🚀 go-pugleaf

I suspect that the local news feed chewed up my last attempt to post this. If it
didn't then please forgive the second post!




I would like to ask for opinions on this issue:

How long, on average, would you consider a project design/construction to take?
i.e. how many man-weeks?

I refer to a project capable of being designed by one engineer and constructed by
two technical staff.

I know this is an open ended question, with not enough details to answer
precisely; but I'm after a "gut-feel", not a project plan. Projects are
non-trivial (trivial means a circuit that can be knocked up in under a week or
two with no worries) and require an engineer's skill (i.e. they're not the sort
that an experienced technician would be expected to handle), often with
background research required (e.g. magnetic properties of toroid materials, ECL
circuit design, high voltage electronics [10kV-20kV at several amps] etc).

Project design time in this case refers to:

1	Project specification
2	Design and schematic capture, with simulation and breadboarding where
		necessary
3	Printed circuit artwork design (on a CAD system)
4	Printed circuit fabrication, drilling and loading (assume in-house
		fabrication takes one day)
5	Circuit test and revision/modification
6	Chassis work (hole drilling, PC mounting, etc)
7	Front panel design and fabrication (Scotchcal or similar)
8	Final test and shipment ('out the door')

Also, how long would a repeat build take. That is, use an existing design. This
would be equivalent to steps 4..8 above, without the circuit revision or front
panel design elements.

My reason for asking is that a director here is under the impression that the
output of one engineer and two technicians here has been lower than it should.

Personally, I believe that their output has been beyond expectation. However, so
as not to bias your opinion, I'll not quote the details now.

I will summarise if there is enough interest.

John Haddy

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      |  _  |_   _   |_|  _   _|  _|              Electronics Department
    |_| (_) | | | |  | | (_| (_| (_| \/           School of MPCE
    ---------------------------------/-           Macquarie University
                                                  Sydney, AUSTRALIA 2109

    Email: johnh@mpce.mq.edu.au, Ph: +61 2 805 8959, Fax: +61 2 805 8983

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