Application of 3-D Kriging to the seismic refraction survey for calculating earth-volume in cut-slope

Abstract

This paper presents 3-D modeling results of seismic refraction surveys performed to calculate the earth-volume of cut-slope. 3-D modeling was conducted for four p-wave profiles of seismic refraction data and analysis of physical properties (uniaxial compressive strength, rock core p-wave velocity) of the sampled rock cores was carried out to estimate the correlation between p-wave velocity and stiffness of rocks. As a result, p-wave velocities of rocks are decided for each status of rocks. The 3-D modeling results showed an accurate outline of the actual slope and p-wave velocity distribution. Based on a Kriging technique, p-wave velocity distribution was used to analyze the earth-volume and the total volume of rocks was calculated as 79,444 m3. This value was similar to the calculated total earth-volume used in civil engineering although the volume for each rock types was calculated differently. However, the calculation method traditionally used in civil engineering seemed to have some errors due to the irregular underground structure of the study area; while the Kriging method proposed in this study showed a prominent efficiency to minimize the probable errors when calculating the earth-volume.