DARLING DOWNS SOARING CLUB INCORPORATEDddsc.org.au/private/meeting_minutes/Minutes-2014-04-13-C.pdf · DARLING DOWNS SOARING CLUB INCORPORATED Committee Meeting Minutes 13 April 2014

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DARLING DOWNS SOARING CLUB INCORPORATED

Committee Meeting Minutes 13 April 2014

McCaffrey Airfield

1. Meeting was opened at 9:00am

Present: Jenny Thompson (C), David Nash, Richard Hoskings, Barry Jeffrey,

Kerry Klein, Sarah Thompson, Rob Gould, Chris Guy

Apologies: Bob Flood and Denis Lambert

2. Jenny Thompson moved that the previous meeting minutes be accepted as read.

Seconded by Richard Hosking. CARRIED

3. Business arising from Meeting Minutes

a. Nil.

4. Summary Reports

a. Safety Officer

i. SO’s report Attached

b. Presidents Report

i. Current focus has been on housekeeping like updating forms,

insurances, etc. A lot of inconsistency in terminology etc.

ii. Will write to Brad Ansty Re outstanding DDSC Debt

c. Club Development Officer

i. Toowoomba Show – at least 1 potential new member. Consider a

presence again next year

ii. Dalby Chamber of Commerce – consider a presentation followed with

a student education session at the High school.

iii. Region Shows – investigate whether DDSC should have a presence at

these (Miles/Chinchilla/Dalby/Etc)

iv. Chronicle Paper (Toowoomba region) – get added to the “10 things to

do this weekend”.

v. Testimonials – Sarah setting a place where visitor testimonials can be

added. Already collected a few

vi. Cadets – disappointing no progress in this area. Bureaucracy within

the cadets appears to be the problem

vii. Visitors – Introduce gliding clubs with limited/no cross country

potential to visit DDSC. Try and do it at the same time as other visits,

due to DDSC resourcing constraints...

viii. Grant Funding - Follow-up leads

ix. Family Day – investigate and submit proposal


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d. Treasurer

i. Report Attached

ii. Stock take of Bar complete. Report to be advised (should be

interesting)

iii. 100 hourly on SWR is the next major expenditure expected

iv. Old Shirts – It was agreed to liquate the old stock at $10 each, since

rebranding (in progress) will make these obsolete.

v. Extra logbooks needed in office (Ordered – DN 15/4)

e. Secretary Report

i. Report Attached

ii. Community Register established to maintain contact with our

neighbours and the community. Kerry has a list of all the neighbours

and we aim to have a single point of contact for each. Secretary to

setup in DROPBOX

iii. Mini Comp –

1. Ring John Ennis to set rules for AGM presentation

2. 1st place award only (others places can be mentioned only)

3. Presentation limited to 5 min maximum.

4. New format required for next year

f. CFI

i. Report Attached

g. Tug Master

i. SWR – back next week from 100 hourly/engine rebuild. The plan is

for this to go to Goondiwindi Easter Comp.

ii. Compressor Fixed (Thanks Bob)

h. Airworthiness Officer

i. RI – back from Rodger

ii. QX – back from Rodger. After an extensive investigation, no reason

for the control-lockup could be found. Flew at Warwick last week

(Cadets)

iii. Puches- be aware of an AD requiring the rear seat to be lifted to

inspect under (see back of maintenance release)

iv. adding errors continue to be a problem in the maintenance releases.

v. One Puch will be refurbished from mid July. Scope to be developed

and booked into Rogers

i. Webmaster

i. New ‘branded’ hats ordered

ii. Training Panel to be presented with new shirt options (as part of

rebranding). Long sleave (?) with ‘Instructor’ on it (TBC)


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iii. After old shirts are ‘disposed’, new shirt orders will be taken from

members

5. Current Business

a. Nil

6. New Business

a. Membership ~70 flying members (cf with GFA DDSC has 74 Flying members (total of

82))

b. Debentures

i. Debentures can be generated and developed quite quickly

ii. 5 year plan to be developed, such that ‘member investors’ can see

where the money is planned to be spent. Plan will be updated

periodically (ie rolling plan)

c. Fleet Upgrade

i. Discus

1. Kingaroy club contacted- Not interested in selling either CS

2. Maddock’s B is made-up from a couple of ‘wrecks’. The hours

on these are quite different making future maintenance

compliance difficult – therefore not recommended

3. The CS isn’t owned by Maddock’s yet (Shinzo). Glider is still in

Narromine and needs a thorough inspection before any

decision can be made

4. Discus 2B is too expensive ($150k) and its performance only

slightly superior. Need to keep looking for a good second-

hand Discus B or CS.

ii. LS7

1. LKSC showed initial interest, but have now gone quite

2. Until a replacement (Discus) can be source, it won’t be

advertised

iii. Puch

1. JT to make contact with other gliding clubs with older training

gliders (Blanik, etc).

2. They may be interested in purchasing a Puch as a replacement

d. Tug Options

i. Need to maintain both tugs at least until Bob ward’s option is proven

or otherwise

ii. Both Tugs need slightly more money/maintenance to get on-top-of

fabric issues, etc. The tug ‘cost centre’ seems to support this;

however small increases in future tow changes may be necessary.

iii. Full report attached

e. Rebranding

i. Signs – Quote to upgrade 4 existing sign – KK to action


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f. Future Development Approval

i. (Council Approval) Due to expire shortly. We will let it lapse (as

recommended by Jo Davis & others). New approval will need to be

sought.

g. Club Rules

i. Continue with tidy-up (terminology, positions on Committee, etc)

ii. Tidy up Proxy Voting and introduce ‘Post Votes’

iii. Add emails are a valid form of communicating a meeting,

nominations, etc

iv. Secretary to action

h. Credit Card Surcharge

i. The 3% surcharge should be applied to every credit card transaction,

including TIFs

i. Windsock

i. 2 proposals were table, both comprehensive. Bob Ward (DDSC) and

G&S Industry.

ii. After a brief discussion, it was decided to accept the G&S Industry

proprietary solution, on the basis it meet DDSC OH&S obligations and

planning compliance

j. Hangar Request

i. Robert Hart requested a hangar place for Alice (Nimbus 2)

ii. After reference to DDSC Hangar policy and available space, his

request was denied (not a DDSC member and no space for a Nimbus

size glider).

7. General Business

a. Tug Master Honour Board

i. No Tug Master Honour Board

ii. DN to discuss with Libby

8. Meeting Closed at 11:30am

Next meeting 24th May.


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CSO Report

Committee Meeting Sun 13th April 2014

Safety Management Plan has been submitted to GFA

Safety Management System still in progress. This will outline our procedures to

comply with the SMP and include our current SOP Flying. Denis and Bob will

collaborate on this after Easter.

Parachute section of SMS has been implemented. Copy has been placed on Chute

cupboard and on door of Pie Cart. An article submitted for Chaotic outlining new

procedures.

White board listing chutes; capacity; repack dates and damage reports etc.

Emergency Evacuation procedures Card has been placed in each of the bunk rooms.

Steps to bunk rooms and club house from briefing room and annex have had leading

edges painted yellow, following a report about Griffo having difficulty.

Switch board in western hangar has been repaired and compressor repaired also.

Still need need to establish a Safety Committee which will meet every 3 months and

include:

o CSO

o CFI

o AWO

o Tugmaster or rep

o General member

o To be actioned after Easter

Next steps

o Complete writing SMS (Training Panel/CFI reviewing current SOP Flying)

o Complete Risk Analysis and establish Risk Register

o Review SAR Register (Spot)

o Establish reporting procedures

o Training register (Flying and facilities)

o Review Emergency Response Plan

o Annual test of ERP

o Annual confidential safety survey

o Electrical Safety Audit (will need to engage electrician)

o Oxygen storage facility. (Where?)

o Other stuff I haven’t thought of.

Bob Flood


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Treasurer’s Report

Hi All,

We are now more than ¾ of the way through the financial year – actually only two months to go.

Attached is a cash flow snapshot through to March 2014 which is an attempt to give a clearer

version of the club’s finances.

This statement gives a brief summary of where our funds were spent and how this expenditure was

financed.

During the year we had two major out of the ordinary outlays

1.The deposit on the new two seater $20007.

2.The not so pleasant outlay of approximately $30k on SWR’s engine recondition.

To briefly explain the cash flow statement – the club’s overall bank balance reduced by $33266

largely due to $20k deposit on two seater and $19k to Suncoast Aero Engines for engine recondition

and the repayment from a members balance of $5k as well as $9k on parachutes this year.

The balance to reinstall the engine + 100 hourly $11k has been paid today.

The statement shows a dramatic drop in the in the members flying balances of $35k which has been

brought about the fact that the annual membership charged in March ($24k) and the gradual

reduction in members reducing their credit balance.

It should be noted that a good number of balances went into arrears but will be corrected on receipt

of their monthly statement and it should be expected that the majority of the subscriptions ($24K)

will hit the bank soon.

Members balances have historically been around $65k.

The tugs have been true to form costing an average of $14000 each per year in the long term.

We are still maintaining increased activity over recent years.

I have attempted to give some insight into our operation and sincerely hope I have not confused

you.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if I have.

I will elaborate more at the next meeting with a more recent update which should reflect a clearer

situation after the subscriptions hit the bank.

Regards

Barry Jeffrey


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Secretary’s Report


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CFI Report for Committee Meeting - 13 Apr 2014

1. Accidents and Incidents – Still getting a steady flow of reports via IRIS. Thanks to those

putting the reports in. Reporting culture good. Details passed to CSO and placed in

Dropbox. Will be in a secure Folder once the details of this are worked out. Collating

data from previous CFI files to provide for a more detailed history.

2. Instructors - Davis Nash Upgraded to Level 1 and Paul Bart upgraded to Level 2. Kerry

Klein upgrade to AEI. Congratulations to all and well deserved. Others being

assessed and may be considered this year.

3. TP – Instructor Notes have been very successful in passing on information about

students to each instructor. Email sent to all club members advising that the notes

are available to each individual students . No requests thus far to see notes from

individual students. Still waiting on Greg Schmidt to reply to my emails about Chads

upgrade to a Coaching Position. Will push it with him at the Easter Comps

4. Easter – Only have requests for two club aircraft so far. Duo Discus (Alain/Peter and

myself) and LS7 (Kerry). Alain will aerotow Duo there and I’ll aerotow back. Duo

should be available Sunday 27 if required for club flying. (weather permitting). 10

DDSC aircraft entered although LS7 not showing on list.

5. Taxonomy Survey Details sent to RTO/OPS concerning possibly scrapping of IRIS and

the introduction of a new system to better allow the trending of data. Further info

TBA once Tony Scarlett has all the returns.

6. Puchacz – I’ll be returning the Puchacz (WQX) sometime Sunday from Warwick

morning via aerotow depending on transports arrangements and also have the

logbook etc.

7. Meeting – Sorry please accept my apologises as I’m still trying to work out transport

arrangements to get back from the Air cadet Camp at Warwick as I’ve been

instructing there since last Sat and can’t guarantee that I’ll be able to make the

meeting.

Cheers

Denis


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Tug master report

Hi all SWR engine is back and being refitted plus the rest of it's annual inspection.

We are having problems with a lot of rust and sediment in the fuel filters so I installed an external

filter to the refuelling pump, unfortunately the air driven pump we have builds to much pressure for

the filter causing it to break I have removed the filter so we can still fuel the tugs. I haven't been

there for a few week but the large compressor for the fuel pump was also caving problems, I was

wondering if fitting a 12 volt fuel pump with a solar charged battery might be an alternative to fixing

the compressor which also be able to handle the fuel filter as well , any way would like to discuss this

at the meeting.

Cheers Rob


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Tug Options – By Tug Master

Glider tug options

Tugs Currently

SWR has just had a bulk strip of its engine, bringing all parts of the engine to within manufacturers'

specification tolerances. The airframe history has been consistently solid with no indicators of

fatigue. The fabric is the only major component requiring attention in the short-term. Dalby Air is

currently metalising the fuselage of a pawnee. This will provide a good indication of the cost and end

result. This modification leaves fabric only on the wings and control surfaces, also providing easier

access to the inside of the fuselage saving time and therefore cost during maintance . The fabric on

the wing is still in fair condition although would benefit from a rejuvenation, entailing approximately

80 hrs of labor plus materials.

MLR's engine is currently at 1/2 life, and may need to be looked at, or at least, commence testing the

oil to try and catch problems in their early stages. The fabric is holding up well since rejuvenation 3

years ago, although will require ongoing maintenance.

Refurbishment of our tugs

A minimal refurb would entail recovering and painting, starting at about $30k. However, once the

fabric is removed damage or corrosion may be found potentially pushing total refurb costs out to

$50k or more.

Replacement

Due to the drought there are relatively large numbers of small ag planes on the market relatively

cheaply. Although there are only a few types suitable for our operation: GA200 Fatman; Piper pawne

235/260; and Piper brave 300.

Currently there is a Brave 300 for sale at Dalby for around $50k, with over 3000 hrs left on the spars,

although the engine has only 300 hrs left to TBO. The Brave 300 is a larger metal version of a

pawnee. More research will have to be done as to whether a MoGas STC could be found.

There are a number of Pawnees currently available, ranging from $45k - $90k. The pick of these has

been completely restored but has been storage for many years, and the fabrics could have started

to degrade. Most of the cheaper Pawnees require the same, or more work then ours.

The GA200 is an Australian made metal pawnee or a converted metalize pawnee (a9/235), most

have an upgraded 250 hp motor. I have found an a9/235-250 for sale for $75k in Victoria , but has

only 300 hrs left on the engine.

Recommendation

Each model has its pros and cons, and each option has drawbacks.


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MLR - at the moment is in pretty good condition, due to the recent maintenance. In order to

manage cost and down time, a maintenance schedule should be implemented in the medium to long

term for the replacement of the fabric on the stabilisers, and metalizing the fuselage and

rejuvenation of the wings.

SWR - The fuselage and tail appendages are showing signs of wear damage although this will be

patched during the next 100 hourly. The fabric on the wings is in fair condition, however the paint

and finish are also showing signs of wear and cracking, exposing the fabric to the elements and

accelerating fabric decay. This will need attention shortly in order to prevent any further damage to

the fabric.

After discussing the condition with Glen and Allister the most economic way forward would be to

rejuvenate the wing fabric and look at metalising the fuselage - involving most of the aircraft being

repainted. This will make SWR a very presentable plane with a solid airframe and good times

remaining on the engine.


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Other Supporting Info

From: Committee [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of David Nash

Sent: Friday, 11 April 2014 4:11 PM

To: [email protected]

Cc: [email protected]

Subject: [Committee] Committee Meeting - Some background to agenda items

(ATTACHMENTS NOT INCLUDED)

Some background info for the Committee Meeting

Wind sock – To replace RWY 30 windsock. The existing windsock is U/S, as is the swivel. The swivel can’t be easly repairs and accessing the windsock to changeout is hazardous

o Bob Ward has proposed a solution ~$1000 est plus installation. This proposal also folds. The design isn’t ‘engineered’

o Commercial Windsock (G&S Industry) $3000 plus installation. This is an engineered solution which folds and lowers to the ground

Discus B o Chad and Robert have done a ‘paper’ evaluation of the Mike Maddock options

The ‘wrecked’ Discus B (2 gliders brought together) isn’t recommended due to the large difference in the hours of each original aircraft

The Discus CS is still owned by Shinzo. This aircraft is in Narromine and can’t be viewed easily.

o also emailed Greg Schmidt to see whether Kingaroy may wish to sell one of theirs. No response

Rules – see attached DRAFT – changes tracked o It is basically a tidy up:

Cl15.1 Add positions of CDO and Safety Officer to Committee Management Cl 18.* & Cl 24.* Replace (everywhere) Instructor Panel with Training Panel Cl 24.6 states the CFI chairs the TP meeting. This isn’t right so this needs to

be reworded (after I understand what happens) Proxy Voting – casused a lot of confusion last year

o And with it an opportunity to make a few other things better (?): Cl 16.2 Suggest we add ‘email’ as a valid way of posting names of candidates

for an AGM. Currently we need to display in the club rooms at least 2 days prior (not always (never!) convenient). Suggested words added to attached.

Cl 31 Was thinking of proposing the introduction of ‘postal votes’ at an AGM/general meeting. It gets over this holding 1 proxy limitation, and if I do up ballot papers like I did last year it is pretty straight forward. It doesn’t help however if we get nominations from the floor at the meeting... In my view the Postal Votes would count towards the quorum (I need expert advice on this). Have a think about this ... maybe not worth the effort, but last year we had a mad flurry of activity trying to find people to hold proxies. Maybe it was just a special year. I haven’t drafted any words here to the attached

David Nash

Secretary - Darling Downs Soaring Club, Qld

Documents

DARLING DOWNS SOARING CLUB INCORPORATEDddsc.org.au/private/meeting_minutes/Minutes-2014-04-13-C.pdf · DARLING DOWNS SOARING CLUB INCORPORATED Committee Meeting Minutes 13 April 2014