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Electronics Workshop

The Electronics Workshop is located in B013 on the Ground Floor of B Block and is accessed under the bridge that links the Science Concourse to the E Block Lecture Theatres

The workshop main hours are from 9AM to 5PM and you should contact Rod Wesson to discuss electrical or electronic testing and repair and fabrication of specialist equipment. Please email r dot c dot wesson at warwick dot ac dot uk first as we are not in the workshop at all times.

The departmental Electronics Workshop undertakes a range of testing and repair work of portable electrical and electronic equipment including instrumentation and instrument controllers.

Specialist equipment can also be designed and fabricated in collaboraton with research groups when there are no commercially available alternatives.

We have the goal of providing an efficient service. We welcome feedback and appreciate comments on the service that you have recently received.

Design

Here are some designs from the workshop

Six channel custom column heater with 3D printed components.

6 channel column heater

285nm UV reactor and solidworks model.

285nm UV reactorRW75 UV reactor solidworks

405nm 800mW UV reactor.

405nm UV reactor

265nm UV source with solidworks model.

265nm UV sourceRW63 solidworks

Six channel UV reactor with stirrer solidworks model

6 channel UV reactor

Camera trigger, on the right a loan unit with the electronics stuffed in the box

on the left a properly layed out in house made PCB with cable clamp and sleeved loom for durability

Trigger box

Solar degradation test rig, this is designed to test 24 solar cells over a long period of time.

Solar degredation tray  tray in use

New design work

For new design work we have a selction of software to assist us...

For PCB design we have ISIS schematic capture (circuit design) and simulation using SPICE models. This links with the ARES PCB layout software

isis ares

For CAD and artwork design we use Coreldraw 15.

corel

For programming the PIC microcontrollers we use on some of our designs we use MPLAB.

mplab

We also have a CEL Robox 3D printer!

We are currently working on improving what we can offer and the workshop is been refurbished to reflect this.

Repair

Ika hotplate repair. Common fault on old hotplates when the relay fails it can burn a hole through the circuit board. This has been milled out and new board and traces fitted. process takes less than two hours for a £600 hotplate.

PCB repair

Ion gauge crushed! Now realigned and back in service

bent ion gaugefixed ion gauge

Here is a selection of components we have replaced when repairing various bits of equipment

Components

From left to right...

0805 resistor

1206 resistor

1218 resistor

Mini MELF diode

MELF diode

80 pin BGA transceiver IC

8 pin SOIC MOSFET

LCC CMOS 1024 x 1 imaging IC

8 pin DIL switch mode driver IC

ISOPAK power MOSFET

Trim pot

Ceramic disc capacitor

For rework we use standard soldering irons and a hot air pencil as well as various hand tools.

We also have thermal imaging capabilities. These pictures show a working furnace and one with faulty elements that were in use on the 3rd floor.

thermal1 thermal2