Underground Utility Analysis and Soil Characterization Using Ground Penetrating Radar

This paper describes modern, non-invasive data acquisition methods of underground utility detection. Basic parameters, methods and their influence on the acquisition speed and data quality are defined. This data can be used for development of complex Geographic Information Systems. The aim of this paper is to show data extraction from the hyperbolic reflection on the radargram. These data are used for pipe radius and soil moisture content estimation. Influence of determined dielectric permittivity was discussed in terms of pipe radius estimation. Also, soil characteristics influence on the velocity of propagation was analyzed. For complete analysis new application was developed. This application includes hyperbola fitting algorythm for the raw data and additional calculation of variables mentioned above from determinated hyperbolic function. The analysis was applied to a number of real radar data scans of relevant underground utilities.