A Project Oriented Laboratory of Embedded Control Systems

This paper presents a laboratory of Embedded Control Systems, for the Electrical Engineering students. The laboratory is project oriented, whose final goal is to develop a complete platform of motion control, with well-defined specification, including simple mechanics and quite complex drive system, consisting in motor and motion control, making use of feedback sensors. Our desire, sustained by many studies proving the benefits of "learning-by-doing" approach, is to motivate the students to rapidly acquire/recall knowledge and develop skills, mainly related to electronics and software design and implementation, having a clear image of what and why they are doing in order to complete every project stage. Moreover, we gave an equal importance to make the students learn and work with "the big picture" in mind - the system purpose, its functionality and related knowledge, all perceived and integrated as a whole, with the motivation to "make it work". The project includes hardware development, simulation, software design and implementation, and finally testing. This paper details the project stages, emphasizing the students' activities, and it presents some relevant results.