Engineers present the procedures, materials, and results of their experiments in laboratory reports. These reports are essential to the development of the discipline, as it is through these reports that new knowledge is recorded and communicated to researchers, teachers, and students. Laboratory reports for some assignments may have particular requirements. Generally, the laboratory reports you are assigned will follow the organization used in laboratory reports written by engineers working in industry and government.
Your report will need to accomplish the following:
establish the main question or problem under investigation and provide some background
state the objective of the laboratory work (to measure, to verify, to compare, and so on) and the exact methods and procedures step-by-step
describe and comment on your results, explain what they mean, put any unexpected results in context, and compare your results with established knowledge in the discipline
place your results in the context of your stated purpose; note patterns apparent in the results, implications for future consideration, and any questions that remain unanswered
tell your reader if you achieved the predicted or anticipated results; account for any differences if possible
The structure of your laboratory report will function as “instructions” for anyone who wants to replicate your experiment, verify your results, or use your work as a foundation for his or her own research.
You can use the same method and structure to record and report on engineering design projects.
Related topics:
Project notebooks
Technical reports
Proposals
Progress reports