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    How Thin Is A Thin Bed PDF

    Uploaded by

    Mark Mao

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    (GEOPHYSICS, VOL. 38, NO. 6 (DECEMBER 1975, P HOW THIN IS A THIN BED?; M. B. WIDESS* Based on reflective properties, a thin bed may bbe conveniently defined as one whose thickness is less than about 24/8, where Ay is the (predomi nant) wavelength computed using the velocity of the bed. The amplitude of a reflection from a thin beds to the first order of approximation equal to editor's notes This paper is reprinted with the Permission of the Coptvseal Society of Tota ‘thon ffs normals ihe policy of Gowns notte. publish prescusly published material, an Cncepion hae be made fr this paper borane of lhe urvent renewal inicreat in setae reflection omplitues. For an unknown reason the geophy dustry appears to have grown up with some mis: conceptions on the reffcctive properties of so- called thin beds. What is the reflective behavior of thin beds? How thin must the bed be before the reflection has negligible amplitude? Our pur- pose is to consider such questions in elementary terms. CRAPMEAL MLUSTRATION OF A TM Let us first examine the algebraic difference of two identical wavelets which are displaced slightly in time. Referring to Figure 1a, wavelets Ry and = Ry are identical except for the time difference AT between them. Vertical lines between R, and = Ry mark the difference in amplitude at sueces- sive simultancous times, and this difference Ry is plotted in Figure 1b. The following properties of Raace evident, (1) Wavelet Ry has sero amplitude in each half eyele at a time close to midway be- ‘ween the times when Ry and —Ry are at theit ‘mizxinem amplitude. That is, there is W-degree 7640, 2 FIGS. 4nAb/Rs, where b is the thickness of the bed and A is the amplitude of the reflection if the bed were to be very thiek. The equation shows that a bed as thin as 10 ft has, for typical frequeney and velocity, considerably more reflective power th fs usually attributed to it. phase shift between Ry and the mean of Ry and the phase being advanced in time. (2) Cor- respandingly, whereas Ry exhibits an "M" form of character (shen considering strongest peaks and trough), Ry has an “S” form of character {when cons strongest peak and trough). (3) ‘The first. maximum (a trough) of Ry arrives earlier than the first maximum (a trough) of Rs, and the last maximum (a peak) of Ry arrives later than the last maximum (a trough) of Ry, In total, Re has a all evcle more than does Ry, and this, incidentally is associated with a greater relative ‘content of high frequency in Ry than in Ry. ‘The wavelet Ry is clearly the reflection from a thin bed, Figure fe, when the acoustic impedance {product of velocity and density) in the medium above the bed is the same as that in the medium below the bed, Ri being the reflection from the top interface and Ry from the bottom interface (transmission loss and multiple reflections being neglected). The negative sign attached to Re in Figure La, of course, accounts for the phase inver- sion at the bottom interface in this example, The time displacement AT is equal to 26/Vs for vert cal incidence, where b is the thickness of the bed and Vs is the velocity of the bed. Since Ry is the difference between identical wavelets that are displaced in time, Ry appro mates the time derivative of Ry when the time dis placement is small. It is significant however that { Reprinted from Proceedings of the Geophysieal Society of Tulsa 1957-S8, Manuscript received by the Ritor May’, 1075, * Retired from Amoco Production Co, Houston, ‘Tex 77001 © 1973 Society of Exploration Geophyscits, Al sights reserved 1176 How Thin is @ Thin Bed? the form of the wavelet Ry still closely: approxi- rates the derivative of R; even when b is as great tas one-eighth of the wavelength Ay computed using the velocity in the bed Qy=rl, where + is the predominant period of the wavelet). ‘This is iustrated in the next figure to be discussed The traces in Figure 2d show reflections from a progessively thinner bed. As before, the velocity ‘above the bed is the same as that below the bed, Figure 2a, The velocity of the bed itself is twice that of the superjacent and subjacent media. The Jets Ry and R; reflected from the upper and lower interfaces respeetively, as well as the fist ‘order multiple R, are shown in Figure 2e in terms ert Ws: VELOCITY GRAPH nw of the amplitude Ay of the incident wavelet Ry ‘The relations are for vertical incidence, and den sity changes are neglected. The first-order mul: tiple reflection is so weak that for our present ‘purposes it could also have been neglected, as are the higher order multiple reflections. The traces in Figure 2d were derived arithmetically by com positing Ry, Rs, and R, in a time relation corre- sponding to the respective bed thicknesses. The traces exhibit interplay between reflections from the top and bottom interfaces of the bed, produc ing desteuetive interference for b= Ny/2 and com Ay/4. Our attention however is to be directed toward the sill is at fi structive interference especially for inner beds, where constructive interference ill active bue with successively thinner bed a REFLECTION RAY DIAGRAM Fic. 1 Thephaseshiftand change incharacter resulting rom the difference af identical wavelets displaced slightly in time. Identical wavelets, Ry and ~ Ay, displaced by time Ab, Difference, Ky between Ry and ton from a thin bed in which Bc Rellec V,. Ryand —Hz are identieal except fora time displacement. (For simplicity, the transmission loss and multiple reflections are neglected and density is considered uniform) 78 vetoes oe és nites ° pte § worse! ff i sx. | eee wy sereeron 4) omer ‘ONSETS OF R, AND Ra eerste | OBE EEN aan ‘PROPAGATION TIMED Fig, 2. Bifect of bed thickness on the reflection, a. Velo AY A AO city graph. b, Refcetion ry diagram. c, Individual re fected waves that are composited using ime delays computed from bed thickness d, Form and relative timing of ‘composite reflection asa function of bed thickness, marke composite reflection), ming line interval is 08. d= thick Dom avelength within bed Oem wavelet Ry beds, destructive interference proceeds to ex- tinguish the reflection ‘When the bed is very thin, the character of the reflection is that of the time derivative of the in- cident wavelet and the timing is dictated by the time to the center of the bed. That substantially trough time. Q marke veroampiitade time ("center of ness bed. r=predominant period of incident wavelet, ‘Amplitudes for composite rellections ate all relative to the same incident the same character and timing exist for bed thick- ress as great us about Ay/8 is demonstrated on the trace for that bed thickness. The time derivative ff the incident wavelet is shown there by the dotted-line wavelet, and we see that this almost duplicates the reflection on that trace. (In draw- How Thin is a Thin Bed? ing the time derivative wavelet, its amplitude was increased by a constant factor to match the am- plitude of the refection on the trace, and the on set of the time derivative wavelet was located at the mean of the onset times of Ry and R:.) Thus, insofar as bed thickness alone is concerned, the character of the refleetions is indistinguishable for beds whose thiekness is less than about Xs. For that reason it is appropriate to define a thin bed as one whose thiekness is less than about \s/8, ‘Two-way ume through a thin bed would then be less than about 7/4. A bed that is thin for one frequency is, of course, not necessarily thin for a higher frequency ‘To the first order of approximation the central portion of wavelet Ry in Figure 1 may be treated asa sine wave whose maximum amplitude is the mean between the amplitudes of the predomi rnant peak and trough of 2. This simplification permits an casy derivation of the approximate amplitude of reflection Ry from a thin bed. Re. ferring zero time f to the mean of the deep-trough times of Ryand — Re, the equations for the central portion of Ry and ~ Re respectively are then = A cos (1+ b/Vi)2/7, 1) — A.cos (t— b/Vi)2x/r, (2) where tis the time relative to fo and 7 is the pre- dominant period of the wavelet. By expanding the two equations and taking the difference, we ob- ti Rom RRs @) & [2A sin 2nd/rV] sin 2et/r, ‘The term in brackets is approximately the maxi mum amplitude 4y of wavelet Ry. To the first order of approximation in the ease of a thin bed, sin 2xb/2V5 2% 2nb/rV, So that Ag de Ab/V Since Vs, we have! Ay Abie. (4) 179 ‘Therefore for thin beds the amplitude of the re- flection is approximately proportional to. the thickness of the bed and inversely proportional to the wavelength. We note that reflections from beds that are generally considered very thin are not necessarily restricted to small amplitudes. For example, it B= 20, we have Av0.64, That ina typi cal case of a relleetion whose predominant fre- ‘queney is 50 hz and a bed whose velocity is 10,000 ft/sec, the wavslength 2 is 200 ft, so that a bed whose thickness is only 10 ft would still have about 0.6 of the amplitude that would result if the bed were very thick. IT the bed were to be only § ft thick, the factor would still be fairly large, ie, 0.3 instead of 6. These magnitudes may he seen in the bottom two traces respectively of Figure 2d, comparing ther with the top trace, ‘The above conditions apply only to thin beds for which the two media bounding the bed have the same acoustic impedance. The relations do not apply when the to bounding media have ap- preciably different acoustic impedance, since in that ease not only isa thin bed involved but also an acoustic change in the absence of the thin bed. Itis then generally sufficiently accurate to con sider that the reflection from the bed is a com- posite of the fullosing two reflections: (1) the reference reflection, ie, the reflection which ‘would result in the absence of the thin bed, and (2) the time-detivative type of reflection asso- ciated with the thin bed itseli, for which the acoustic impedance above and below the bed is the same and is equal to the acoustic impedance fof the medium which the bed replaces. The effect of the thin bed may then be reckoned in terms of the relative strength and phase relation between the reference reffection and the time-derivative reftection. The relation may be shown readily by vectorial representation The exact equation for rllcetion feom a singe im. beside layer, considering simple harmonic waves and Accounting for transmission loss fbut not absorption fo), ie given in. Rayeigh (1983). ‘The eqoaton, Adapted to ou notation, 18 Ay = A+ AACR co b/AE+ + AYA, where ris the ratio of acoustic impedances. The qua "rd obtained ftom this equation difers fom sn equation 4} by no more than oly’ 12 percent when the bua is thin, B/Arecf and when 4-

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