Facilities and Labs

The Applied Engineering Technology Management department at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville gives students hands-on experience with processes and materials that are important in today's manufacturing and construction fields. Our facilities have everything you need to learn the intricacies of construction, industrial controls, or manufacturing.

UW-Platteville students at outdoor Construction Lab listening to instructions

Construction Lab
UW-Platteville student in Safety Lab practicing using traffic control sign with arm gestures

Safety Lab

Automation and Electronics

Lab facilities include analog and digital systems, semiconductor devices, automation, Allen Bradley Rockwell Automation Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs), LogixPro PLC programming, National Instruments LabVIEW Data Acquisition and Controllers, Multisim circuit simulation software, Tek Digital Storage Oscilloscopes, Fluke and Mastech Digital Multimeters, ATmega328P - 8-bit AVR Microcontrollers (on Arduino platforms), and facilities for Senior Design capstone projects including a complete range of electronics components (resistors, capacitors, inductors, “ice-cube” relays, digital logic ICs, switches, inductive/capacitive/photo sensors) power tools and hand tools.   Lab activities include electronic devices exploration, troubleshooting, data acquisition and control with LabVIEW, digital logic, instrumentation, circuit analysis, and simulation.  This lab serves a range of students, from basic AC/DC to advanced Automation and Control courses. 

Metals Labs

The lab is equipped so students can perform the following types of casting operations:

  • green sand molding
  • petro-bond sand molding
  • permanent molding
  • lost wax molding
  • lost foam molding

Students are able to pour:

  • aluminum
  • cast iron
  • cast steel

Plastics Lab

Many consumer and industrial products are made of plastic and working with plastic is a valuable skill. 

The plastics lab includes injection molders, blow formers, vacuum formers, and more.

Robotics

FANUC robots are in the top three robotics companies worldwide.  Our labs have three industry-standard FANUC robots, two of the LR Mate range and one M. These are interfaced with conveyors and vision systems.  In addition to the physical robots, we also use offline robotics programming, using the industry-standard ROBOGUIDE software package. As technology merges across all sectors, we utilize the FANUC robots to not only cover robotics but also automation, vision, and manufacturing.  In addition to practice in robot programming and troubleshooting, this lab is also used in interfacing sensors and actuators in automation.  FANUC Robotics ROBOGUIDE simulation software and teach pendants available for students to learn how to program real-life programming and robotics implementation skills.  This lab is a springboard for our graduates, as manufacturing engineering and automation managers, our graduates are familiar with the full spectrum of tasks that of an operator, technician, engineer or programmer needed to set up, program, troubleshoot and maintain robots.

Robotics and Controls Lab

Robotics are present in an ever-growing percentage of factories. We provide experience in our Robotics and Control lab with an x-axis robot, and a work cell.

Woods Technology Lab

Although high-tech materials are prevalent today, there is still no substitute in many applications for renewable wood as a building material. 

The Woods Technology Lab includes saws, a CNC router table, drill presses, jointers, mortisers, a planer, a router table, and sanders including disk sander, drum sander, thickness sander, and downdraft table.

Equipment

  • Saws 
    • Band saw
    • Miter saws
    • Scroll Saw
    • Table saws
  • CNC router table
  • Sanders 
    • Disk sander
    • Drum sander--oscillating
    • Thickness sander
    • Down Draft Table
  • Drill presses
  • Jointers
  • Mortiser
  • Planer
  • Router table