Chemical Engineering 436 - Chemical Engineering Laboratory I
Prof. Daniel T. Schwartz
COURSE OBJECTIVES AND OVERVIEW
The objectives of the Chemical Engineering Laboratory are to develop the student's ability to conduct research (to formulate an investigation, to make appropriate measurements, to analyze the data, and to report the results) and to deepen his or her understanding of chemical engineering principles. It is also our intent to improve your ability to communicate technical material; you should therefore review any notes or texts you have on technical writing and public speaking.
Each student is assigned to one 4-hour laboratory meeting per week. In addition, there are lecture/discussion classes scheduled Tuesday and Thursday for all students at 12:30 p.m. In these sessions, which will meet regularly only for part of the quarter, we will discuss statistical concepts, analysis of errors, and laboratory procedures. The laboratory sections will be divided into groups that consist of two students. Each group will work on three different experiments during the quarter, spending two or more laboratory sessions per experiment.
The course will be graded on a point system with a maximum of 400 points per student, distributed as follows:
Formal report 75
Formal Statistics Report 25
Memo reports (2 x 50 points each) 100
Revision of Memo 2 25
Plan of Investigation 25
Individual Oral Report 25
Group Oral Report 50
Student Critique of Memo 1 25
Laboratory Performance 25
TOTAL (maximum) 375
Nota Bene
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Assignments are due at the beginning of your 4 hour lab section (1:30 pm), unless specified otherwise.l
PENALTIES FOR LATE/MISSED WORK ARE DEVASTATING TO YOUR GRADE-STUDENTS WHO FAIL DO SO USUALLY BECAUSE OF THESE PENALTIES!!!!Æ
Late work: Score is reduced by 10% of total possible points for each ten minutes late (maximum reduction during first day is 30%). A 15% reduction takes place per day thereafter.Æ
Each missed lab sessions will result in a score reduction of 50% of the maximum possible points(being 30 minutes late for lab constitutes a missed session.)
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You must submit all written reports and perform all presentations to receive a passing grade.l
The Formal Report and Memorandum Reports must be typed using the format specified with each assignment. Failure to follow the format for each report will result in a 10% reduction of total points.Step-by-step guide to how the lab works:
Week 1: Lab day
Go to Benson 115, choose groups, receive experimental assignment 1, and then go to lab and get safety orientation.
Week 1: >24 hours before next lab session
Sign-up outside experiment instructor's office for Planning session (experiment 1). Go to meeting at scheduled time. Signing up for planning sessions is your responsibility.
Week 2: Lab Day
Go straight to Lab and perform experiment 1.
Week 3: Lab Day
Go straight to Lab, perform experiment 1, and receive assignment 2.
Week 3: >24 hours before next lab session
Sign-up outside experiment instructor's office for Planning session (experiment 2). Go to meeting at scheduled time.
Week 4: Lab day
Go to lab, turn in Memo 1+2 complete copies, then go and perform experiment 2.
Week 5: Lab day
Go to BNS 115, listen to Oral Report 1. Then go to lab, perform experiment 2, and receive assignment 3.
Week 5: >24 hours before next lab session
Sign-up outside experiment instructor's office for Planning session (experiment 3). Go to meeting at scheduled time.
Week 6: Lab day
Go to lab, turn in Memo 2, then go to Lab and perform experiment 3.
Week 7: Lab day
Go straight to BNS 115 and listen to Oral Report 2, and receive Memo 2 back with requested revisions. Then go to lab and perform experiment 3.
Week 8: Lab day
Go to Lab, turn in Revision of Memo 2, and perform optional day of additional experiments, if necessary.
Week 9: Lab day
Go to BNS 115 and Turn in Formal Report 3.
Week 10: Lab day
Go to BNS 115, turn in Formal Statistics Report, Student Critique of Memo 1, and Present Group Oral Report 3, then go down and clean laboratory.
PLAN OF INVESTIGATION
The Group must arrange a planning conference with the appropriate instructor at least one day before the first laboratory session of each experiment (and preferably earlier in case alterations to the plan are necessary). Both group members must attend. A written Planning Report is to be submitted at this time. It should be a formal outline indicating the information desired and the required measurements. The report should include appropriate equations for data analysis with order-of-magnitude estimates of key quantities, sketched figures indicating (qualitatively) the trends expected, and schematic(s) of the equipment to be used. The planning report may be handwritten, but must be legible. Be prepared to expand on any material that is unclear in the written report.
The responsible instructor for each experiment is as follows:
Transport (2x) DTS Pipe Friction LW
Vacuum Ops. DTS Air Flow Meas. LW
Convection DTS Orifice Charac'n. LW
Pump Charac'n. LW
Professor Schwartz will hold office hours in BNS 353. Time for office hours will be set in consultation with the students.
GRADING PROTOCOL
Grades for all items (except planning reports) are assigned by Professor Schwartz, though the teaching assistants will have the main responsibility for assessing the technical quality of each report. The grading protocol will involve Professor Schwartz reading every report and grading the students on their technical communications (i.e., is the report well written, are thoughts conveyed in a lucid and logical sequence, are the conclusions consistent with the data, etc.). The teaching assistants will assess the technical quality of the reports (i.e., were the correct equations used, did the students identify important assumptions in the analysis, was the experimental procedure adequate, were the sample calculations correct). Copies of grading sheets that show the relative point values for various aspects of the written report will be provided to the students well in advance of each due date.
Detailed guidelines for writing the Memo and Formal reports are provided in separate handouts, as are guidelines for the Oral reports.
LABORATORY PERFORMANCE
Each student will be graded on his or her work in the laboratory. This grade will be influenced by awareness of safety precautions, advance preparation and understanding of experiments, general orderliness and housekeeping, participation in the performance of the experiments, regular, ON-TIME attendance, etc. Appropriate eye protection is to be worn in the lab at all times. Instructors will probe the knowledge of each group member by asking questions during the laboratory period.
The laboratory must be returned to a neat and orderly condition at the end of each session. Groups will be penalized for leaving the lab in a disorderly state.
STUDENT EVALUATION OF MEMO 1
At the beginning of experiment 3, each student in Lab will be given copies of earlier Memo 1 reports that describe studies performed by classmates on the same apparatus. You will be asked to critique the memo 1 reports for their clarity and content. Your grade on the one to two page critique will be determined by the quality of the feedback you give to the original writer of the memo 1 report. In industry, you will be expected to write constructive evaluations for people you supervise; this is an opportunity to practice giving feedback in a positive and constructive, yet unequivocal, manner.
NOTES on Group WORK
In industry you will be expected to work on team projects and will often write reports as a team. In this class, however, we need to grade the performance of each individual. The following comments are aimed at this need:
• You should talk over the experiment prior to the Planning Report, share data taken in lab (only within a group, however), and discuss the interpretation of the data. Each person should write his or her report independently, however. For example, while data are shared, graphs and results derived from the data may not be shared. Each student should independently graph his or her data and carry out all calculations required to fulfill the assignment. Evidence suggesting that these rules have been violated will be dealt with harshly.
• Each group member will be individually questioned on aspects of the experiment, either in the Planning Meeting or in the lab, and will be expected to be completely informed.
• Each group is to maintain a bound laboratory notebook in which all data are neatly recorded. Each page should be dated and labeled with your name. At the end of each lab period, a copy of the pages containing the data collected during that period is to be given to the lab instructor. Recommendations on the type of lab notebook to use will be provided by the instructors.
Some texts you may find helpful
In general, your lecture courses should have covered the basic material that is needed to understand the experiments in this laboratory. However, you may find some additional information helpful; the following books are recommended for practical information such as cutaway diagrams of equipment, properties of materials, etc.:
Perry, R., Chemical Engineering Handbook, Mc Graw Hill.
McCabe, W.L. Smith, J.C., and Harriott, P., Unit Operations of Chemi.Engi., McGraw Hill, 1985.
The following technical writing manual is the text used in the college technical writing courses.
Brusaw, C.T., Alred, G., Oliu, W.E., Handbook of Technical Writing, St. Martin's Press, N.Y., 1976.
The statistics presented in class and used in your experimental write-ups can be found in the text:
Box, G.E.P., Hunter, W.G., and J.S. Hunter, Statistics for Experimenters, Wiley-Interscience, 1978.
ORAL REPORT
Three oral reports are scheduled. Each student will report for 7 minutes on their results from either experiment 1 or experiment 2, and the group will present a report on experiment 3 in a 15 minute talk. These presentation should describe the project briefly, mention its purpose, and present and discuss the principal results and conclusions. It must be well organized and should be rehearsed as time limits will be strictly enforced. Questions from the audience should be answered clearly and succinctly.
Detailed guidelines for the oral report will appear in a separate handout.
FORMAL REPORT
The Formal Report is a substantial piece of work that will be a major focus of this course. The Formal Report is written in the format of a scientific article. The body of the Formal Report is expected to be under 15 pages, but substantial appendices are normally included.
Detailed guidelines for the formal report will be given separately.
Memo 2 REVISION
One of the most important step in writing is revision and editing. Thus, after Memo 2 is submitted and graded, it must be revised. The amount of work required for the Revision depends on the quality of the original Memo 2. An excellent Memo 2 will need very little revision, and it will be relatively easy to earn a good grade for the Revision. A poor Memo 2, however, will require extensive revision, i.e., two or three times more effort than the original Memo 2. This grading system, therefore, rewards excellent work and penalizes poor work. Revisions are due one week after the graded and dated Memo 2 has been returned to you.