Physics 209 - Winter 2008/09

Introduction

Term One

In the first term of Phys 209 we will investigate a variety of analog and digital electronic circuits. We will begin with simple analog circuits, and then move one to more complicated resonant circuits, op-amps, and then on to digital electronics.

Keeping a good lab notebook is a very important part of the course. There are some ideas on how to do this here.

You will need two yellow physics lab notebooks for this course. You can purchase them at the bookstore. If you come to the lab without, we'll send you to the bookstore to buy them. You must have them.

Descriptions of the experiments can be found on the course website here.

You will write a formal lab report on one of the experiments at the end of the term. More information on this will come as the time gets nearer. Since you may not know ahead which experiment will be written up, it is very important that your lab notebook contain enough information to allow you to decipher your measurements.

In term one you there will be occasional assignments, designed to help you acquire skills you need to analyze your data.

The tutorials in term one serve two main purposes. They are an opportunity for you to ask questions about what you are doing in the lab and on the assignments. We also use the tutorials to present background information you need to understand the lab experiments.

Term Two

The second term offers you a chance to select from a wide range of possible experiments. All of these are limited in the number of experimental set-ups that are available, so we ask that students work in pairs. Sign-up sheets will be posted in the lab so that you can select the experiments that you want to perform and you can browse through the lab descriptions to help you decide on your choices. When you sign up, you have a block of 2 weeks to perform the experiment, but depending on the lab you may be able to complete all of the measurements in one lab period. More commonly you will need to come back the next week for more measurements (if required) or to get advice on the analysis and writeup. If you do finish the lab work completely in the first week let us know so that someone else can have access to the equipment the following week. You are expected to complete a total of FOUR experiments. The lab books are due exactly two weeks from the time you begin an experiment (at 2 pm). A formal report is due one week after the end of classes and more instructions for the formal report will be given later in the term.

In each experiment's description there are questions under a heading Prelab Questions. These are designed to help prepare you for the experiment and must be completed and turned in before you start an experiment.

Additional Notes

1. The lab manual is being continuously updated, so some details and procedures may continue to change from the versions available at the beginning of term. Try to stay up to date on the latest versions of the experiments that you are doing and help us out with any suggestions that you might have after you have done an experiment.
2. New experiments continue to be developed for the laboratory and we welcome your input if you have suggestions for other experiments that might be appropriate.