What I have started doing is looking at average, peak-to-peak variation, and
standard deviation on each channel, over a half-hour or so of stable cruise.
I am watching for any trend or sudden change in variability of data on a
channel. Doesn't tell all, but I hope it will alert me to something going
awry, whether it is engine or sensor. And it was easy to do in Excel.

Stan


"Jay Honeck" wrote in message
...
I've had the EDM-700 in my panel since 2002. I was able to download
the engine data once, way back when the unit was new, but then my old
laptop's battery died, and I never could remember to bring it (or its
power cord) to the hangar. And, quite frankly, IMHO the saved data
was presented in a less-than-useful format. So, I never downloaded
it again.

Fast forward to 2007, and I've got a new Vista laptop. After half a
dozen failures, I finally got JPI's new(er) EZTrends software to
work. (First my old serial-to-USB cable wasn't Vista-compatible, then
the old EZSave software wasn't Vista compatible, then the COM ports
weren't configured right, then...)

After all this tinkering and updating, I was at last able to download
my last 22 flights, going back to October. The new EZTrends software
is very cool (and far superior to the old EZSave), showing a snapshop
of each cylinder's EGT and CHT taken every 6 seconds throughout the
flight. Using built-in features, you can graph & view maximums,
minimums, averages, and trends of all parameters, including outside
air temperature and oil temperature.

The graphs seem to paint a rosy picture. At no point did any cylinder
exceed maximum allowable temperatures. All the averages are nice,
straight lines, declining somewhat as we entered the colder months.
There appear to be no alarming trends.

So, to you computer gurus out there -- now what? Should I be looking
for anything other than peaks and trends? Is there any parameter, or
combination of parameters to watch out for? What do you guys do with
your data?

Thanks!
--
Jay Honeck
Iowa City, IA
Pathfinder N56993
www.AlexisParkInn.com
"Your Aviation Destination"