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WSC Trade description in electronics

History Finland participated first time 1995 LyonNot in St. Gallen 1997Montreal 1999Seuol 2001St.Gallen 2003Helsinki 2005  Finland WSC-expert Olavi Lähteinen, since 1999 Montreal

Trade Manager since 2002

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WSC Trade description in electronics

The Technical Description consists of the following: • Section 1 – Technical/Competition Description (TD)

• Section 2 – Project Design Criteria (PD) • Section 3 – Skill Management Procedures (SM)

• Section 4 – Workshop Setup (WS) • Section 5 – Infrastructure List (IL)

• Section 6 – Appendices

Part (TD) includes the following sections in Electronics (defined for the WSC Helsinki:

B/ Drawing/ 2 hours/ 10 points C/ Prototype/ 6 hours/ 30 points

D/ Fault finding/ measurement/ 6 hours/ 30 points E/ Assembly project/ 6 hours/ 20 points

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WSC Trade description in electronicsThe selection of the projects

With the development of the branch being rapid, the projects of electronics are not selected until the start of the competition at the competition-site; projects that are tightly agreed upon too early tend to become obsolete very quickly. An appropriate number of prepared suggestions for projects are agreed on between the participating countries. The

actual competition projects will then be selected from these proposals. This selection process significantly effects the contents of the final tasks.

De finition of TD

S e le ction ofcom pe tition

Ta sks

P roposa l from pa rticipa te d countrie s

One proposa l a cce pte d pe rm odule ( usua lly 5-6 m odule s)

4 da ysCom pe -

tition

Discussinga bout ne w

TD

P roposa l from pa rticipa te d countrie s

Fina lizene w TD

Old com pe tition Ne w com pe tition pe riod

T rade description development process, W SC T rade 16, Industrial electronics

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WSC Trade description in electronicsMontreal 1999, Seoul 2001, St.Gallen 2003

1. Assembly task, assembly according to the assembling instructions, to be completed in 6 hours (15 p)

2. Drawing, drawing, interpretation of PCB parts layout and creation of circuit diagram based on this, to be completed in 2 hours ( 10 p.)

3. Theory, 10 theoretical tasks related both to digital and analogue technology, to be completed in 2 hours (10 p.)

4. Fault finding, 3 different fault finding tasks, each of them to be completed in 2 hours, 6 hours in all (20 p.)

5. Prototype building and design, to be completed in 4 hours ( 20 p.)

6. Testing and measuring task, building an equipment and testing its performance characteristic, to be completed in 4 hours (20 p.)

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What problems do the present competition projects involve?

.

Assembling- the projects are often similar to those of the previous years (1999 and 2001). The assembling project of St. Gallen seems to be unclear in terms of the description of the trade.

- we only use old-fashioned components and the main emphasis of the assembling often lies on making of a circuit board only.

Prototype and design-  design projects are often too simple, because only hardware is used

-  the wire-wrap technique is out-of-date-  In design projects is no programming, although in the application of electronics that it is daily business these days

- there is no circuit board design, there is only a layout interpretation which very seldom comes up in practical work nowadays

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What problems do the present competition projects involve?

Theory- disconnecting theory from other work is against “the spirit of a skills competition”- the theory projects are too difficult for a “skills competition”, this is no “engineer competition” after all

Measuring and testing- too much assembling is often involved into these projects and it is often difficult to carry out realistically the testing and measuring projects on a single circuit board.Common remarks-  the projects do not really measure creativity, because the solutions of many of the projects are foreseeable- the projects favour “repeating

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An outline for new project areas in 2003

The main focus area in the future2.1. Prototype design

In this project a competitor creates a solution defined in the assignment to meet the properties in a given environment (embedded system). He/She first designs the

necessary additional connections to a printed basic circuit and creates the necessary additional programs to carry out the functions.

2.2. Prototype assemblyBased on their designs,the competitors assemble an actual prototype. The project involves working out the layout of the elaborated circuit diagram, putting it into

practice and testing the device. How to make this device? Milling a complete protoboard would take too much time

(perhaps not)???!

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The implementation of the new trade description/specification

Our proposal in St.Gallen to Helsinki 2005, trade description

 Assembling, a more precise specification of the project and more major elements of mechanics! (6h)

Prototype design and assembly (a programming-based embedded system) (8 h)

Fault finding (4 h)

Testing and measuring (4 h)

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The implementation of the new trade description/specification

Final TD in Helsinki1. Assembly task of electronics, 6 hours, 20 points

Projects should include assembly of PCB-boards that include conventional and surface mount components. Wiring and mechanical assembly will also be required. It

is recommended that• 50% of the marks for assembly should be based on components

• 25 % be based on wiring and• 25 % based on mechanical assembly.

2. Building proto equipment, 6 hours, 30 points Prototype building, which demands design skills of a competitor. He/she gets a

device building problem to be solved in a determined processor environment (PIC). He/she has to show through solving the problem his/her skills of programming (C-

language) and the so-called hardware skills. 3. Fault finding and use of measuring device , 6 hours, 30 points

4. Theory, 2 hours, 10 points 5. Drawing, 2 hours, 10 points

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The implementation of the new trade description/specification

Our proposal in Helsinki to Sizuoka 2007, trade description 

Assembling, OKPrototype design and assembly, new proposal

The prototype board and PIC prosessor have to be connected to standard I/O-Bus. Only the I/O interface is defined and the competitors may choose the type of

prosessor. The interfaces are defined so that no so.called intelligent circuits can be used for a task board. A recommendation for the way of assessment for the

programming is createdFault finding (4 h), OK

Testing and measuring (4 h), OKDrawing and Theory, new proposal

The task be changed completely into circuit board design to enable theory being integrated into it. The designed circuit board will be milling on the competition site and it will be made into a device immediately. In this case the task can be part of assembly or as an alternative, an independent task itself.

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The implementation of the new trade description/specification

Final TD in Sizuoka1. Assembly task of electronics, 4 hours, 18 points

2. Product development and building of proto equipment, 7 hours, 31 points (the share of circuit card layout is 10 points)

The second task relates to the so-called prototype building, which also demands design skills of a competitior. The task begins with a supplement of a partially

designed circuit diagram. Maximum of time 3 hours. Once this is completed, he/she starts the design of a circuit card corresponding to

the circuit diagram, using the CAD program (Altium Design). Time: 2 hours. For this CAD-based design a competitor gains 10 points out of the task category.

These parts of the task are carried out during the first day of competition. During the competition, the circuit cards are made with the help of a proto milling

machine (S62 of LPKF). On the third day of the competition, a competitor is given two hours to complete the final assembly.

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The implementation of the new trade description/specification

Final TD in Sizuoka3. Proto equipment with embedded system (PIC 184520), 3 hours, 15 points

Here a competitor is given a problem to be designed in a determined processor (PIC) environment, in the solving of which he/she has to make use of his/her command of

programming skills (C-language). The programming is directed to a specific "hardware" environment that has to be activated.

4. Fault finding and repair, 4 hours, 18 points Testing and fault finding skills are assessed through two integrated tasks. In these

tasks, the faults are, however, at the component level, not in the programming. The location of the fault has to be documented, too, and thus the fault finding method will

be partioned. 5. Measuring and testing, 4 hours, 18 points

This is a type of task in which a competitor has to focus on the creation of complex measuring problems. The task also includes rules that are necessary in

implementation situations. A competitor also has to document the outcome of the measurement.

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An outline for new project areas in 2009Discussions in Japan concerning the development of the

trade for GalgaryThere were many signs of alteration towards a good direction in Helsinki, but needs to change the description of electronics and problems involved in it still

exist. Proto equipment is an example of the desire to keep the HW design as a

separate task and leave the embedded systems as it is now: a pure SW task.It is necessary to combine these items to form one single task basing on

embedded systems. Finland intends to propose an alteration to this for the WSC in Japan.

As far as the fault finding and measuring are concerned it also seems to be quite unnecessary to keep them separated. They, too, could be combined to form one

single task. An assessment of the social and communicative skills of the competitors should be incorporated in the structure of the WSC tasks. This could be facilitated by

introducing pair work into the competitions.