The deviation model — finding the odd cylinder

Sixteen exhaust temperatures overlaid on one axis is sixteen lines in a ribbon: you can see the ribbon move, but not which line is wrong. The Deviation model view answers the other question — which member of this family is not behaving like the rest of it.

Plan note: the Deviation model is a Pro feature. The Faults & codes view and everything on the Trend view are available on Starter. See Licensing & plans.

What a family is

A family is a set of channels whose names differ only by a number — “Cyl 1 Exhaust Temp” through “Cyl 16 Exhaust Temp”, “TC-1” through “TC-8”, “Rod Load 1” through “Rod Load 4”. Overtrace finds them from the channel names in the log you loaded; nothing has to be configured, and a family needs at least three members before it is offered.

  1. Open the View menu in the top bar and choose “Deviation model”.
  2. Every family in every loaded log is laid out one under the next — scroll to the one you want; there is nothing to select first.
  3. Each family's header names it, counts its members, and says whether anything is outside the band. Use the caret to roll a family up.
  4. Read the number in each tile's top-right: that member's average distance from the family mean over the visible time range.
  5. Tiles outside the band are outlined and coloured — red for running hot, blue for running cold.
  6. Click any tile to plot that channel on the Trend view and go straight there.

The two y-axis modes

The range is percentile-clamped on purpose. One sensor dropout or a single 3000° spike would otherwise flatten all sixteen tiles into straight lines.

How the band is decided

Each member's average deviation is compared against two standard deviations of the spread across the family, with a floor at 3% of the pooled range. The floor matters: a genuinely even bank has a spread near zero, and without it every member would be flagged over rounding noise. A healthy bank flags nothing.

The baseline — the second, more sensitive verdict

Comparing a cylinder against its peers has one blind spot, and it is the important one: the peers include the cylinder that is going bad, so the mean walks along with the fault. If every member of the bank creeps up ten degrees over a month, a peer comparison sees nothing at all. So each member is also compared against ITSELF.

A baseline is never taken from a shutdown. A stopped machine is beautifully stable and completely useless as a reference, so windows where the speed channel reads near zero are skipped. If nothing in the log ever sat still, the calmest window found is used and labelled unsteady.

What it is measuring, and what it is not

Families are modelled as you scroll to them, so a log with twenty families opens as fast as a log with one. The y-axis mode and any members you took out of a comparison are saved in .otsession.json, so a session sent to a colleague reopens the same way.

FAQ

How do I find a cold cylinder in Overtrace?

Open View → Deviation model and scroll to the exhaust-temperature family. Each cylinder is drawn against the bank mean and its average difference is shown in the tile; a cylinder running cold is outlined in blue with a negative number.

Why is no family offered for my log?

The deviation model needs at least three channels whose names differ only by a number. Logs with a single exhaust thermocouple, or with cylinder channels named inconsistently, have no family that size.

Does the deviation model need the channels to be plotted first?

No. It reads the family straight from the loaded module, whether or not those channels are ticked in the sidebar. Clicking a tile is what plots one on the Trend view.

Is the deviation model available on Starter?

No, it is a Pro feature. Starter keeps the Trend view, the fault list, and the core cursor, measurement and alignment tools.