature, which makes this experiment problematic as an after-work evening activity. It'd work better on a weekend day or holiday since we have day jobs.

September, 2016
Nancy, Enrique. The first CRISPR-modified bacteria on the Strep-Kan plate was left at room temperature over the weekend (48 hours). However, no bacteria colonies could be easily seen in the plate. The plate was left at room temperature several more days with no change. It looks like our first attempt did not wildly succeed.

September, 2016
Enrique. I prepared a new set of Agar (3) and Strep-Kan Agar (3) plates for troubleshooting experiments and a second try at CRISPR. We should test the full CRISPR protocol again, both on Agar and Strep-Kan plates, but also test the survival of bacteria at several other steps: Transformation Mix only and Transformation Mix + tracrRNA + crRNA.

September, 2016
Enrique and Nancy. We developed a troubleshooting protocol under the suspicion that maybe none of the bacteria are surviving (we did not make a plain Agar control plate last time). We also tested the 'sterile' innoculation loops vs. a bag of zip-ties we found laying around. Nancy brought an alcohol thermometer that's probably more accurate in water than the IR thermometer. The resulting plates were incubated for 24-48 hours. It was difficult to re-suspend the bacteria in solution after harvesting from the first plate. A vortex generator (basically a strong vibrator) would be helpful.

September, 2016
Enrique and Nancy. Hm... there are some specs on the CRISPR plate this time, just 2-3 colonies though. All the other (Agar) plates had tons of bacteria, so clearly the low efficiency is at the CRISPR step with the Template DNA. Also we brought in more Bleach for disposal of old samples, and bleach wipes.

September, 2016
Enrique. I located a much better (real) biological microscope with up to 1000x magnification in the basement. Man our inventory sucks; I had no idea we had this thing. Images are much better, although I'm not certain we're looking at individual bacteria. I also purchased a hotplate so we can actually control temperature baths in the future.

January, 2017
See notebook.

February, 2017.
The third trial of the CRISPR process gave us a positive control sample, which makes the result inconclusive. While the Agar media grew more, both the CRISPR and original LD 21 bacteria grew somewhat on the Strep-Kan media. We perfomed a second control experiment, plating 100uL of the LD21 bacteria and the Transformation-Mix HME 63 strain with 400uL of DI water each, onto Strep-Kan media.

June, 2017
Purchased Bacterial CRISPR refill kit using HacDC Project CRISPR funds.

July 2017 - Bobby, Nancy, Enrique, Sophia and Richard.
Met to plan workshop. Bobby gave us his Introduction to Molecular Biology talk - it was about 90 minutes but could probably be shortened to 60 if needed. Prepared fresh Agar and Strep-Kan plates. Sophia showed us a new (correct) streaking technique. We plated some bacteria but they overgrew (storage place on top of the fridge is too warm in the summer), making it impossible to isolated a colony. Sophia took a second batch home and it was better with some isolated colonies.

August 23, 2017 - Sophia, Nancy and Enrique.
Trial 4 of the full CRISPR process. Enrique took the resulting plates home to monitor growth at room temperature. No growth observed on the CRISPR sample. Control sample grew quickly.

December 11, 2017 - Nancy and Enrique.
Contacted kit supplier to obtain fresh ingredients.

January 09, 2017 - Enrique.
Prepared fresh Agar and Strep-Kan Agar plates. Checked for contamination growth 48 hours (none).

January 12, 2017 - Nancy, Enrique and guests Tobi and Tom.
Trial 4.5 of the CRISPR process. Used bacteria straight from the supply rather than a colony (not available). The result after 48 hours was much growth on the Agar plate and zero growth on the Strep-Kan plate. (no modification)

== Sample Inventory ==
'''CRISPR Trial 8/24/2017
'''
LB-Agar Plate at 1 and 20 Hours:
[[File:IMG_20170825_001628s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170825_190805s.jpg]]

StrepKan Plate at 1, 20, 28 and 57 Hours:
[[File:IMG_20170825_001648s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170825_190912s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170826_032748s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170827_093620s.jpg]]

'''CRISPR Trial 1/12/2018
'''Clean Agar plate after 48 hours incubation. No contamination growth observed.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-Agar_blank_48h.jpeg]]
Clean Strep-Kan plate after 48 hours incubation. No contamination growth observed.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan_blank_48h.jpeg]]
Agar plate with the post-protocol bacteria incubated 48 hours (control sample): much growth (overgrown).
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-Agar_Bact_48h.jpeg]]
Strep-Kan plate with the post-protocol bacteria incubation 48 hours (CRISPR result): no growth.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan_CrisprBact_48h.jpeg]]

== News References ==
* Video: bacteria evolving antibiotic resistance in 11 days. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yybsSqcB7mE
* Video: CRISPR Patent Controversy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IboHEQumDGc

DC CRISPR Initiative at HacDC

2018-01-27T02:07:38Z

Summakor: /* Sample Inventory */ 123

==Project Description==

* Organizers: Enrique C., Nancy C. Wolfson, Bobby B.
* Contact: crispr@hacdc.org
CRISPR-Cas9 is a groundbreaking new (2012 vintage) gene editing technique. While gene editing is not a new concept, previous methods were far more expensive, slow and restricted in capabilities than CRISPR. Further, whereas previous methods only successfully edited a few percent of the exposed cells, CRISPR's efficiency approaches 100%. This is particularly important for gene editing in living multi-cellular organisms. The new technique is dramatically accelerating the pace of genetic engineering since its invention in 2012.

CRISPR is an acronym that describes a genetic curiosity observed several decades ago: Clusters of Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. A few years go it was recognized that these odd DNA sequences in bacteria are deactivated virus DNA and make up a kind of Virus Definition Database. Finally, it was discovered that a protein exists which goes around scanning bacteria DNA searching for matches to virus DNA sequences and, when a match is found, cuts the gene in the bacteria DNA very precisely and efficiently. This protein was termed Cas9. In effect, bacteria and other organisms already have an excellent built-in gene-editing mechanism, and scientists have since learned to hijack that mechanism using engineered RNA sequences that direct the Cas9 protein to cut DNA in any desired location in the genome.

The Cas9 mechanism only cuts the DNA in one location, leaving DNA repair mechanisms to fix the double-strand cut. Repair mechanisms for such a serious double-strand break are so imperfect as to incapacitate the gene with errors most of the time. Thus the Cas9 protein deactivates genes rather than removing them. However, by programming two custom RNA target strands, two Cas9 proteins can be used in tandem to excise part of a genome altogether. To add a new gene, there must be enough of that gene floating around during the CRISPR process that it becomes incorporated into the genome via the repair mechanisms.

These are the best videos we've found so far:
Genome Editing with CRISPR-Cas9 by McGovern Institute for Brain Research
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pp17E4E-O8

What is CRISPR? by Bozeman Science
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MnYppmstxIs

Read more here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR

Read more here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CRISPR

In the ODIN kit experiment, bacteria (E. coli HME63 strain) are modified to add resistance to the antibiotic streptomycin. The kit provides the vulnerable bacteria, the resistance gene, and growth media with and without antibiotic. The original unmodified bacteria can only grow on the plain agar media whereas bacteria with a successfully edited genome will also grow on the streptomycin-laced agar. This is similar to Wenyan Jiang, David Bikard, David Cox, Feng Zhang and Luciano Marraffini, RNA-guided editing of bacterial genomes using CRISPR-Cas systems, Nature Biotechnology 31(3), pp.233 (2013). http://zlab.mit.edu/assets/reprints/Jiang_W_Nat_Biotechnol_2013.pdf

==Financial Support / Sponsors==
HacDC - 8/2016 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit.
Enrique C - 11/2016- purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR Kit.
Nancy W - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit.
Enrique C - 5/2017 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR Kit Refill.
Nancy W - 2017 - purchased Bacterial DIY CRISPR kit refill.
Nancy W - 2017 - purchased temperature-controlled water bath.
Nancy W - 2017 - loaned 1600X Optical Microscope with USB camera.
Enrique C - 2017 - purchased supplies and gram staining kit.
The ODIN - 01/2018- provided free sample of next-gen CRISPR kit.

==Activities and Goals==
DC CRISPR Initiative is our effort to learn about, perform, and teach CRISPR genetic editing at HacDC. To begin the project, we’ve ordered a Do-It-Yourself CRISPR Kit, which includes (supposedly) all the tools and ingredients needed to perform a CRISPR procedure a few times. We’ll hold a few events at HacDC to go through the procedure and document our experience. Eventually we’ll create a guide that older high school kids can follow. This project also explores interest in molecular biology and genetics at HacDC. We're just starting! Keep an eye out for CRISPR events in our MeetUp page, on the mailing list, and our Blabber discussion forum.

==Project Team Members==
Enrique C. - Project Manager and Point of Contact
Nancy W. - Project Development Lead
Bobby B. - Molecular Biology Advisor
Sophia M. - Scientific Advisor

==Worklog==
July 30, 2016
We received the CRISPR kit purchased with Project EXPANSION funds (thanks!).

August 2, 2016
Nancy and Enrique inventoried the ODIN kit and designated the small classroom fridge as the "NO FOOD" Project CRISPR fridge.

August 5, 2016
Nancy and Enrique prepared four Petri dishes (two plain agar, two streptomycin-agar). The agar and antibiotic(streptomycin)-laced agar are gel-like substances similar to gelatin. They come as powders which must be mixed with water and heated to dissolve. The recipe is proportioned for seven Petri dishes but we scaled down to one of each, scaling the agar powders and water by one-seventh. Even so we were able to coat two dishes with each growth medium. We didn't have distilled or deionized water and used bottled purified drinking water in a pinch. The mixture (agar gel only, no bacteria!) was heated in the microwave 7 seconds at a time. It took 4-5 cycles until the powders were fully dissolved and the liquid transparent, then another 5 minutes until they were cool enough to handle and pour into the plastic Petri dishes. The dishes cooled at room temperature for an hour to remove some condensation (the covered hot liquid creates condensation on the lid), then placed in the fridge. Two are agar (no antibiotic) and two are streptomycin/Kan agar (antibiotic laced).

August 10, 2016
Ken, Bobby, Nancy, and Enrique. We streaked some of the original E. coli HME63 bacteria onto two plain agar plates. Plate 1 was left out tonight (the bacteria need to grow). Plate 2 was immediately refrigerated and will be taken out to grow just before the actual experiment.

August, 2016
Nancy, Ken and Enrique. We performed the CRISPR experiment, but realized we don't have a constant-temperature water bath. We used an IR thermometer and the microwave to prepare and maintain a water bath of approximately 42C. The incubation period post-CRISPR is also quite long, up to 4 hours at room temperature, which makes this experiment problematic as an after-work evening activity. It'd work better on a weekend day or holiday since we have day jobs.

September, 2016
Nancy, Enrique. The first CRISPR-modified bacteria on the Strep-Kan plate was left at room temperature over the weekend (48 hours). However, no bacteria colonies could be easily seen in the plate. The plate was left at room temperature several more days with no change. It looks like our first attempt did not wildly succeed.

September, 2016
Enrique. I prepared a new set of Agar (3) and Strep-Kan Agar (3) plates for troubleshooting experiments and a second try at CRISPR. We should test the full CRISPR protocol again, both on Agar and Strep-Kan plates, but also test the survival of bacteria at several other steps: Transformation Mix only and Transformation Mix + tracrRNA + crRNA.

September, 2016
Enrique and Nancy. We developed a troubleshooting protocol under the suspicion that maybe none of the bacteria are surviving (we did not make a plain Agar control plate last time). We also tested the 'sterile' innoculation loops vs. a bag of zip-ties we found laying around. Nancy brought an alcohol thermometer that's probably more accurate in water than the IR thermometer. The resulting plates were incubated for 24-48 hours. It was difficult to re-suspend the bacteria in solution after harvesting from the first plate. A vortex generator (basically a strong vibrator) would be helpful.

September, 2016
Enrique and Nancy. Hm... there are some specs on the CRISPR plate this time, just 2-3 colonies though. All the other (Agar) plates had tons of bacteria, so clearly the low efficiency is at the CRISPR step with the Template DNA. Also we brought in more Bleach for disposal of old samples, and bleach wipes.

September, 2016
Enrique. I located a much better (real) biological microscope with up to 1000x magnification in the basement. Man our inventory sucks; I had no idea we had this thing. Images are much better, although I'm not certain we're looking at individual bacteria. I also purchased a hotplate so we can actually control temperature baths in the future.

January, 2017
See notebook.

February, 2017.
The third trial of the CRISPR process gave us a positive control sample, which makes the result inconclusive. While the Agar media grew more, both the CRISPR and original LD 21 bacteria grew somewhat on the Strep-Kan media. We perfomed a second control experiment, plating 100uL of the LD21 bacteria and the Transformation-Mix HME 63 strain with 400uL of DI water each, onto Strep-Kan media.

June, 2017
Purchased Bacterial CRISPR refill kit using HacDC Project CRISPR funds.

July 2017 - Bobby, Nancy, Enrique, Sophia and Richard.
Met to plan workshop. Bobby gave us his Introduction to Molecular Biology talk - it was about 90 minutes but could probably be shortened to 60 if needed. Prepared fresh Agar and Strep-Kan plates. Sophia showed us a new (correct) streaking technique. We plated some bacteria but they overgrew (storage place on top of the fridge is too warm in the summer), making it impossible to isolated a colony. Sophia took a second batch home and it was better with some isolated colonies.

August 23, 2017 - Sophia, Nancy and Enrique.
Trial 4 of the full CRISPR process. Enrique took the resulting plates home to monitor growth at room temperature. No growth observed on the CRISPR sample. Control sample grew quickly.

December 11, 2017 - Nancy and Enrique.
Contacted kit supplier to obtain fresh ingredients.

January 09, 2017 - Enrique.
Prepared fresh Agar and Strep-Kan Agar plates. Checked for contamination growth 48 hours (none).

January 12, 2017 - Nancy, Enrique and guests Tobi and Tom.
Trial 4.5 of the CRISPR process. Used bacteria straight from the supply rather than a colony (not available). The result after 48 hours was much growth on the Agar plate and zero growth on the Strep-Kan plate. (no modification)

== Sample Inventory ==
CRISPR Trial 8/24/2017

LB-Agar Plate at 1 and 20 Hours:
[[File:IMG_20170825_001628s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170825_190805s.jpg]]

StrepKan Plate at 1, 20, 28 and 57 Hours:
[[File:IMG_20170825_001648s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170825_190912s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170826_032748s.jpg]] [[File:IMG_20170827_093620s.jpg]]

CRISPR Trial 1/12/2018
Clean Agar plate after 48 hours incubation. No contamination growth observed.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-Agar_blank_48h.jpeg]]
Clean Strep-Kan plate after 48 hours incubation. No contamination growth observed.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan_blank_48h.jpeg]]
Agar plate with the post-protocol bacteria incubated 48 hours (control sample): much growth (overgrown).
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-Agar_Bact_48h.jpeg]]
Strep-Kan plate with the post-protocol bacteria incubation 48 hours (CRISPR result): no growth.
[[Media:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan_CrisprBact_48h.jpeg]]

== News References ==
* Video: bacteria evolving antibiotic resistance in 11 days. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yybsSqcB7mE
* Video: CRISPR Patent Controversy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IboHEQumDGc

File:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan CrisprBact 48h.jpeg

2018-01-27T02:01:12Z

Summakor: Plate 8, Strep-Kan Agar, after being swirled with modified bacteria and growing for 48 hours. No growth is observed, unlike in plain Agar. The result suggests the bacteria survived the procedure but their genome was NOT modified to be resistant to stre...

Plate 8, Strep-Kan Agar, after being swirled with modified bacteria and growing for 48 hours. No growth is observed, unlike in plain Agar. The result suggests the bacteria survived the procedure but their genome was NOT modified to be resistant to streptomycin as we'd hoped.

File:CRISPR-180112-Agar Bact 48h.jpeg

2018-01-27T01:59:34Z

Summakor: Plate 1, plain Agar, after being swirled with modified bacteria and growing for 48 hours. The result shows a significant number of bacteria survived the transformation process and grow on plain Agar as expected.

Plate 1, plain Agar, after being swirled with modified bacteria and growing for 48 hours. The result shows a significant number of bacteria survived the transformation process and grow on plain Agar as expected.

File:CRISPR-180112-StrepKan blank 48h.jpeg

2018-01-27T01:56:42Z

Summakor: Plate 8, Strep-Kan Agar, after sitting at ambient temperature for 48 hours. No growth is observed, showing no contamination was introduced in the preparation.

Plate 8, Strep-Kan Agar, after sitting at ambient temperature for 48 hours. No growth is observed, showing no contamination was introduced in the preparation.

File:CRISPR-180112-Agar blank 48h.jpeg

2018-01-27T01:55:55Z

Summakor: Plate 1, plain Agar, after sitting at ambient temperature for 48 hours. No growth is observed, showing no contamination was introduced in the preparation.

Plate 1, plain Agar, after sitting at ambient temperature for 48 hours. No growth is observed, showing no contamination was introduced in the preparation.

Regular Member Meeting 2017 12 12

2017-12-13T02:09:21Z

Summakor: /* Adjournment */ asdf

[[Category:Meeting Minutes]] {{TOCright}}

== Time and Location ==
:Date
:Called to order at 8:12 pm by Julia
:Members present: Ken, Kevin, Julia, Bobby, Enrique
:Members remote: Tom
:Others present: Rob
:[[Quorum]]
:: Quorum met? No

== Approval of Previous Meeting's Minutes ==
Approved.

== Recognition ==
Ken facilitated a meeting with DC Govt and National Makers organization, see proposal below.

== New Members ==
Rob R. was a member a number of years ago and is coming back. Works for a USAID contractor, using maker tools and approaches to apply to international development. Rob voted in unanimously.

== Old Business ==

== New Business ==
=== Pursue a grant - [https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2018/nsf18520/nsf18520.htm Smart and Connected Communities (S&CC)] and [[DC_Community_Hackerspaces|Neighborhood Artisan Centers (NACs)]] ===
Ken is proposing that HacDC submit a '''letter of intent''' and '''proposal''' to the National Science Foundation, bidding on their [https://www.nsf.gov/pubs/2018/nsf18520/nsf18520.htm "Smart and Connected Communities (S&CC)"] (Program Solicitation: NSF 18-520), in cooperation with '''[https://nationofmakers.us/ Nation of Makers]''' and the DC government's '''[https://apia.dc.gov/release/mayor-bowser-open-safer-stronger-dc-office-neighborhood-safety-and-engagement Safer, Stronger DC Community Partnerships]'''.
* '''DEADLINES:'''
** January 30, 2018: '''Letter of Intent'''
** February 28, 2018: '''Full Proposal Deadline'''
* '''TL;RL:''' The goal of the NSF Smart and Connected Communities (S&CC) program solicitation is to accelerate the creation of the scientific and engineering foundations that will enable smart and connected communities to bring about new levels of economic opportunity and growth, safety and security, health and wellness, and overall quality of life. This goal will be achieved through integrative research projects that pair advances in technological and social dimensions with meaningful community engagement.
* '''The pot:''' $19,250,000 divided between 7 to 15 bidders
* '''Work in progress:''' [https://docs.google.com/document/d/1UxZ_VBHbBEJ9fVJN7rdwqIjmKjv-HTKhiVUrSnDJta4/ A Concept for Neighborhood Artisan Centers]
* '''Additional information:''' [[DC_Community_Hackerspaces|Neighborhood Artisan Centers (NACs)]]

== [[:Category:Project_Awesome|Project Awesome]] Reports ==

=== Project SUPPLIES - Mirage ===

=== Project EXPANSION - Mirage ===

=== Project HAMRADIO - Jeff ===

=== Project Electron Microscope (SEM) - Enrique ===
Using isopropyl alcohol we located a leak where the column connects to the side vacuum tube (the tube leading up to the gun on the side of the column). Confusingly, the application of alcohol helped the pressure fall quite a bit from 4000mTorr to about 500mTorr. Also the turbo pump did not slow down, which is great. However the desired pressure is closer to 10mTorr (check units on OEM indicator). We only let it pump for less than an hour. It wouldn't be unreasonable to let it pump for 24 hours to see if it improves. Moisture is very time-consuming to remove once it's wandered its way into every nook and cranny, which is why SEMs are generally kept under vacuum with the pumps on 24/7. The good news is major leaks in other areas were ruled out, including the main door seal. EDX flange, blank flange, gauge itself and the gun seal. We should consider connecting the pump exhaust to the laser cutter exhaust to vent oil fumes that make it past the filter (they can be smelled in the room). - Enrique

Also identified all (but one) of the parts to the backscatter detector system. Reverse-engineered and wrote schematics and took photos of it all. We can now design and assemble a better amplifier for it. Julia acquired an identical backscatter system off eBay. Working with two other people reverse-engineering SEMs to make them open-source. Also found someone in CA with two of the same model we have. - Julia

=== Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) -Julia ===
Nothing to report. James is leaving soon too.

=== Project CRISPR -Enrique ===
We've contacted the CRISPR kit supplier who previously offered to send us a new version of the kit ingredients to arrange delivery for early January. Our plan is to perform the CRISPR experiment as soon as the kit arrives to avoid questions of storage temperature.

=== Project SpaceBlimp -Enrique ===
Quite a bit of progress in defining the project long-term goals and ramping up for a launch sometime in late January. We are having biweekly meetings, posted on MeetUp and in conjuction with the Rockville makerspace with whom we do a videoconference. The next meeting is 12/20 and should be a worknight to assemble payloads we're pretty sure we want to include in the next launch. It looks like we'll include a gyroscopic stabilizer, several Raspberry PI zeros with cameras (1080p video) and there's interest in building a Muon detector. Several of us also visited the University of Maryland's balloon launch team; it's a one-credit class for engineering college students and they launch between 6-10 balloons every year. We have several people who want to bring Spaceblimp to area schools, so we've drafted a long-term plan to allow school students to choose, design and build their own payloads for future Spaceblimp launches (8+, 7 will be a demo/practice for ourselves). Bringing this project to schools is also a way to fund many future Spaceblimp launches.

=== Project Media Outreach - Matt ===

=== Project IT Infrastructure - Tom ===

== Member Reports ==

* A wee bit of progress has been made with software to talk to the SEM. It's moving towards a "pronsole-like" interface. ([[User:Ubuntourist|Ubuntourist]])

== Director Reports (Governance related stuff) ==

=== President's Report ===

=== Vice President's Report ===

I have the core switch back up and able to be managed. HacDC VLANs are now correctly applied. We still need to rebuild the rest of the building's network.

We on the Admin team have provided tech support for several wireless connectivity issues to the Church office and some tenants.

Other than that -- we have generally had a month or two of setbacks, and not much progress. I would still like to provide a number of upgrades to HacDC and the church, but the line we had on a donation of locking rack which was to help make all this happen went sideways.

=== Treasurer's Report ===

=== Secretary's Report ===

=== Director-at-Large Reports ===

==== Kevin ====

==== Matt ====

== Adjournment ==
Adjourned by at 9:09pm by Julia

Regular Member Meeting 2017 12 12

2017-12-13T01:46:59Z

Summakor: /* Project Optical Table Robot (OTR) -Julia */ asdf