Common PCB design mistakes - Real Business Scenario

Scenario Mode

👤 Your Role: You are a PCB design engineer working in a manufacturing company.

📋 Request: Your manager wants a report showing the most common PCB design mistakes found in recent projects to help improve future designs.

📊 Data: You have a dataset listing PCB projects with columns: ProjectID, MistakeType, Frequency, and ImpactScore (1-10).

🎯 Deliverable: Create a dashboard showing the top 5 common PCB design mistakes by frequency and their average impact scores.

Sample Data

ProjectID	MistakeType	Frequency	ImpactScore
101	Incorrect trace width	5	7
102	Insufficient clearance	8	8
103	Wrong component placement	6	6
104	Incorrect trace width	4	7
105	Missing vias	3	5
106	Insufficient clearance	7	9
107	Wrong component placement	5	6
108	Missing vias	4	5
109	Incorrect trace width	6	8
110	Insufficient clearance	5	7

1

Step 1: Group the data by MistakeType and calculate the total Frequency for each mistake.

SUM(Frequency) grouped by MistakeType

Expected Result

Incorrect trace width: 15, Insufficient clearance: 20, Wrong component placement: 11, Missing vias: 7

2

Step 2: Calculate the average ImpactScore for each MistakeType.

AVERAGE(ImpactScore) grouped by MistakeType

Expected Result

Incorrect trace width: 7.33, Insufficient clearance: 8, Wrong component placement: 6, Missing vias: 5

3

Step 3: Sort the mistakes by total Frequency in descending order and select the top 5.

Sort by SUM(Frequency) DESC, take top 5 MistakeType

Expected Result

1. Insufficient clearance (20), 2. Incorrect trace width (15), 3. Wrong component placement (11), 4. Missing vias (7)

4

Step 4: Create a bar chart with MistakeType on the x-axis and total Frequency on the y-axis.

Bar chart config: X= MistakeType, Y= SUM(Frequency)

Expected Result

Bar chart showing Insufficient clearance highest, then Incorrect trace width, etc.

5

Step 5: Add a line chart overlay showing average ImpactScore for each MistakeType on the same x-axis.

Line chart config: X= MistakeType, Y= AVERAGE(ImpactScore)

Expected Result

Line chart overlay showing impact scores aligned with bar chart categories

6

Step 6: Add clear labels, title 'Top 5 Common PCB Design Mistakes', and legend for Frequency and ImpactScore.

Add chart title, axis labels, and legend

Expected Result

Dashboard is clear and easy to understand

Final Result

Top 5 Common PCB Design Mistakes

Frequency (bars) and Impact Score (line)

Mistake Type           | Frequency | Impact Score
------------------------------------------------
Insufficient clearance | ██████████ 20 | -------8
Incorrect trace width  | ████████ 15 | -----7.3
Wrong component placement | ██████ 11 | ---6
Missing vias           | ████ 7 | --5

✓Insufficient clearance is the most frequent mistake with the highest impact score.

✓Incorrect trace width is the second most common mistake with a moderately high impact.

✓Wrong component placement and missing vias occur less frequently and have lower impact scores.

✓Focusing on clearance and trace width improvements can reduce major PCB design issues.

Bonus Challenge

Create a heatmap showing the correlation between mistake frequency and impact score across different projects.

Show Hint

Use MistakeType and ProjectID as axes, color intensity representing Frequency * ImpactScore.