Lab Access
A week after the add/drop date, students enrolled in ECE 3011: ECE Design Fundamentals will automatically be given access to the Van Leer third floor design spaces. This includes 24-hour access to our open equipment and resources. Teams are also allowed to rent a locker for project storage by stopping by the Instructional Labs main office. Lockers are located on the third floor of Van Leer’s West hallway and will be assigned on a first-come first-serve basis.
Purchasing Parts
Students in ECE 3011 are allowed to request parts to be ordered for the purpose of using them in their project. All orders must go through the official procurement process as there will be no reimbursement and the labs will not take responsibility for any payments or POs your team initiates. The ordering period will be announced by your instructor and will end two weeks before the project’s due date. See below for the relevant rules and tips on orders.
Filling Out the Order Form
- All orders must use the official Junior Design Order Form.
- The first order must be brought in to the main office in person. All subsequent orders must go through the online order upload.
- All information at the top of the form must be filled out correctly.
- You may add additional lines to the form as you need them.
- All line items must have a primary and alternate source listed.
- All lines must be filled out for each line item.
Rules on What to Order
- All parts requested must have a use in the project.
- Parts that require payment through PayPal will be rejected.
- Tee shirts and other props for the presentation will not be purchased.
- Any software purchased will be installed on a GT computer.
Ordering Tips
- Make sure the parts you plan on requesting are in stock and able to ship quickly.
- Group your order forms by supplier for faster ordering.
- Check whether the parts are already available in our lab inventory before placing your order.
- Make sure you buy extras of components that are small enough to get lost or fragile enough to break.
- Try to use big-name suppliers for all parts, as smaller sellers may require a two-week wait to process.
- Electronics
- Raw Materials
- PCBs
Borrowing Parts
The Instructional Labs keeps a running stock of commonly-needed electronics and components that are available for checkout. Before submitting an order to the lab staff, we suggest you go through the inventory list and meet with the labs to borrow anything your team might need. The benefit of borrowing parts is that they are instantly available for testing and usage as opposed to order requests, which take time to ship in. All parts more complicated than discrete components that are borrowed from the labs must be returned to the instructional labs at the end of the semester. The lab staff will direct you through the checkout process to determine what needs to be logged and which parts are a good fit for your uses.
Offered Support
Help Classes
The lab staff offers soldering tutorials for ECE 3011 towards the beginning of the semester to help you fill out your basic skills requirement. All of the help classes happen towards the beginning of the semester, and the last workshop will always be a surface mount soldering class, so make sure you don’t wait to look into them. You can sign up for the tutorials here. If you miss all of the labs, we will still provide you with the soldering kit, but we may not have time to provide you with any instruction. You can also look into the Senior Design help classes to see if there are any other skills you may find useful for building your project.
Engineering Support
All of the lab staff are experienced in electronics and prototyping. You can consult us on how to implement your project, what parts to use, and what difficulties to expect. The best times to contact us are in the mornings, before 11AM. We can also help by training you on how to use any of our tools and equipment that you may need for your project.
Returning Projects
All ECE 3011 teams should return their entire projects to their professor according to the syllabus. After submitting your project, you should come to the main lab to return any parts that were not used in the project and to let the lab staff know that the rest of the parts have been returned to your professor. You will need to be sure that everything you have ordered is marked returned by the end of the semester. The labs keeps a running list of everything bought or borrowed, and will expect it all back!
You are allowed to return parts before the end of the semester, but you should be sure that they are properly checked in by a member of the lab staff.