Do It Yourself Projects’ for Electronics Engineering Students

The  execution of projects is an essential task for technical students as they pursue their studies. During the course of their engineering studies, projects help them to gain some practical knowledge from their studies. Many companies ask students about the projects they have developed to test their skills and knowledge.

Electronic engineering projects are mainly designed by using different hardware components and devices. These components are assembled in such a way that they process and provide solutions like monitoring and controlling of the electronic appliances in many applications. So project work is necessary for electronic and electrical students.

Do It Yourself Project is a method of modifying, repairing or building projects without the support of professionals or experts. Academic research tells that the Do It Yourself Projects work according to the behaviors of individuals as they connect component parts, semi raw and raw materials to fabricate reconstruct or transform material belongings.

Do It Yourself Projects for Engineering Students

DIY Kit projects are a great way to build up the project components and equipment for electrical and electronic engineering students. Before starting these types of projects, one should know the basics of electronics and should have the idea about circuits, schematics, bread boards, transistors, soldering, etc. These types of projects are very popular in the development of engineering projects.

The main intention of this type of DIY kit is to give a complete step-by-step guidance to the students while they develop the projects and to help them enhance the practical knowledge necessary for electrical and electronic projects. DIY Kit projects include electronic and electrical based projects, solar based, embedded, sensor, DTMF, RFID, RF and GSM based projects, and so on. Some of the kit contents of DIY that are offered by reputed Projects’ Companies are given below.

Zero Board

These types of PCB boards do not contain any wiring and thus allow students to design the board for each component wiring. These types of boards provide more involvement of work than a fully designed PCB.

Bare PCB

Bare printed circuit boards are the major inputs for manufacturing electronics devices. These types of PCBs are different from the other PCBs because bare PCBs require different electronic components like capacitors or transistors. The manufacturers of electronics add different gears to bare PCBs to meet their precise product specifications. These types of PCBs are designed for those who do not have the knowledge of designing a circuit on bare PCB. In addition, they also offer an easy way of soldering every component to the PCB.

Assembled and Tested PCB

The assembly of PCBs involves hole technology and surface-mount technology. In the hole technology process, the components are placed onto the assembled PCB and are soldered through a wave soldering process. In the surface mount technology process, the components are positioned onto the pads and soldered paste is dribbled on to the connection pads of the PCB to form the electrical and mechanical connection.

In tested printed circuit boards, the assembled PCBs are positioned into a fixture that passes electrical power to the boards to turn them into live functioning boards. By using assembled and tested PCBs, we can check the output readings, voltage readings across the components.

 Tool Kit

Tool kit mainly contains different components and tools such as multimeter, probes, bread board, a component cutter and soldering iron, etc. The components of a tool kit are time tested for better performance, including easiness of soldering and connections while dealing with the zero boards and PCBs.

By using the above kit contents, one can build ones own ‘Do It Yourself Projects’ by following the audio visuals and assembling and testing procedures’ videos given in such kits.

2 Do It Yourself Projects

Project 1: LED Based Flash Light System using Microcontroller

Hardware components:

• Yellow LED
• Reset
• Crystal
• 8051 microcontroller
• Resistors
• Capacitors

Software Components:

• Keil compiler
• Embedded C language
• Proteus software

Circuit Diagram

Design the circuit with the components shown in the above figure by assembling them on a zero board or PCB and soldering them in a neat fashion. It is always better to design the circuit in simulation software and to check whether it is working in a proper way or not. After assembling all the components, program the microcontroller using Keil software.

Program Code

#include<reg51.h>
sbit LED= P0^2;
void delay( unsigned int a);
void main()
{ LED=0;
While (1)
{ LED=0;
delay(600);
LED=1;
delay(600);
}
}
void delay (unsigned int b)
{ unsigned int k;
for(k=0;k<b;k++);
}

Insert this code into the microcontroller with the required hardware circuitry and check the output of the circuit by giving a power supply to the circuit.

Project 2: Electronic Notice Board using Microcontroller

Do the same procedure like that of the above project for this project also by assembling appropriate components in exact location, and then program with the below given code.

Hardware Components

• LCD Display
• Reset
• Crystal
• 8051 Microcontroller
• Resistors
• Capacitors

Software Components

• Keil compiler
• Embedded C language
• Proteus software

Circuit Diagram

Program Code

#include<reg51.h>
#define kam P0

sbit rs= P2^0;
sbit rw= P2^1;
sbit en= P2^2;

void lcd_initi();
void lcd_dat(unsigned char );
void lcd_cmd (unsigned char );
void delay(unsigned int );
void display(unsigned char *s, unsigned char r);
void main()
{

lcd_initi();
lcd_cmd(0x80);
delay(100);
display(“EDGEFX TECHLNGS”, 15);
lcd_cmd(0xc0);
display(“KITS & SOLTIONS”,15);
while(1);
}

void display(unsigned char *s, unsigned char r)
{
unsigned int w;
for(w=0;w<r;w++)
{

lcd_dat(s[w]);
}
}

void lcd_initi()
{
lcd_cmd(0x01);
delay(100);
lcd_cmd(0x38);
delay(100);
lcd_cmd(0x06);
delay(100);
lcd_cmd(0x0c);
delay(100);
}
void lcd_dat(unsigned char dat)
{
kam = dat;
rs=1;
rw=0;

en=1;
delay(100);
en=0;
}
void lcd_cmd(unsigned char cmd)
{
kam=cmd;
rs=0;
rw=0;

en=1;
delay(100);
en=0;
}
void delay( unsigned int n)
{

unsigned int a;
for(a=0;a<n;a++);
}

These are the two simple Do It Yourself projects for those who are interested in building circuits on their own. Therefore, the above mentioned brief description about the ‘Do It Yourself Kit’ projects for engineering students along with the step-by-step guidelines will help develop the projects for them. The readers of this article might have followed the given information, and therefore, they can give their feedback, comments in the comment section below. And, for any technical help to implement some of these DIY projects, you can contact us anytime.

Photo Credits

• Zero PCB by blogspot
• Bare PCB by telus
• Assembled and tested PCB by zentech
• Tool Kit by adafruit