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"I've
been very fortunate
in my life to have found a career
I've worked in the Department
of Electronics in
the UK for ALL
that time. This has given me
My current post can be described as a: Student Project Adviser I
develop electronic designs from their conceptual
level to
I describe my experiences in detail below."
By reading the remainder of this page you should be able to identify my areas of expertise. Students are novices so are bound to make lots of mistakes. My duty is to ensure that they learn from them. If
you see yourself as being like the students described here,
As
well as offering advice I'm ALSO able to undertake
The subjects below are the SAME subjects that our students become experienced in by the time they leave:
I
have Three Technical
Documents that I created originally just for my students. However, I'm
now getting well over 3000 Hits Per Month
on them, so it seems that other people are finding them useful as well.
This Web Page uses a Conceptual Level Approach called Intellectual Property to design a Sequencer Circuit for generating Control Signals.
Clock Recovery in digital receivers traditionally use either Phase Locked or Delay Locked Loops which involve Analogue Circuits. The
method described here is Totally
Digital.
www.lvr.com I now publish this document in Five different forms as:-
There
is a common belief that the less clicks you
have to perform to get your information the
better. They may leave
your Web Page before they've
seen it all.
Hence the reason for my Long Web Page version.
There's also a theory regarding Information Overload. If you present too much information at a time, the reader just can't absorb it all. Therefore these Web Pages were created with a seperate topic per page to overcome this problem, especially as their content is very technical and needs to be interpreted thoroughly. An E-mail Course - CLICK HERE E-mail is claimed to be the Most Powerful of the Internet media being equivalent to the Free Newspaper or Advert posted through your home letterbox/mailbox. The Course is in the form of 14 Daily E-mails ( i.e. 1 per day ) each on a particular topic. Of course, the Web Pages can be viewed by anybody, there's also no guarantee that they'll read them. However with an E-mail Course, you have to Subscribe Voluntarily so there's more chance that recipients of the E-mails will read them. There's also a small bonus to this document type in that you can harvest their E-mail addresses as being a Highly Targeted Group of Individuals. These addresses will then be very useful for informing them of further information in the future. An E-mail Article - CLICK HERE By
monitoring the
traffic to this E-mail Course using the free facility at: I find that some subscribers unsubscribe after 10 or so E-mails. Therefore this document is presented as an E-mail Article to overcome this and is the Complete Course in One E-mail Only. There
are also thousands
of new Web Sites,
Ezines and Newsletters
popping up every month. Therefore there is a demand
for content.
A
Text-Only E-mail Course - CLICK
HERE
This
document form has been requested by several people who only
have access to Text E-Mail.
I have always assumed that nowadays the PC
with
its Web Browser
and Graphics
support is the only way the Internet is accessed. This obviously is not
the case.
Therefore
to address this problem I've created a Text-Only
Version of the E-mail Course. The graphic
image files used in the Web Page Version
of the course are compressed into a single ZIP
file. My
PCB Assembly Techniques has been published
in:
I
felt that my PCB Assembly Techniques Course could be further enhanced with
the ability to "See"
some of the actual techniques being described.
The
Video Show enhances particular sections of the course involved with "Surface
Mount Components" and uses "Video
Clips" to demonstrate these techniques.
There's
also "Audio Narration" which
explains key areas of the videos in more detail.
Take
a look at the Video Show's format at:
I created SmallBuys at: to fill what I feel is a gap in the market. I've had lots of problems trying to acquire small quantities of electronic components for student projects. Companies can't afford to deal with these small orders so impose either a minimum quantity or minimum price order. Companies can improve their customer relations by recommending SmallBuys to these potential customers instead of just turning them away. SmallBuys consolidates requests for small quantities of products so that eventually a minimum quantity/price order can then be placed by SmallBuys directly. For more information on SmallBuys visit my How it Works page at:
Students projects vary in difficulty. Some will have too much content where the student couldn't succeed without my advice and support, to projects that need filling out to give the student a reasonable amount to do. My job is to even out the projects to enable ALL the students to ACHIEVE their maximum potential in the limited time available. After all, there'll learn and remember much more after applying their knowledge practically. Students need guidance in 2 main areas of design:
A common problem with electronic projects is that there is little detail initially. Questions need posing AND answering. e.g.
A feasibility study is planned together with the student. This is achieved by getting them to try and explain to me exactly what he/she thinks the project should achieve. How do we achieve the desired task practically? Their
ideas quite often are not practical
due to their total lack of experience, therefore a considerable amount
of guidance is
required at this stage.
The most common mistake is simply taking on all facts as read. By this I mean accepting information without question. There a 2 main forms of information available nowadays:
Printed Documents These remain static for ever and easy to copyright. Most
of us have grown up with the illusion
This not necessarily true for the designer of today. A Classic Example: Most books in people's possession are usually many years old so will have references to electronic devices that are virtually obsolete. e.g. The 741 Op-Amp This was one of the first op-amps developed and became a classic in its time. However time moves on - but the printed word DOESN'T! Compared to today's modern op-amps it has EVERYTHING wrong:
The Moral of the Story: Always
question the written word.
Last Important Clue: Check to Document's DATE! If
it's MORE than a YEAR OLD then there will
Web Pages Web Pages are DYNAMIC, they are hosted and maintained by manufacturers that offer the BEST and MOST RELIABLE information available. These documents should NEVER be printed! Otherwise
they'll fall into the category above and
A Big BUT: BEWARE! Another Common Mistake: Just because you've found your IDEAL device on a Web Page there are some CRUCIAL questions that need answering:
Students are expected to tackle projects at the design phase and then implement them in hardware. However they have little experience of hardware construction of any kind. This is where they need the most guidance. A Common Misapprehension: Most students assume that the FIRST stage of implementation is to Build a PCB. This in fact is less important, as usually the PCB is NEVER actually seen by the customer. During the Conceptual Design stage, ideas can change frequently but to implement the design in hardware the design will remain FIXED. Any mistakes made at this stage are PERMANENT! Therefore it is vitally important to follow a Procedure to Reduce Errors. This is described below:
The use of Surface Mount (SMT) Components As described above this rule below should NEVER be broken: NEW DESIGNS SHOULD ONLY EVER USE MODERN DEVICES As everybody is aware, ALL modern electronic components and products are getting smaller. This means that MOST if not ALL the components WILL be Surface Mount. Using Surface Mount Components not only reduces the component's size it also reduces the assembly and component costs as well. An opinion held by many: SMT components are ONLY used in mass produced products However, if this comment is true, how then would students or companies ever create prototype designs prior to the production version? Students MUST be FAMILIAR and CONFIDENT in handling these tiny modern devices in their projects, just as they will be expected to do in industry. Read my document on: PCB
Assembly Techniques
which
describes the procedures I've developed for handling
and soldering
SMT components specifically
for prototype
designs.
The example below of a Student's Prototype SMT Design is justification that my Assembly Techniques described above ACTUALLY WORK. The
PCB below also demonstrates the Conceptual
and
Implementation
Level
PCB Description:
Top Left, down to Bottom Right:
I also develop new experiments and teaching aids for my department. The latest of these is described in detail by CLICKING HERE.
As you'd expect, I get the same questions occuring frequently. I've included the most common of these on my FAQ Page which is accessed by CLICKING HERE.
I've tried to explain exactly what I do and how I do it using specific examples. I'm not deliberately demeaning the students I advise. They're my clients, they have ability but need to gain knowledge to build up THEIR OWN EXPERIENCES.
If you think that you could benefit from my advice or project support then please feel free to contact me using the form below: Thank
You
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