Mean Direction Formula needed

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Guest

Plaese can anyone help?

I have some columns of directional data (0 to 360 degs) and need to calculate a mean direction, can anyone help? I'm sure it can't be that hard.
 
To calculate a mean, you use the Average or Median
function. The equation is:

=Average(A1:D10) or
=Median(A1:D10)

where A1 to D10 is the range of data.

It has to be data, though, not text. If you need to
separate the numbers 015, 030, 060, 135, 270, etc. from
the word "degrees", then click Data on the Menu Toolbar,
select Text To Columns and follow the Wizard's directions.

Cheers,
Scott S.
-----Original Message-----
Plaese can anyone help?

I have some columns of directional data (0 to 360 degs)
Click to expand...
and need to calculate a mean direction, can anyone help?
I'm sure it can't be that hard.
 
Hi Lange,
Scott has given you two correct formulas but be careful. While AVERAGE and
MEAN are synonyms, MEDIAN is something else.
If your data are all integers and you are unhappy with a decimal result such
as 230.5, go to Chip's site www.cpearson.com to find how to get 230:30 (230
deg and 30 mins)

Bernard

Lange said:
Plaese can anyone help?

I have some columns of directional data (0 to 360 degs) and need to
Click to expand...
calculate a mean direction, can anyone help? I'm sure it can't be that hard.
 
Thanks for the hep, but I need to explain myself better.

I am trying to get a mean direction for a set of data which varies through 360 degrees. If I just use the Average function this will not work, for example the mean of 1, 0 and 359 degrees will be 0 degs, using the Average function in Excel would give me a result of 120 degs, which is not what I am looking for. Any ideas?
 
Lange said:
Thanks for the hep, but I need to explain myself better.

I am trying to get a mean direction for a set of data which varies
through 360 degrees. If I just use the Average function this will
not work, for example the mean of 1, 0 and 359 degrees will be 0
degs, using the Average function in Excel would give me a result
of 120 degs, which is not what I am looking for. Any ideas?
Click to expand...

If you had two bearings, 0 and 180, would your 'average' direction be 90 or
270? Order-dependent? No net movement? Unless it's no net movement (so the
average direction would be undefined), I can't see how you get a meaningful
answer (at least an answer consistent with polar coordinates).
 
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