ECE 220 Fall 2008

Lab Policy

PLEASE NOTE THE PRELAB PAPER
DEADLINE OF FRIDAYS AT 4 p.m.
(SUBMIT PAPERS to the Faculty Support Center (ECE 255))

Instructor: Dr. Robin N. Strickland, strickland@ece.arizona.edu

Lab TAs: See main web page

Labs are held in room ECE 311. Prelab lectures/demos are held on Tuesday (9:30 a.m. - 10:20 a.m.) mornings in our regular classroom. (See p. 10 of course syllabus.)

Your lab section belongs to either the Week 1 or Week 2 group. See Lab Sections.

Procedures/Policies
  1. Attend the prelab lecture for your lab group, namely Week 1 or Week 2. (The schedule of dates is shown on p. 10 of the course syllabus.) The prelab requires the preparation of a report.
  2. Prelab reports are to be handed in at ECE 255 on or before 4 p.m. on Friday of the same week. At the same time, you will be asked to sign a sheet to prove that you handed in your report.
  3. Attend your lab section the week following prelab week and complete the required experiments.
  4. Everyone works individually.
  5. Wear the provided safety goggles at all times.
  6. Write your data in the provided prelab table. Have your TA check your data and initial the data sheet(s).
  7. The TA will give each student a brief test on instrument skills listed in the prelab.
  8. While recording your results, keep in mind the following guidelines:

    Look over the numbers. Do the data appear reasonable? Do some data points appear to be way off the mark? Do the data confirm what you predicted in the prelab? You should be prepared to explain any discrepancies between prelab (theoretical) and experimental (practical) results.

  9. Answer the questions in the Experiment section of the lab in your lab report.
  10. Provide a thorough and thoughtful answer to each Question given at the end of each experiment. These are worth the most points of any part of the lab.
  11. Typed lab reports are required, with circuit schematics drawn using PSpice.
  12. The lab report, including the TA-initialed data sheets, are due at your next scheduled lab.

Grading

Each lab is worth 70 points. The Prelab/Pspice exercises are worth 30 points, and the lab report, experimental results, and results of the instrument skills test will constitute the remaining 40 points. The six labs make up 20% of your semester grade. Extra credit of 2 points/lab and 1 point/prelab are available for work that is exceptional in terms of organization, completeness, neatness and presentation.

Late Penalty (Submit papers to Faculty Support Center ECE 255)

Prelab Papers: 25% penalty for submission between 4 p.m. and 4:50 p.m. on Friday. 50% penalty for submission on Monday before 9 a.m.
Lab Reports: Lab reports are due at the start of your next regularly scheduled lab. Late reports are not accepted without permission from Dr. Strickland, and there must be an exceptional reason.

Lab Report Format

The report must be typed, and circuit schematics must be drawn using PSpice and pasted into your document. The lab report must consist of:

  1. Title page.

    2. Experiment #

    Title of experiment

    Your name

    Date

    TA’s name

  2. Statement of Objectives.

    3. In your own words, write one or two sentences describing the objective of each part of the experiment, e.g.

    Objective for part 1… …

    Objective for part 2 … … etc.

  3. Results & Analysis.
    4.

    Each experiment is divided into several parts. In this section you must list/graph/tabulate your measurements and answer the given question(s). There is no need to restate the procedures you followed, since this is discussed in the lab assignment

    i.e.

    Part 1: Measurements (tables, graphs)

    Answers to given questions...

    Part 2: Measurements (tables, graphs)

    Answers to given questions... etc.

  4. Summary & Conclusions
    5.

    This section summarizes the experiment as a whole.

    This section should include:

    How well were the objectives from the Statement of Objectives met?

    Discrepancies between theory and experiment.

    Any noteworthy observations and adjustments made during the experiment.

    Problems encountered.

    Suggestions for improving the experiment.

  5. Initialed Data Sheets.
    6.

 

 

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Last modified: August 5, 2008