ECE 1201 Electronic Measurements and Circuits Laboratory Spring 2014

Writing Laboratory Reports

By Steven P. Jacobs
Many engineers do not write well, often because their undergraduate curriculum required only
one course in which their writing was evaluated critically. For those of you who go on to work as
engineers, it will be important for you to communicate your ideas effectively to your supervisors
and customers. The lab reports you write for this course may be the best opportunity you have to
develop your technical writing skills. This document will give you guidelines on the proper
structure and style for lab reports.

STRUCTURE
Make sure that the structure of the report is correct. It should, but too often does not, contain the
following:
Cover Page: The cover page should show the experiment title and number, the date the
experiment was performed, the date the report was written, and the names of the author(s).
Introduction: A 1-2 paragraph section indicating what the informed reader should know to
understand the report. It should be written in paragraph form, not as an itemized list, and should
not include pages of details. This section may take up no more than one normally filled page. It
will show if you know what the laboratory experiment is all about.
Recall that the Purpose, Procedure, Results and Conclusions are to be repeated for each part
of the experiment. You are also to write a brief Conclusion or Summary for the entire
experiment.
Purpose: What is to be done in this section of the experiment. This is usually very short.
Procedure: Describe exactly what you did. Many students writing reports for the first time need
much more detail in this section, and others unnecessarily clutter the procedure by writing a users
manual for the test equipment. Several examples are given in the DO NOT section below.
Results: This section will contain a summary of the results you obtained in each section of the
lab, and a discussion of those results.

This section will typically contain several figures. They should be numbered, have
descriptive titles, have identifying names and units for any measurements. Describe each
figure in the body text using several complete sentences, written as a paragraph. Never
present any figure without discussing it in the text!

Extensive tables of raw data should be placed in an appendix, or omitted entirely, unless
specifically required by the laboratory assignment. Do not use both tables and graphs to
represent the same information. Choose the best one for the particular situation.

Identify what is important for the reader to note about each result. Were the results
expected, or were they a surprise?

Compare the results of the simulated and actual circuits. Just listing different numbers
side-by-side is not a comparison. Try to offer reasonable arguments for any differences
that exist.

Be sure to answer any questions asked about your results. Make it clear what question
you are answering.

Conclusions: The main things learned in the experiment should be summarized here. The
following are some typical items.

What good or bad results surprised you?

Did you learn anything new about the circuits you designed or the test equipment you
used?

What did you conclude about the laboratory instruments employed, the measurements
procedure, the circuits tested, and your circuit design?

Did you try any additional experimental work and with what results?

References: Be sure to include all human references, text references, and web references that
you used in completing the experiment and writing the report. Don't include circuit components
or test equipment, but do include data sheets or user's manuals, if appropriate.
Appendix: This is a catch-all section for compulsive report writers. Such individuals are seldom
encouraged.

REVISION
Perhaps the most important step in writing any document is editing and revision. After you have
written your report, read what you wrote.

Check for grammar, spelling and similar errors.

Have you included meaningless statements?

Have you used complete sentences or fragmented segments?

Is the report short? Complete? Does it show that you know what you did?

Is each section labeled?

Is there material in one section that does not belong or repeats material from other
sections? Do sections overlap in content?

DO NOT:

Do not use phrases such as "very small", "very large", or "very accurate" where you have
quantitative data and can use numerical values. For example, a milliwatt is a million
times larger than the nanowatt that some semiconductor engineers work with, and it is a
millionth of the kilowatt used by power engineers. So is a milliwatt a "small" amount of
power? Similarly a 1% error when measuring time may be a large error on a daily time
keeping basis (how much is it in minutes?), but if the tolerance of your equipment is
10%, it is a very small error.

Do not refer to zooming in or out on the scope. Indicate what sweep speed was selected
in order to see the appropriate display.

Do not use phrases such as "this experiment demonstrates to the student", "ideal
conditions do not exist", and other meaningless phrases.

Do not use more significant figures than your data warrant.

Do not unnecessarily increase the bulk of the report. A heavy report weighs the instructor
down and makes him grumpy.

Do not produce cluttered graphs. It should be easy for the reader to interpret any figure.

Do not write a set of instructions for someone else to follow. Instead, write it as a
documentation of the steps you performed.
Incorrect: "First, get a 555 timer chip out of your parts kit, and place it on your
protoboard.
"Improvement: "The 555 timer circuit was built for use as a clock, following the
schematic shown in Figure 2. The clock period was set to 500 s, because"

Do not summarize long procedures with one or two sentences. Describe how you did it
(and why) in detail.
Incorrect: "We then used the scope to measure the delays by zooming way in until we
could see where the signals crossed the 50% line and using the cursors."

Improvement: "The delays for each bit of the counter circuit were measured using the
oscilloscope. Channel 1 was connected to observe the clock signal, and"

Do not tell the reader which menus you selected in Max Plus and which buttons you
pressed on the scope. Often a reference to a figure is more appropriate.
Incorrect: "We added two D flip-flops to the schematic by double-clicking on the editor,
and then typing `7474' and hitting return. Next we selected the line tool"
Improvement: "The design for the counter circuit was entered into the Graphic Editor, as
shown in Figure 4. For the D flip-flops, the 7474 component was selected from the Altera
libraries. The Preset and Clear inputs on each package were"

DO:

Use a dictionary, texts on grammar, and a thesaurus to improve your writing skills.

Use specific values rather than general terms, e.g., instead of saying "a high frequency"
specify the frequency as 1 MHz or whatever value you used.

State the % error rather than say a large or a small error. Afterwards you can compare it
with the tolerances of your measurements and then you may say, "It is large compared
to"

Number your pages.

Be neat enough to make your lab report readily comprehensible.

Be as brief as possible, consistent with clarity.