Avionics lab
To fabricate and assess your antennas you will be given access to the Avionics lab (4th floor, North Tower building). The access is made with a bank card. To register and activate it, you must go to the secretary of the Telecommunications Scientific Area (same floor) and ask the administrative there. 
In the Avionics lab, you will find some consumables (glue, metric tape, screws, etc.) that you can freely use. In case you need to buy any materials, please see below.
The hardware (SDR, LNB, RF cables, etc.) is given by me when I have the confirmation that you've reached the prototyping phase. You should send me an email and I will give you the instructions.

Tips for PCB mask production
The mask production must follow the indications of the provided Guide.

Advice for very common mistakes/problems:


- Before producing the mask, first unite in CST all the metal components present in the desired layer into a single object: select them all in the tree on the left, then do       Modelling > Boolean > Add 

This makes the hashing process easier in the next step.


- Do not leave Water Marks in the final mask, otherwise they will be printed as well, and radiate in unpredictable way. You can use the LibreCAD tool (https://librecad.org) that has no water marks.


- Do not forget to include the mask of the ground plane, whenever it has any hole e.g. for the coaxial cable, or shorting pins. In this case, the alignment marks are mandatory. Please pay especial attention to the "flip" detail explained in the guide. If this is ignored, the circuit will be ruined and you will have no left time to repeat.

In order to avoid flipping mistakes, print in all the masks, somewhere near the alignment markings, a random word of your choice. This helps very much in finding quickly which is the printed side of the transparent film. Otherwise you will have a bad time figuring out the right side of the film in the dark room.  


Tips for 3D printing

- You can use CST's embedded CAD tool to produce the parts 3D model. Or, you can use any other CAD tool of your choice. The final part must be exported to STL file format. Use one separate file for each part.

- Because of the layer-by-layer FDM printing process (check the videos below) the parts must have some planar face to adhere firmly to the printing bed. This requires that this flat face is a natural part of your design. And it requires that you plan in advance the best orientation of the part on the printing bed.

- Try to minimize the printing time, avoiding unnecessarily thick and sturdy parts. Note that in most cases the antenna weights only a few hundred grams; typical printing times for one single part may reach 5-12 hours. Also you can use low infill %, typically 20%.

- You can test in advance for print errors and printing time loading your STL file to the Ultimaker CURA tool. For the configurations use Ultimaker 2+ Extended or Ultimaker 3 Extended, with a 0.4 mm nozzle. 

- You will have the support of the iStartlab (floor -1, Mathematics building) that is open on Monday and Wednesday mornings (10:00 - 13:00). To print your parts email Ricardo Febra (ricardo.febra@tecnico.ulisboa.pt - include Prof. João Felício and istartlab@tecnico.ulisboa.pt in cc) in advance and take the stl models in a pen drive and let them know that this is a work for the Antennas and Propagation course.


If you are a 3D printing freshman, check the following videos before producing the parts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SI59pi_FG2M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLBsO1UzIL0


Material acquisition

We have some materials available for prototyping, but it may be necessary to buy specific items. In the latter case, you will be responsible for purchasing the items yourselves. To get reimbursed of the expenses, you must bring me the receipt/invoice with VAT number 502 854 200 Instituto de Telecomunicações - do not not buy anything before informing me and getting my clearance.