[chbot] CHCH Robotics Group, meeting notes 15 May 2017

[Mark Atherton]

Hello everyone,

Good turnout with 26 attendees, quite a few exhibits, and lots of 
huddles-of tech-talk.

$23 collected and transferred to BR05 account. Associated loose change 
is in the Robotics loose-change box.

The recently prompted email regarding equipment donations to the trading 
table has resulted in quite a pile of ‘new’ equipment. Just to 
reiterate; yes donations are welcome (including cables, hard drives, PCB 
assemblies, lead acid batteries), but no CRTs, printers or toner.

With thanks on behalf of the group,

Mark Atherton

==============
Peter E. turned up with a pile of older computers, and peripherals. 
Enthusiastic engineer-grade-swarming ensued.

Peter H brought in his recovered ‘wall-of-batteries’, which he discussed 
in detail. He also brought along and talked about the charger for his 
Nissan Leaf.

Ben J brought in a remote/processor controlled tracked-vehicle.

Chris brought in some salvaged equipment. This included an interesting 
orange data-logger, possibly 1980s vintage. Unit was based on an INS8900 
CPU, along with a few Kb of EPROM, and much less volatile RAM.

Robin G lead a discussion about home PCB fabrication, with geometries 
down to a few hundred microns.

Andrew talked about his battery charger/discharger based on the Battmon 
II project. New project has a Python GUI, runs on an Raspberry PI and is 
called the Battmon PI