[en] A sawtooth crash algorithm that can automatically detect irregular sawteeth with strongly varying crash characteristics, including inverted crashes with central signal increase, has been developed. Such sawtooth behaviour is observed in ASDEX Upgrade with its tungsten wall, especially in phases with central ECRH. This application of ECRH for preventing impurity accumulation is envisaged also for ITER. The detection consists of three steps: a sensitive edge detection, a multichannel combination to increase detection performance, and a profile analysis that tests generic sawtooth crash features. The effect of detection parameters on the edge detection results has been investigated using synthetic signals and tested in an application to ASDEX Upgrade soft x-ray data. (paper)