Guidelines for reports

MME 2202a: MECHANICS OF

MATERIALS

Department of Mechanical and Materials Engineering

University of Western Ontario

GUIDELINE FOR LABORATORY REPORTS

LABORATORY REPORT:

The laboratory reports should be of technical note style and should not exceed five (5)
pages (excluding the title page and appendices). Reports must be typed single-spaced, on
one side of the page, using 8.5  11 inch white paper and 12 point font size. The pages
must be numbered. REPORTS WHICH ARE NOT TYPED WILL BE DECLINED.

TITLE PAGE: This is a separate cover sheet that should clearly identify the report
by title, course number, date and instructor. The names and numbers of students
(laboratory partners) who jointly completed the experiment and the report should
also be indicated in the title page.

SUMMARY: The summary of the laboratory reports should not be more than half
page. No references and no figures should be mentioned in “Summary”.
The summary section is addressed to the section manager, who generally is
concerned that his section is making progress on resolving problems. It should state
the purpose of experiments, main results and associated uncertainty, conclusions and
recommendations. This section should be self-contained (i.e. you should not need to
read the report to understand what it is all about).

MAIN BODY OF THE REPORT

1. INTRODUCTION: The Introduction is addressed to the technical manager, who

generally is aware of procedures and is mainly concerned with efficiency and proper
testing procedures. The Introduction should provide the scope, the objective and
relevant background information. Define the general problem to be examined during
the experiment and describe the main aims and scope of the study.

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Guidelines for reports

The sections II – IV and the appendices are mainly addressed to colleagues or others
who are interested in doing similar tests and thus need to understand some details of
the theory, testing procedure and calculation methodology.

2. THEORY (Maximum half page): It should be focused on the physical principles

involved in the experiment. Only those equations that are important in describing the
physical principles should be given. Also discuss any limitations of the equations
used.
This section should be concise (only relevant information should be given).
Presentation of extraneous material is strongly discouraged.

3. EXPERIMENTAL APPARATUS AND PROCEDURES: Describe the

experimental apparatus. Describe the procedure you followed during the experiment
(i.e. the experimental methodology and how the experimental values were obtained),
and list experimental conditions.

4. UNCERTAINTY ANALYSIS: Identify and discuss the sources of uncertainty

in the experiment. Provide the uncertainty values of all parameters used in the
calculations. Attach a sample calculation of complete uncertainty analysis of one
final parameter.

5. ANALYSIS OF DATA AND DISCUSSION OF RESULTS:

Present and discuss all the results.
The results should be presented in a compact form. The use of tables and graphs are
strongly encouraged. The results listed in the tables and graphs are to be referred in
the text. For example,

The displacements of the free end of a cantilever beam under different

loads are listed in Table 1 (or plotted in Figure 1).

The results should be discussed based on the significance, limitations and

uncertainty. For example, the results can be assessed by comparing with the
theoretical values. The emphasis should be placed on explaining trends and
reliability (i.e. referencing measurement uncertainty) of the results. The uncertainty
estimates should be included as error bars on the data presentation wherever
possible.

If computer programs were written for the report, then the software programs have to
be verified and validated.

6. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS: This section is addressed to

the technical manager and colleagues. Conclusions should provide again the scope,
the objective, and summary of key results. One or two short introductory sentences
are required, followed by the main conclusions that were derived from this study.

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Guidelines for reports

The conclusions should not be confused with results. The main issues to be
addressed are:
(i) assessment of the quality of the experimental results
(ii) summary of the key points and trends obtained from the data, and
(vi) strengths/weaknesses of the experimental methodology used.

REFERENCES: References should be cited in the text by giving the last name of the
author(s) and the year of publication of the reference: either “Recent Work (Smith and
Jones, 1985) …” or “Recently Smith and Jones (1985) …”. With three or more authors,
use the form “Smith et al. (1985)” in the text.

References should be listed in alphabetical order, according the last name of the first
author. Some sample references follow:

Sparrow, E. M., 1980, “Forced-Convection Heat Transfer in a Duct Having

Spanwise-Periodic Rectangular Protuberances,” Numerical Heat Transfer, Vol. 3, pp.
149-167.

Wheeler, A. J. and Ganji, A. R., 1996, “Introduction to Engineering

Experimentation,” Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, NJ.

TABLES & FIGURES

All tables and figures should have captions and should be numbered. They should be
referred to in the text. Tables and figures should be distributed where appropriate
throughout the report. It is the preferred and recommended way to present the results.

EQUATIONS
The equations should be numbered, i.e.,
d 2x
 p2x  0 (1)
dt 2
Refer to equations in the text as “Eq. (1),” etc., or “Equation (1),” etc., at the
beginning of a sentence.

APPENDICES

Appendices are not to be considered as an integral part of the report but rather an aid for
the faculty in evaluating the report. There is no page limitation for the appendices. The
students are requested to have:

Appendix I Raw data

Appendix II Sample calculations (including for uncertainty analysis)
Appendix III Extensive, non-obvious mathematical manipulations

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Guidelines for reports

Appendix IV Auxiliary information/documentation

The students should be made to clearly understand that the main body of the reports
(Sections 1 through 6) should be self-standing.