Appendix C - Notes on the Preparation of Project Reports

Introduction

Your project report is the major component of the overall project assessment and therefore of your overall degree mark. The project report carries a high proportion of the credits which contribute to your final assessment. It is therefore important that your report contains all the information required by the examiners, i.e. it should reflect the effort you put into the project and provide details of the work you have carried out, together with the conclusions drawn. It is in your own interest to ensure that the content and presentation are of a high standard.

Potential employers may ask to see project reports, and you may be called for interview by the External Examiner when your degree classification is being determined. He/she will have a copy of your report to hand and will probably want to discuss it with you.

The project report is an opportunity to develop the skill of writing a substantive technical report. Technical report writing is a standard method of communication between engineers, and the report should be written in an appropriate style and layout. It must be written in formal and grammatically correct English, without use of colloquialisms, slang terms and abbreviations such as "didn’t". The report must have a formal style and a standard layout. You may wish to refer to recommendations given in British Standards (BS4811: 1972: Specification for the presentation of research and developmental reports, British Standards Institution, London).

Prior to submitting the final copy of the project report, a PDF version (with “draft” in the filename) must be uploaded to the EN3300 module in Learning Central. This will give you the opportunity to view the Turnitin originality report, and if necessary, make amendments to it. The actual and final submission is again via uploading a PDF of your report (with “final” in the filename) to Learning Central.

Presentation and layout

The presentation and layout of the report must be as follows:-

• The report is to be presented using double line spacing and a font size of 12. The size of all margins must be not less than 25.4mm or 1 inch.

• The first page must be a statement regarding plagiarism - a suggested format is shown in Appendix E.

• The entire report, including the summary, list of contents, notation, equations, tables, figures, references, appendices, etc.

• Any additional data, copies of any computer programmes developed during the project and any CAD drawings or models can be included within report as appendices. However, these appendices will have to be short. It is not necessary, and often impossible, to include all the raw experimental data in the written report. Wherever practical this data should be included in a CD and handed over to supervisors, in case it is needed for future research, but only the written report will be marked. It is better to present data in a concise, clear form such as a graph than to include lengthy lists of numbers.

• Drawings should generally conform to BS8888, which is available via the British Standards Online website which can be accessed via the Library webpage under "Electronic databases". All large illustrations, CAD drawings, maps, charts, circuit diagrams, etc should be either electronically produced, or scanned (e.g. using one of the MFD-copiers in the library), in PDF format, and included within the single PDF report. Any hand produced work (e.g. a sketch) is also to be scanned and included within the PDF report. In a project that aimed to produce a detailed design, sufficient engineering drawings of good quality must be included to allow the examiners to assess the final design properly. Drawings of several different components may be included on one sheet, clearly separated by lines to avoid confusion.

• Each report will have a front page with the title, your name and your student number.

• A table of contents should be included at the beginning of the report but there is no need for separate indexes of figures and tables.

• Page numbers should be centred at the bottom of each page.

• Captions of figures and tables must comply with British Standards, i.e. figure captions are below figures; titles and table number are above tables. All figures and tables must be numbered and referred to in the text. Graphs do not need a title above as well as a caption below.

• Colour figures may be used to improve clarity, but remember that black and white photocopies may be made in the future. In general it is better to use different line styles in a graph rather than different colours, and to avoid grey backgrounds which do not copy well. Text in figures, such as numbers and axis titles on graphs, should be of a similar size to the main text. Graphs and figures can be small - it is possible to put fifteen or more graphs on a page - but care will be needed to make sure they are clear and easy to read.

• Any equation that is referred to in the text must be numbered. All equations should be numbered so that they can be referred to with ease, either in the text or in the viva.

• Writing must always be in the passive voice e.g. "dial gauge readings were taken" and not in the active voice e.g. "I took dial gauge readings". Writing must never be in the first person singular e.g. "I then found out" or second person e.g. "You can see that ", although some text books adopt the first person plural style e.g. "We have seen in Chapter 2 that" as a more informal way of engaging the reader (here the term "we" refers to the author and his or her readers). If you have to express a personal opinion in the text, then use something like "In the author's opinion" rather than "It is my opinion that". Report of work conducted in the past must be referred to in the past tense e.g. "the time to collect 26 kg of water was recorded". Contents of the project report can be referred to in the present tense e.g. "Figure 4 shows" or in the past tense when a certain text is referring to earlier text e.g. text in chapter 3 can have a sentence like "It has been demonstrated in chapter 2 that". Diagrams etc. can be referred to in the text by abbreviations e.g. "Fig. 2.3" but the first word of a sentence should not be an abbreviation. "Figure 2.3" should thus appear in full when the word figure starts a sentence.

• You must include an appropriate Reference Section and, if appropriate, a bibliography. This is important, in order acknowledge your sources, provide pointers to further information, add authority to your arguments and avoid accusations of plagiarism. In general, a reference should be included whenever you have used information from another source. A bibliography provides suggestions for further reading or background information. The format of the references should conform to the School of Engineering's standard format, which is available on Blackboard in the EN3300 module. References should contain full bibliographical details including the full title of the publication and the names of all authors. Names of journals should be given in full, with volume and page numbers and the year of publication. References to books should include the publisher and the place and date of publication. References to web sites should include the name of the author if it is available, and must include the full URL and the date on which it was accessed. 

• When referencing, be aware that websites such as Wikipedia are not generally regarded as reliable sources. Wherever possible, use books and reputable peerreviewed journals. Note that even these can often contain errors!

• Include a copy of the record of meetings with your supervisor. This will be used to help assess your diligence and effort during the project.