Utility locator apparatus, systems, and methods

• US 9,945,976 B2
• Filed: 07/01/2014
• Issued: 04/17/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 09/18/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Seescan, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Seescan, Inc.
• Inventors: Olsson, Mark S., Merewether, Ray, Martin, Michael J., Stuart, Paul G.
• Primary Examiner(s): Phan, Huy Q
• Assistant Examiner(s): Russo, Raul Rios
• Application Number:
  US14/321,699
• Publication Number:
  US 20160003961A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,386 Days
• Field of Search: 324 67, 324326, 324327, 324329, 702 65, 702 75, 702 76
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/08 operating with magnetic or electric fields produced or modified by objects or geological structures or by detecting devices with electromagnetic waves G01V3/12
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/081 the magnetic field is produced by the objects or geological structures characterised by the method of magnetic field measurement G01R33/00
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/10 using induction coils
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/101 by measuring the impedance of the search coil; by measuring features of a resonant circuit comprising the search coil measuring impedance or characteristics derived therefrom G01R27/00, e.g. quality factor G01R27/26
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/102 by measuring amplitude
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/104 using several coupled or uncoupled coils G01V3/101 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/105 forming directly coupled primary and secondary coils or loops
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/107 using compensating coil or loop arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/15 specially adapted for use during transport, e.g. by a person, vehicle or boat
• CPC Class Codes: G01V 3/16 specially adapted for use from aircraft G01V3/165 - G01V3/175 take precedence

Abstract

Man-portable locator systems for locating buried or otherwise inaccessible pipes, conduits, cables, wires and inserted transmitters using detector arrays and stochastic signal processing and similar techniques to analyze and display multiple target objects at differing frequencies in a layered user interface (UI) are disclosed.

Claims

1. A locator device, comprising:

a sensor array for simultaneously detecting magnetic field signals from a first buried object and a second buried object;

a circuit for processing the received magnetic field signals to simultaneously generate a plurality of output signals associated with the first buried object and the second buried object;

a processor for receiving the output signals and determining information associated with the buried objects based at least in part on the output signals; and

a display for providing an output of the determined information associated with the buried objects simultaneously.

2. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the first buried object and the second buried object are selected from addition buried objects sensed by the locator device based at least in part on an estimated proximity of the first buried object and the second buried object to the locator device.

3. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the locator device sensor array includes upper and lower omnidirectional antenna nodes and right and left gradient antenna coils, and wherein the plurality of generated output signals are generated based on output signals provided from the upper and lower omnidirectional antenna nodes and the right and left gradient antenna coils to the circuit for processing the received magnetic field signals.

4. The locator device of claim 3, wherein each of the omnidirectional antenna nodes and the left and right gradient nodes include antenna coil elements, and each antenna coil element is operatively coupled to a corresponding antenna coil signal conditioning and digitizing circuit assembly for separate digitization of each of the antenna coil element signals so as to generate eight corresponding digital signal streams.

5. The locator device of claim 4, wherein the eight digital signal streams are provided to a digital filter based at least in part on a frequency-dependent characteristic of the digital signal streams.

6. The locator device of claim 5, wherein the digital filter is an adaptive filter associated with proximity values of the buried objects.

7. The locator device of claim 6, wherein the digital signal streams are provided to a power spectrum estimator to determine signal energy as a function of frequency.

8. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the first buried object comprises a buried pipe and the second buried object comprises a dipole magnetic field sonde.

9. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the first buried object and the second buried object are buried pipes.

10. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the first buried object and the second buried object are dipole magnetic field sondes.

11. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the determined information of the first buried object and the second buried object correspond to positions of the buried object, and the positions are provided on the display as a representation of each buried object in an overlaid fashion corresponding to the relative proximity of each to the locator device.

12. The locator device of claim 11, wherein the buried object determined to be in closest proximity to the locator device is rendered on a GUI of the display as larger in size than the other buried object.

13. The locator device of claim 11, wherein the determined information associated with the buried objects further comprises a current flow direction corresponding to current flowing in the buried objects at a calculated frequency or in a calculated frequency range.

14. The locator device of claim 13, wherein the current flow direction is shown as a series of curved segments.

15. The locator device of claim 11, wherein the display further includes a representation of magnetic field gradient line information corresponding to an offset from a trace line.

16. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the determined information associated with the buried objects comprises a current flow direction corresponding to current flowing in the buried objects at a calculated frequency or in a calculated frequency range.

17. The locator device of claim 1, wherein the display further includes a representation of magnetic field gradient line information corresponding to an offset from a trace line.

18. The locator device of claim 5, wherein the digital filter is a variable-time bandpass filter.

19. The locator device of claim 18, further comprising one or more additional variable-time bandpass filters coupled to the digital data streams.