2025 Meeting Minutes

September 3, 2025 MMAC Club Meeting Minutes

Zoom Meeting only with 5 members present

Meeting called to order at 6:08PM by President Dennis Batty

Tim Brockman gave secretary report

Andy Ringlien gave the treasurer’s report.  Bank balance remains stable

OLD BUSINESS:

Tim gave a report on delivering the thank you cards to land owners. He received a positive reaction. The cards were given to Central Turf Farms where we fly and KLM Farms that owns the land north of Central Turff. Andy said it would be good to find out who owns the land south of Central Turf. Also, he said we should contact Central Turf to verify rules for driving etc. Tim will reach out and contact them.

NEW BUSINESS:

Dennis gave dates for indoor meets, Nov 9, Dec 14, Jan 11, Feb 15, March 15 and April 12. Andy mentioned it would be nice to have some practice time. Dennis will look into that. Dennis also mentioned he had contacts at Cedar Valley Church in Bloomington and they have an area that would be a nice indoor flying site. He will contact them to see if that is a possibility. 

There was some discussion about the proposed rule changes that were published in the recent NFFS newsletter.

SHOW AND TELL:

Jim showed some ribs he had 3D printed.

Meeting adjourned at 7:10 pm.

August 6, 2025 MMAC Club Meeting Minutes

Zoom Meeting only with 7 members present

Meeting called to order at 6:03PM by President Dennis Batty

There was no Secretary’s Report as Secretary Tim Brockman was absent.

Andy Ringlien gave the treasurer’s report.  $100 in contest income and not expenses the past month.

Dennis Batty gave a report on 2025 Free Flight Nationals in Muncie, Indiana.  Good week.  Good flying.  Good weather except for rain on Friday afternoon.  The metal count went as follows:

Bill Kuhl:  2nd place – 1/2A Nostolgia Payload, 3rd place – PeeWee 30

Tim Brockman:  3rd place – Andrade Rubber,  3rd place – Jimmy Allen

Dennis Batty:  3rd place – Vintage Wakefield, 2nd place – Large Nostolgia Rubber.

Contest day for August was discussed at some length. We decided to wait until Thursday to make the call because of the chance of rain on Saturday.

Some time was spent discussing the club meeting day of the month and the time of day as well as the format, Zoom or in-person.  For the time being it was decided to stay with the present day of the month as the first Wednesday and the same time: 6:00PM.  For the time being the meeting will remain just Zoom meetings.  We discussed the possibility of having the club meeting as part of the contest day as another possibility.  The desire was expressed to have at least one in person meeting sometime during the year.

Input from the club on events and format for the up-coming indoor season contests.  Everyone seems to be happy with the Sunday afternoon contest time.  Two other things were brought up and discussed.

1.      Having a 30 minute window during contest for just ultralight airplane flying.

2.      Having a mass launch event for Phantom Flash and making it a winner takes all pot event where anyone wanting to fly put in a buck or two.

MMAC July 9, 2025 Club Meeting Minutes (Zoom Meeting)

Meeting called to order by president Dennis Batty at 6:08PM. 

5 members were online

Secretary Tim Brockman reported that the info on the website is up to date. The meeting move from July 2nd and Zoom only was posted. He has added a photo carousal to the front page of the website to make it more interesting and also keeps a banner with current information so that anyone that goes to the website can see that it is current. 

Andy gave a treasurers report. Funds remain stable.

Old Business

No old business was discussed

New Business

Dennis will start working with LILA at the end of August to set up the indoor contests for 2025-2026.

Show & Tell

Jim showed stuff he had made with his 3D printer and talked about various uses for it.

Tim showed his Last Resort and another plane he made for Andrade rubber competition at NATS. He and his wife also gave a demo of their new laser cutter.

Dennis showed his new plane he made using an F1G wing he had.

Meeting adjourned at 7:20 pm

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MMAC June 4, 2025 Club Meeting Minutes

Meeting called to order by president Dennis Batty at 6:20PM. 

Tim and Dennis were the only two present at the library, Jim, Matt and Ken were present online

Tim Brockman reported that the info on the website is up to date.

No treasurers report since Andy was not there but Dennis said club finances were stable.

Old Business

Dennis said the results of how to do the point system for this year were in and the consensus was to keep things the way they have been in the past.

Dennis did up the contest sheet for this summers events and emailed it to the club. Basically the same as last year except there are new WoJoRo rules.

Dennis mentioned it would be nice to do a mass launch event. There was some discussion that we could start that this year.

New Business

There was discussion about changing the meeting to a Zoom meeting only as the last 2 meetings only Tim and Dennis showed up at the library. Also discussion about changing the day of the meeting. Dennis will send out an email asking the whole club what they think.

Show & Tell

Dennis showed his new P30 that he built with the rolled tube he showed last time.

Meeting adjourned at 6:55 pm

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MMAC May 7, 2025 Club Meeting Minutes

Meeting called to order by president Dennis Batty at 6:03PM. 

Tim and Dennis were the only two present at the library, Andy, Don, Gary P, Drew, and Bill were present online.

Tim Brockman reported that the info on the website is up to date.

Andy Ringlien gave short treasurer’s report.  The club is financially solid with all known expenses for the year paid.  Bank balance of $3,169.  

Old Business

Dennis sent out a ballot for how to do points. It lists 3 options. Option 1 is to do it like last year (except for changes already stated for WoJoRo). Option 2 is have all of the events that we normally have but only count 6 scores towards club total. Option 3 is to only have 6 events each contest varying which events we have. There was a lot of discussion and questions about this with most of them centering around variations of option 2. People should let Dennis know their preference via email.

New Business

There was no new business

Show & Tell

Dennis showed a rolled tube fuselage he built. He also showed an Earl Stahl Gypsy that he had built over the winter.

Drew mentioned that he bought a Comgrove Z1 10 watt laser cutter and was working with it. It has a 16x16 bed. He uses Q-Cad and Inkscape and there was talk of DXF and DWG files.

Meeting adjourned at 6:53pm

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MMAC April 2, 2025 Club Meeting Minutes

Meeting called to order by president Dennis Batty at 6:00PM

Tim Brockman was absent so no secretary’s report was given.

Andy Ringlien gave s quick short treasurer’s report.  The club is financially solid with club AMA re-chartering, insurance and contest sanctions all paid for the coming year and outdoor season.  Andy also reported income slightly up from contest fees from a larger number of attendees.  Bank balance of $2,600+.  Motion to approve by Ron Cota, Second by Gary Peterson.  Motion carried.

Old & New Business

The balance of the meeting was spent talking about the upcoming outdoor contest season, contest scoring methods and event rules

Outdoor Contest Dates

The Outdoor Contest dates as follows are sanctioned by the AMA as two (Saturday & Sunday) events so that we as a club have the option of holding the contest on either Saturday or Sunday depending on the weather.  Typically they will be held on Saturday unless the weather does not cooperate.  We will make the call to change it to Sunday by Thursday evening. President Dennis will send out an email to the club making the change and Tim Brockman will also post the change on the Website.

Outdoor Contest Schedule (all dates are Saturdays, 2nd Saturday of the month)

June 8

July 12

August 9

September 13

October 11

These are preceded by our May 10 Fun Fly. 

Someone mentioned that maybe it should be renamed something like, “Slogging Through May”, referring I think to the endless process of trimming to get planes to fly right, or is it left?

Contest Scoring Options

We discussed in some detail some options for Contest scoring.  I had sent out and email on Wednesday morning, April 2nd that Andy and I had previously discussed and he had typed up.  I am including the test of that email in the minutes, as we spent considerable time discussing these options.

Andy Ringlien and I spent some time last evening working through some possibilities for club contest point options.  Below is the gist of what we came up with and Andy typed up for your consideration.  We will discuss this at tonight’s April club meeting and vote on it sometime in the next month, well in advance of the first outdoor contest.  Feel free to suggest changes or other options and put them out there for the club members to discuss.

MMAC 2025 Club Point options

     1.   No Changes from 2024: 

o    All events MMAC flies are flown at each outdoor contest

o    All events entered count towards MMAC club points

o    Score one point for making a flight in the event and 1 point for each person you beat.  When less than 3 people in the event, 3 pts to win, 2 pts to finish second

o    No penalty for making less than three flight

o    High-Start towline (WoJoRo) will be a $5(?) cash event, no club points, enter as many times as you want $5 each entry. Andy will seed the pot with $25

Pros:  Your favorite events are always available.  Can encourage building more airplanes of different types so others don’t get easy wins in unpopular categories.

Cons: Exhaustion, insanity, high stress trying to fly maximum quantity. Tends to remove free-*time to collaborate, help newcomers, time other peoples’ flights.  Tends to reduce quality in favor of quantity.

1.        User picks 6(?) events, prior to flying, to count towards their MMAC club-points

o    Score one point for making a flight in the event and 1 point for each person you beat.  When less than 3 people in the event, 1 bonus point for making all three flights

o    High-Start towline (WoJoRo) will be a $5(?) cash event, no club points, enter as many times as you want $5 each entry. Andy will seed the pot with $25

Pros:  Provides a chance for strategy – pick popular events or pick events only you fly.   Should encourage building more airplanes of different types so others don’t get easy wins. Should free up time to help newcomers fly/learn, talk with and watch others fly, time other peoples’ flights…   Should allow those will smaller fleet to compete for club championship.  Don’t have to load-up the entire fleet.

Cons: May not provide more head-to-head competition than current format

2.       Club lists 6(?) events each contest that will count towards club points, the list of events will rotate each contest with every event on the list at least twice each year

o    Score one point for making a flight in the event and 1 point for each person you beat.  When less than 3 people in the event, 3 pts to win, 2 pts to finish second

o    No penalty for making less than three flights

o    High-Start towline (WoJoRo) will be a $5(?) cash event, no club points, enter as many times as you want $5 each entry. Andy will seed the pot with $25

Pros:  Should provide the most head-to-head competition.  Should encourage building more airplanes of different types. Should free up time to help newcomers fly/learn, talk with and watch others fly, time other peoples’ flights…   Should allow those will smaller fleet to compete for club championship. Don’t have to load-up the entire fleet.

Cons: Some contest event lists may not include many/enough of the events you fly.  Bad weather could mean some events are not even flown all season

The test of the email contains three distinct options summarized below.  There may be others.  You are encouraged to articulate your ideas and present them to the club members via the email thread.  My plan is to put together a ballot and publish to the club on Wednesday, April 23rd, a week from this coming Wednesday and two weeks before the next club meeting on May 7th.  That would everyone two weeks after the ballot is published to ponder and cast a vote.  I want everyone to have a chance to vote, not just those who attend the club meeting.

(End of Contest Scoring Options)

Other Business

Matt Decker suggested that we put together, as a club, a list of airplane plans, kits and sources for them for new and not so new members who may want to venture into flying in new events (for them).  As of the writing of these notes several of you have already started putting information on the email thread.  Keep those ideas and information coming.  Eventually we should have a spot on the website where this can be a resource anyone looking for information.

Andy has put together a “rule book” for the club for the events that we fly.  We will discuss this in more detail at the next club meeting and eventually publish it on the website.

Meeting Adjourned at 7:00PM.

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March 12 , 2025 CLUB MEETING MINUTES

Meeting called to order at 6:09 PM by President Dennis Batty

Present in person:  Tim B., Dennis B., and Ron C.

Present via Zoom:  Jim, Bill, Don and others

Tim gave a secretary report. Minutes of the February meeting  and contest results have been posted on the club website. A new banner at the top of the home page lists the current upcoming meeting and contest date.

Andy was not present so no treasurers report

OLD BUSINESS

Dennis has not yet gotten sanctions for outdoor events. There will be 5 outdoor events on the 2nd Saturday of the month with the weather day being Sunday.

There was mention of how great it was to have 9 contestants at the last meet. Mark Robotti, an AMA assistant vice president for our area, was at the meet.

There was continued discussion about the number of events at our outdoor contests and how to do points. The general consensus was to continue to have the same events as we have had for the past several years. There was additional discussion about how to do points. Question was raised, should we pick 4 evetns for scoring? We will continue discussion about how to do points.

NEW BUSINESS

Jim talked about having an FAC event at our outdoor contests. Perhaps a mass launch event. There seemed to be general interest in a mass launch event.

There was no show and tell and meeting was adjourned at 7:00 pm.

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February 5 , 2025 CLUB MEETING MINUTES

Meeting called to order at 6:00 PM by President Dennis Batty

Present in person:  Matt D, Tim B., Dennis B., and Ron C.

Present via Zoom:  Jim, Gary P., Andy and 2 new people Ken and Drew

Minutes of the January meeting  and contest results have been posted on the club website by Secretary Tim Brockman.

Treasurer’s report by Andy Ringlien. Club balance remains consistent, simular to last month. Motion to accept the report by Gary Peterson, seconded by Jim Jorgenson.  Motion carried.

OLD BUSINESS

Election of officers. Dennis B. to stay President, Tim B. Secretary, and Gary O. Vice President. Gary O. was not present as he had shoulder surgery and is recovering.

NEW  BUSINESS

Dennis sent out dates for summer contests. Will do the same as last year with Saturday the primary day and Sunday the backup day. Dennis will get sanctions and insurance. Dennis made contact with the owners of the sod farm. It appears no Christmas card / gift was given to them this year. Dennis will look into it.

There was discussion about outdoor events. How many events should count for club champ points. No decisions were made and discussion will continue at March meeting.

Andy announced the High Start as the WoJoRo event for this year.

SHOW AND TELL

Dennis showed off his Bleriot

Meeting adjourned at 7:07 pm

The next indoor contest is Sunday, March 9 at 2:00PM at Lakes International Language Academy in Forest Lake.

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