Club Innovations

[griffindm]

Things in the Club forum have gotten a little stale. I would love to hear from clubs that are innovating how they achieve their mission. Please take a moment to add any relevant ideas or changes you are implementing and how they are being received.

I'll start.

Baltimore Fencing Center has moved to Clubexpress for website management. This integrates forums, a storefront, and other useful features for a reasonable price. We have only taken baby steps so far, and are having a little trouble getting members to use the new site, but it holds promise for improving club communications and marketing.

We have also been updating our facilities from a technical perspective. In our Columbia facility we have added home-built LED extension lights for our SG-11 fencing boxes. These now allow spectators and coaches to follow the action on all strips from a central location. No more blind spots where boxes face a wall. I will make a posting in the Armory section in a couple of days outlining the parts list, pricing, and photos of these lights.

We are also permanently mounting our video replay system in the ceiling, which allows for a larger image on the wall and removes the current mount from sight-lines. Now used for both classes and open bouting, we will also add video recording, Youtube fencing video broadcasts for tactical classes, and even movie nights with fencing-based themes. The students like the system, but we hope with the additional changes it will become even more useful.

I look forward to hearing from other clubs on their innovations. Let's build on each others successes.

Dave G.

[noodle]

http://www.squarespace.com imo.

[griffindm]

http://www.squarespace.com imo.

Looks interesting, but from the website, I cannot see if it supports forum and storefront functionality out of the box, or whether it just makes it easier to program.

Are you using it?

[noodle]

Looks interesting, but from the website, I cannot see if it supports forum and storefront functionality out of the box, or whether it just makes it easier to program.

Are you using it?

personally, no. but yes, it does, afaik.

[jjefferies]

We have also been updating our facilities from a technical perspective. In our Columbia facility we have added home-built LED extension lights for our SG-11 fencing boxes. These now allow spectators and coaches to follow the action on all strips from a central location. No more blind spots where boxes face a wall. I will make a posting in the Armory section in a couple of days outlining the parts list, pricing, and photos of these lights.

Will be very interested in this thread once you get it up. Also could you pass along information about where you got the leds, I'm hoping they're the extra bright kind.

[griffindm]

Will be very interested in this thread once you get it up. Also could you pass along information about where you got the leds, I'm hoping they're the extra bright kind.

I used 10 cm LED strips, available from multiple vendors (mostly from Hong Kong) on eBay. They contain 12 LEDs and are 12VDC and run anywhere from $2.50 - $7.50 per strip, depending on vendor and sale offerings. They are more than bright enough for the job. They are flexible as well. I used this to work them into circular shapes for the lights.