ESG Microseismic System Manual v1

Engineering Seismology Group Canada Inc.
Microseismic Monitoring System User

Guide
Version 1.0
July 2016
Copyright 2016 Engineering Seismology Group Canada Inc.. All rights reserved.
Information in this document is subject to change without notice. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or any means electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording
for any purpose other than the purchaser's personal use without the written permission of Engineering Seismology Group
Canada Inc..
The software described in this document is furnished under a license agreement or nondisclosure agreement. The soft-
ware may be used or copied only in accordance with the terms of those agreements.
This manual is prepared as a convenience for ESG customers. ESG assumes no responsibility for any inaccuracy, error,
omission, defect, deficiency or nonconformity contained in this manual. In no event will ESG be held liable for direct, indir-
ect, special, incidental or consequential damages resulting from any defect or omission in this manual, even if advised of
the possibility of such damages. This manual is provided “AS IS,” with all faults.
ESG Solutions is a brand name of Engineering Seismology Group Canada Inc.
Engineering Seismology Group Canada Inc.
20 Hyperion Court
Kingston, ON K7K 7K2
Phone 613-548-8287
CONTENTS
CHAPTER 1
Introduction 5
Overview: Hardware Components 6
Overview: Software Modules 17
IT Requirements 19
CHAPTER 2
Microseismic Sensors 21
Microseismic Signals 22
Geophones and Accelerometers 23
Troubleshooting 27
CHAPTER 3
Paladin® IV 32-bit Seismic System Hardware 31
Overview 32
Setup 35
Paladin Web-interface 40
SIB 78
Precision Timing Server (PTP) 82
Troubleshooting 87
CHAPTER 4
Hyperion Software Suite (HSS) 91
HNAS 92
WaveVis - Waveform Visualizer 99
SeisVis - Seismic Visualizer 107
PalDiagnostics 117
SeisWatch 130
SeisAlert 147
iv
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
Welcome to ESG's industry-leading microseismic monitoring system. This guide provides an overview
of hardware and software components of a typical ESG system.
Engineering Seismology Group (ESG) Canada Inc. is an innovative research and development com-
pany that combines international expertise in engineering, seismology, rock physics, mining, and the pet-
roleum industry. At ESG, we are committed to solving problems that concern the mining, petroleum,
geotechnical and environmental communities by offering a broad range of turn-key equipment and ser-
vices. Moreover, a unique marriage of research and design personnel allows us to develop customized
data acquisition equipment and processing software to assist in the monitoring of induced and natural
seismicity.
ESG's acquisition hardware is centered around our flagship product, the Paladin IV® digital seismic
recorder. The Paladin® system’s modular design allows new ideas to be quickly implemented and
tested. ESG's software platform consists of over 25 separate modules that together make up the Hyper-
ion Seismic Software (HSS) Suite. Here we provide basic instructions for the most commonly used fea-
tures in the primary software modules HNAS, WaveVis and SeisVis. For detailed software resources
please refer to the help guides found under the help menu of each software module.
If you have any comments or questions regarding this document orESG's hardware or software com-
ponents, please contact us. ESG's address and telephone number are listed in the Support section of
the manual. We hope you find this guide useful.
This chapter discusses the following.
Overview: Hardware Components 6

Overview: Software Modules 17
IT Requirements 19
Overview: Hardware Components
How Do Microseismic Systems Work?
ESG’s monitoring solutions are deployed modularly and operate as a complete turn-key solution. In general, a system is
made up of a number of unique components including:
1. Sensors: Triaxial 4.5Hz geophones and a mix of uniaxial/triaxial 15Hz geophones.

2. Acquisition Box: A NEMA-4 enclosure that houses essential acquisition and communications equipment, including
Paladin® digital seismic recorders, which serves as the backbone of the system.
3. Communications: Ethernet or wireless communications for full-waveform data transfer.
4. Computers: Fast multi-core acquisition and processing machines with dedicated graphics.
The figure below illustrates a conceptual system highlighting the key components for deployment and operation.
Paladin® Microseismic System Components
The figure below illustrates the process flow of data from event origination to visualization in the Paladin® system.
6
Paladin® Microseismic System Flow
1. The sensors (Component 1) detect energy released by events and transmit the analog signals via shielded cop-
per cables to the ESG Paladin® acquisition platform (Component 2).
2. Each recorder is a web-enabled digital seismic recorder equipped with its own IP address to facilitate iden-
tification, remote monitoring, and calibration. It is fully independent, and can be supported by solar power for
remote locations.
3. Once the signal has been registered and digitized it is transmitted via a wired or wireless network (Component 3)
to the acquisition PC (Component4).
4. ESG’s Hyperion Network Acquisition Software (HNAS) is installed on the acquisition PC (Component 4) and
provides continuous, full waveform data acquisition and triggering in real-time for events.
5. The Hyperion Seismic Software (HSS) suite, installed on a workstation computer (Component 5), provides a pro-
cessing environment for analysis and visualization of the activity in 3D. A diagnostic module centralizes information
for maintenance efforts. With an intuitive interface the complete software package is user-friendly for onsite staff.
Hardware Components
Microseismic monitoring system consists of sensors, digitizers, timing hardware, communication hardware, and com-
puters. The chart below lists the hardware components for each category with a brief description. Please refer to the spe-
cification sheets for more details. Sensors will be covered in a separate section.
CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Digitizer (Recorder) and the additional supporting hardware
Paladin 2-Viper Digitizer that converts analogue signal from sensors

into digital samples (50Hz to 20kHz).
Sensor Interface Box (SIB) for Paladin 2-Viper Powers accelerometers
Pre-amplifier for Paladin 2-Viper Provides adjustable gain (12dB to 72dB) for each
channel before signal digitization.
8
Paladin IV ESG’s latest generation digitizer with increased on-
board storage, powerful on-board processing and
IEEE1588 PTP timing compatibility.
Advanced Diagnostics Board (ADB) for Paladin IV Combination of Sensor Interface Box (SIB) and Pre-
amplifier for Paladin IV with additional functionalities
such as auto detection of sensors and their status and
advanced geophone diagnostics

Timing
Paladin Timing Source (PTS) Installed on surface and connected to a GPS

antenna, provides GPS and PPS (pulse per
second) timing information to Paladin Timing
Receiver (PTR) via its two fiber outputs (MM&SM
or dual SM with ST connectors)
Paladin Timing Receiver (PTR) Installed in Paladin junction boxes, receives timing
information from Paladin Timing Source (PTS)
via fiber input (MM or SM) and provides timing
information to Paladins via its copper outputs. It
also acts as a timing repeater via its two fiber out-
puts (MM&SM with ST connectors or dual SM
with SC connectors)
Precision Timing Server (PTP Server) Connects to IEEE1588 PTP-compatible network,

provides timing information via its Ethernet output
to Paladin IVs connected to the same network. It
is usually installed on surface and connected to a
GPS antenna
10
Communication
Ethernet Switch (Third Party) Also called a media converter (Fiber to Ethernet),
installed in/close to the Paladin junction box and acts as
a bridge between the fiber optic network and the Palad-
ins (Ethernet)
PTP-compatible Ethernet Switch (Third Party) For PTP timing, IEEE-1588 PTP-compatible Ethernet
Switch is required.

Watchdog
Rackmount Watchdog Monitors the status of critical software (data acquis-

ition/processing, data transfer, data archive) for up to
four computers (acquisition servers). It will power-
cycle the acquisition server when a problem is detec-
ted in order to ensure continuous data acquisition
Desktop Watchdog Serves the same purpose as a Rackmount Watchdog

for one computer (processing PC)
Watchdog (Third Party) Interfaces with ESG software (SoftDogService) to

provide the same functionality as the Desktop Watch-
dog for one computer (processing PC)
12
Computers
Acquisition Server (Third Party) Handles real time continuous data acquisition, stor-
age, triggering, and automatic processing.
Processing PC (Third Party) Handles data processing (manual/remote), trans-

fer, visualization, alerting, and analysis.
Sensors
ESG manufactures a wide range of sensors to cover the magnitude range needed for microseismic monitoring.
Monitoring ranges associated with different types of sensors
All of ESG’s sensors come in watertight stainless steel housing, designed to withstand the harshest environments.

Geophones
G1-1.1-1.0 / G3-1.1-2.0 15Hz Omni-directional Uniaxial/Triaxial Geophone

Commonly used for soft rock mines.
Also used in hard rock mines for extending the lower fre-
quency range (for larger magnitude events) and more
accurate source parameters.
Sensitivity: 1.1 Volts/inch/second
Diameter: 1.0 or 2.0 inches
Frequency range: 15 – 1000 Hz
G3-1.1-2.0-HP / G3-2.2-2.0-HP 15Hz Omni-directional High Pressure Triaxial Geo-

phone
Designed to be installed in deep boreholes. Dual-ele-
ment variant offers increased sensitivity.
Sensitivity: 1.1 or 2.2 Volts/inch/second
Diameter:2.0 inches
14
DH-2.2-2.0 15Hz Omni-directional Dual-Element Downhole Geo-
phone Array
Commonly used for long-term petroleum applications
but also used for mining applications such as shaft mon-
itoring and open pit monitoring.
Customizable sensor spacing and high pressure rating
with temperature/pressure monitoring capabilities.
Diameter:2.0 inches
G3-0.7-2.5 / G3-0.7-4.0 4.5Hz Directional Triaxial Geophone

Commonly used for SGM (Strong Ground Motion) sta-
tions for low frequency detection.
Diameter: 2.5 or 4.0 inches
Frequency range: 4.5 – 500 Hz

Accelerometers
A1-30-1.0 Uniaxial Accelerometer

Commonly used for hard rock mines for detecting high-fre-
quency/small-magnitude events.
Sensitivity: 30 Volts/g
Diameter: 1.0 inches
Powered: 24-28 V
A3-1.0-1.25 Triaxial Accelerometer

Used in hard rock mines with A1-30-1.0 sensors in order
to provide more accurate source parameters
Sensitivity: 1 Volts/g
Diameter: 1.25 inches
Powered: 18-28 V
Frequency range: 0.13 – 8000 Hz
16
Overview: Software Modules
Overview of the HSS
The Hyperion Software Suite includes a number of programs designed to record, filter, process, visualize and report seis-
mic data. The software suite works together to perform five main tasks:
1.Data Acquisition
2.Data Processing
3.Data Analysis
4.Data Storage
5.Diagnostics and Alerting
Data Acquisition is performed using the Paladin® data acquisition hardware and HNAS™ software. HNAS™ monitors the
signals which are recorded on each data acquisition channel, and identifies data that looks like it could represent an event.
Data associated with suspected events or blasts are automatically processed and saved for later analysis. The data pro-
cessor is configured using the program SeisProcTree™.
Processed data can be visually analyzed using SeisVis™. Event locations can be observed as they relate to the site geo-
metry, and source parameters such as event magnitude can be presented on a colour gradient to observe any trends or
seismic patterns.
The actual waveforms for each event can be viewed and edited using the visualization software WaveVis™. From here, it
is possible to modify arrival times or perform additional filtering to remove noise, to improve source location calculations.
Data can also be analyzed using the report generation properties of the Seismic Database™. A variety of custom time
span reports and graphs can be created.
Permanent data storage is performed using Archiver™. Data can be moved from working directories on to a backup drive.
Finally, real-time monitoring of system health and sensor function is performed using PalDiagnostics™. Settings can be
configured to alert users when a certain number of sensors are not functioning, when the system goes offline or if Paladin
stations become out of sync, among others.

Flow chart describing the main components of the Hyperion Seismic Software (HSS) Suite.
18
IT Requirements
Recommended Setup
ESG recommends physical machines connected to ESG’s Watchdog hardware over virtual machines. This recom-
mendation allows for the use of Watchdog functionality which power cycles the connected seismic PCs when crucial ESG
software stops working/responding, and allows for easier maintenance and troubleshooting. Also, most virtual machines
lack dedicated graphics card needed for smooth visualization.
Recommended Specification for Seismic PCs

Acquisition Server:
Intel Xeon E3-1220 v5 Processor (or better)
8GB DDR4 Memory
500GB 3.5 inch SATA 7200RPM Hard Drive
2nd 500GB 3.5 inch SATA 7200RPM Hard Drive (RAID1)
2TB 3.5inch SATA 7200RPM Hard Drive for Ring Buffer Storage
Windows Server 2012 (or 2008) Operating System
Processing PC:
Intel Core i7-6700 Processor (or better)
8GB DDR4 Memory
1TB 2.5 inch SATA 7200RPM Hard Drive
2nd 1TB 2.5 inch SATA 7200RPM Hard Drive (RAID1)
Dedicated Graphics
Windows 10 (or 7) Operating System
User accounts
It is recommended to use one user account (“Seismic” account) for all seismic PCs in order to avoid potential issues
caused by ESG programs running under different user accounts.
If individual user accounts must be used, they must have all the necessary permissions listed below in order to run crucial
ESG software without issues when another user logs into the seismic PC.
Permissions
The following permissions should be granted to all users logging into seismic PCs.
Run, stop, and pause services
Read/write access to C:\ESG folder
Access to Command Prompt
Ability to restart the PC
Run ESG software with administrative privileges (read/write access to Windows Registry)

Technical Support
If any problems or errors should arise while using this package, please direct questions or comments to:
Mail:
ESG Solutions
20 Hyperion Court,
Kingston, Ontario, Canada
K7K 7K2
Tel: 613-548-8287
Fax: 613-548-8917
E-mail: support@esgsolutions.com
20
CHAPTER 2
Microseismic Sensors
Microseismic waves can be detected using two types of sensors: geophones and accelerometers. Geo-
phones are devices which convert the velocity of ground vibrations into a voltage signal. They are
rugged devices that can stand up to harsh monitoring environments. Accelerometers measure the
acceleration of ground vibrations as a voltage signal. They are more sensitive devices, and can detect
smaller signals with higher frequencies.
Microseismic Signals 22
Geophones and Accelerometers 23
Troubleshooting 27
Microseismic Signals
When activities such as mining or hydrocarbon extraction alter the stress equilibrium surrounding rock masses, adjust-
ments in the form of new rock fractures or movements along existing fractures may occur. This activity releases energy,
which can be monitored throughout a site. Information about the microseismicity of these events can be used to locate
their source relative to workplaces or mine openings, and help observe how the seismicity changes over time.
What do we want to measure?

When seismic activity is caused naturally (i.e. earth- quakes, seismic events) or induced (i.e. an explosion, blast), vibrations
travel outwards through the ground from the source of the activity. The length of time it takes for sensors located around a
site to measure these vibrations, and the size of these vibrations give an indication of how far the source of the activity is
from these sensors. These vibrations are called body waves since they travel through the ground. There are two main
types of body waves: P-waves and S-waves.
P-waves:
P-waves (Primary waves) travel in a longitudinal direction away from the source. They are compression waves, since the
ground is compressed and dilated as the wave propagates outward. P-waves travel nearly twice as fast through the
ground as S-waves, therefore they are the first wave to be detected by ground sensors located throughout a site.
S-waves:
S-waves (Secondary waves) travel in a transverse direction, causing the ground to be displaced in a direction that is per-
pendicular to the direction of P-wave propagation. S-waves travel more slowly through the ground than P-waves, there-
fore they are detected by ground sensors throughout a site after p-waves have already arrived.
Diagram depicting P-wave and S-wave particle motion
How are microseismic waves measured?

Microseismic waves can be detected using two types of sensors: geophones and accelerometers. Geophones are devices
which convert the velocity of ground vibrations into a voltage signal. They are rugged devices that can stand up to harsh
monitoring environments. Accelerometers measure the acceleration of ground vibrations as a voltage signal. They are
more sensitive devices, and can detect smaller signals with higher frequencies.
Both geophones and accelerometers can detect microseismic activity in one direction (uniaxial sensors) or in three dir-
ections (triaxial sensors). Traditionally, uniaxial sensors are used to create a wide ranging, cost-effective sensor array to
ensure monitoring coverage over an entire site. Triaxial sensors give information about the direction that the waves are
traveling in, and therefore are useful for providing information for advanced data processing.
The sensors are installed throughout a site, both on the ground surface and underground for maximum coverage.
22
Geophones and Accelerometers
How do they work
Geophones
Geophones function much like the alternator in your car which uses the motion of a running engine to generate electricity
to keep your car battery charged. The coil of wire is supported by a suspended mass that should remain still while the outer
casing and magnet move with the ground. This movement of the magnet within the suspended coil generates a voltage
which is directly related to the amount of ground motions.
Schematic of a geophone cell
Accelerometers
A piezoelectric material (usually quartz) is contained within the accelerometer. A small cantilever mass applies a constant
force to the crystal. When the mass moves the stress on the crystal changes (increases/decreases) and this change
provides information on direction (polarity) and amplitude of ground motions.
Schematic of an accelerometer

Direct Comparison
Geophones Accelerometers
Geophones are analogue devices that measure ground Accelerometers are analogue devices that measure ground
motion as velocity. motion as acceleration.
Geophones require no electrical power to operate, Accelerometers require electrical power since amplification
which is why they are often preferred for long-term and conversion to acceleration occurs within the sensor.
installations.
Geophones are lightweight, robust, and able to detect Compared to geophones, accelerometers have increased
very small ground motions. sensitivity and higher upper cutoff frequency for detecting
extremely small ground motions.
Some geophones are uni-directional (SGM geo- Accelerometers are omni-directional, meaning they can be
phones), meaning they must be mounted in a certain ori- mounted in any orientation.
entation in order to function properly.
Sensitivity
Sensor sensitivity is the conversion from velocity (m/s) or acceleration (m/s^2) into voltage. Geophone sensitivity is meas-
ured in Volts/inch/second or V/m/s (1 meter = 39.37 inches) whereas Accelerometer sensitivity is measured in Volts/g (g =
gravity, which is ~9.81 m/s^2). Voltage at the sensor depends on the ground motion and the sensitivity of the sensor. In
order to measure/detect very small ground motions, a sensor with a very high sensitivity is required.
For example, if we have a sensor with sensitivity of 100 volts/m/s (geophone) and the ground is moving at 10^-7 m/s, then
the sensor voltage will reach 10^-5 volts.
10^-7 m/s * 100 V/m/s = 10^-5 V (0.00001 V)
If the geophone’s sensitivity is 1000 volts/m/s, then the sensor voltage will reach 10^-4 V (0.0001 V). Since 0.0001 V is very
small, gain is applied to maximize the signal (please refer to the section on gains for more details).
Choosing the correct sensor type for the microseismic system ensures that the desired magnitude range falls within the
threshold of detection. For detecting small magnitude events from greater distances, sensors with a higher sensitivity are
required. However, for detecting large magnitude events, sensors with a high sensitivity may risk having signals clip.
Gain
Gain is a multiplier applied to recorded voltage values during acquisition inside a Paladin in order to overcome attenuation
and waveform divergence. Gain can also be represented in decibels (dB) and the following formula is used for conversion:
dB = 20*log (Gain)
10
In order to prevent signals clipping, the highest expected amplitude multiplied by the gain should not exceed the maximum
voltage range (4.096V for Paladin 2-V, 2.38V for Paladin IV).
While the sensitivity of the sensor plays a larger role in event detection, increasing the gain can also improve event detec-
tion. Because HNAS uses the amplitude of the signal after amplification for triggering, increase in signal amplitude due to
applying gain will result in increased event detection.
In the example below, the gain has been modified to show the effect it has on triggering.
*The sensitivity of the sensors was not altered.
24
Screenshot of HNAS triggers with varying gain settings
When gain is being applied/changed, the triggering threshold should be changed accordingly in order to maximize event
detection without increasing noise triggers.
Any gain values used by Paladins are automatically passed through to the final HSF files. The gain values should never be
altered after the fact except for rare cases where third-party hardware was used for data acquisition.
Near-field and Far-field Effects

Near-field Effects
The near-field effect simply means the sensors are too close to the source. Near-field effects can affect the microseismic
system’s ability to locate events and accurately calculate source parameters. If sensors are too close to the source, P and S
waves have not traveled enough distance to separate, which will make accurate picking of P and S waves challenging.
In order to accurately record an event, the sensors and the source must be certain number of wavelengths away from
each other, and this distance between the sensors and the source will depend on the magnitude of the event being recor-
ded.
Large magnitude, low frequency events require that the sensors are 600 to 1000 meters from the source.
Small magnitude, high frequency events require that the sensors are 30 to 50 meters from the source.
This is why low frequency SGM (Strong Ground Motion) sensors are usually installed on surface while high-frequency
sensors (accelerometers) are installed underground closer to the source.
Far-field Effects
If we are unable to deploy sensors close to the source and the expected magnitude range goes below -1 Mw, high-sens-
itivity sensors may be deployed in order to detect the highly attenuated signal (Note: Sensors with high sensitivity tend to
produce high background noise levels). We may also stack sensors to increase sensitivity if alternate tool options are not
available.
Cable Length Effects for Geophones

As cable length increases, resistance and capacitance between the geophone and the Paladin also increases, resulting in
a decrease of the upper cutoff frequency. ESG recommends keeping the cable length between geophones and Paladins
below 100m wherever possible.

Effect of cable length on geophone signal
26
Troubleshooting
Common Issues with sensors include:
60 Hz (or multiples of 60 Hz) Noise
No Signal
60 Hz Noise
Contamination of seismic signals with 60 Hz noise produces a characteristic cyclical nature in WaveVis. Viewing the data in
frequency domain view produces a peak at the offending frequency (i.e. 60 Hz).
Example of 60Hz noise on sensor signal in WaveVis
There may be a number of reasons why a sensor is picking up nearby noise at a specific frequency. See the table below for
common causes and solutions.

Cause Solution
Close proximity to AC power cables Run the sensor cables on the opposite side of the
drift from power cables.
When required, sensor cables should cross over
power cables at 90 degrees.
If sensor cables are running parallel to power
cables, keep a minimum distance of 3 feet.
Sensor cable cord grips should be installed on the
opposite side of the power/communication cord
grips on the Paladin JB.
Incorrect shielding Shield must be continuous from a sensor to a Paladin junc-

tion box and should not be grounded at any other point.
Exposed splices Use a splice junction box with sensor terminals.

Use 3M Scotchlok connectors (UR2) if splice junc-
tion box is not available.
Severed cable Accelerometer:

If cable is severed, bias voltage reading from the
sensor will be 24VDC for Paladin 2-Viper and
32VDC for Paladin IV.
Visually inspect the cable run.
Starting at the Paladin JB, measure bias voltage
from the Paladin (Should be 24VDC for Paladin
2-Viper, 32VDC for Paladin IV) at each splice until
damaged section is identified.
Replace the damaged section.
Geophone:
If cable is severed, the resistance reading
towards the geophone will be 0Ohm.
Starting at the sensor, measure resistance from
the geophone (~2000Ohm for 15Hz geophone,
~300Ohm for 4.5Hz geophone) at each splice
until damaged section is identified.
No Signal
A second common problem detected with sensors is the lack of a signal. See the table below for common causes and solu-
tions to this problem.
28
Cause Solution
Severed cable Accelerometer:

If cable is severed, bias voltage reading from the
sensor will be 24VDC for Paladin 2-Viper and
32VDC for Paladin IV.
Starting at the Paladin JB, measure bias voltage
from the Paladin (Should be 24VDC for Paladin
2-Viper, 32VDC for Paladin IV) at each splice
Geophone:
If cable is severed, the resistance reading
towards the geophone will be 0Ohm.
Starting at the sensor, measure resistance from
the geophone (~2000Ohm for 15Hz geophone,
~300Ohm for 4.5Hz geophone) at each splice
Incorrect setting on Sensor Interface Box (SIB) – Paladin Toggles on the SIB must be set to the correct position.
2-Viper only
Uniaxial accelerometer: 200Ω (up)
Geophones: Off (middle)
Triaxial accelerometer: CCD (down)
Paladin Swap the channel with the sensor with working

signal to determine if the issue is with the Paladin
or the sensor.
If it is determined that the Paladin is the issue,
install a spare Paladin and contact ESG to initiate
RMA process.

Damaged Sensors Accelerometer:
Measure bias voltage from the accelerometer
(~16 to 20VDC for A1, ~8 to 12VDC for A3)*.
Replace the damaged sensor if the sensor does
not return proper bias voltage.
*Accelerometer must be powered.
Geophone:
Measure resistance from the geophone
(~2000Ohm for 15Hz geophone, ~300Ohm for
4.5Hz geophone).
Replace the damaged sensor if the sensor does
not return proper resistance reading.
30
CHAPTER 3
Paladin® IV 32-bit Seismic System
Hardware
The Paladin® IV data acquisition system provides 32-bit resolution suitable for seismic monitoring of min-
ing, petroleum, nuclear, storage and geotechnical applications. The Paladin® IV is a web enabled, low
powered, rugged digitizer system that can be operated stand-alone or in a multi-station configuration
utilizing a local area or remote wireless network.
The Paladin® IV system provides exceptional monitoring capabilities . It automatically records and dis-
plays continuous seismograph traces. Additionally, event and magnitude data are stored for reference.
Applications include traditional seismic monitoring, mine-induced seismicity, strong motion studies and
blast monitoring.
Each Paladin® IV unit comes with either three or six input channels. The unit may employ uniaxial or tri-
axial geophones or accelerometers.
Overview 32
Setup 35
Paladin Web-interface 40
SIB 78
Precision Timing Server (PTP) 82
Troubleshooting 87
Overview
Configuration Options
There are two possible configurations for running Paladin® IV acquisition stations:
Stand-alone configuration
Networked configuration
Stand-Alone Paladin® IV

The Paladin® IV can be used in a stand-alone configuration allowing the user to periodically download event data collected
on the unit or to the connected USB key. This configuration is often chosen for remote locations where installation of ded-
icated communications (e.g. fiber, radio, cellular or satellite) is not economically warranted. This configuration has also
been used to provide information on background levels in areas of low seismicity where periodic collection of data is feas-
ible.
Networked Paladin® IV Systems

A number of Paladin® IV stations can be networked together. Using the Hyperion™ Networked Acquisition System
(HNAS™) software, a PC can monitor one or more Paladin® IV stations in combination with other data acquisition
systems. In this case each Paladin® IV may have any configuration of uniaxial and triaxial sensors on up to six channels.
HNAS™ stores a continuous record of the acquired data, scanning through the data to compare measurements to trig-
gering criteria and initiating and analyzing triggered events as required. In Acquisition Group Mode, HNAS™ software
allows connection directly to Paladin® IV stations as well as to other instances of HNAS™. In this way, HNAS™ effectively
networks large numbers of Paladin® IV stations.
Specifications
Paladin® IV Data Acquisition Systems are web-enabled, low-power, rugged digitizers running as stand-alone units or in a
multi-station configuration with a local area or remote wireless network. They provide 32-bit resolution suitable for seismic
monitoring of mining, nuclear storage, petroleum and geotechnical applications and seamlessly integrate with ESG’s
Hyperion seismic processing and reporting software.
Physical Characteristics
Operating Temperature -20°C to + 70°C (-4°F to 158°F)
Dimensions (L x W x H) 17.5cm x 13.2cm x 4.1cm (6.9” x5.2” x 1.6”)
Weight 0.89 kg (1.9 lbs.)
32
System Features
Power Supply Voltage 5.3-18 V DC
Power Consumption (w/GPS) 3.2 W maximum
Time Synchronization Internal/external GPS, IEEE 1588 PTP (optional)
Recording mode Continuous (ring buffer) or triggered events
Storage capacity 4 GB SDHD card internal; optional external USB 2.0
Triggering mode Threshold level, STA/LTA
Configuration Standalone or multi-station network
System status LED indicator, active, comm, USB active, time sync, PPS
System interface Web- enabled configuration for all parameters
Communication Ethernet TCP/IP via cable, wireless, radio, fiber, internet
Seismic Channel Characteristics
Seismic channels 1 to 6channels
Sampling frequency In steps from 50 Hz to 20 kHz (programmable)
Bandwidth DC to ½ sampling rate
Resolution 32-bit (24-bit or 32-bit modes available)
Effective resolution 24.4-bit
Effective number of bits (ENOB) 22.6-bit
Dynamic range 144 dB
Gain setting In steps from 0dB to 36dB (extended gain optional)
Calibration ADC gain and offset, built-in geophone pulse, licensed

geophone diagnostics

Instrumentation Module
Instrumentation channels 8 analog inputs, 16-bit resolution tilt, thermocouple, pressure, GMM, cables
(e.g. tiltmeters, thermocouples etc.)
Range 0-4 V DC
Digital input/output channels 2 digital I/O
Specifications are subject to change.
34
Setup
Cold Weather Precautions
If the equipment arrives in very cold weather, allow the boxes to warm up to room temperature for several hours before
opening them. Exposing cold electronic equipment to a warm room can cause condensation that may cause damage to
the system.
If condensation forms, wait for the equipment to dry completely before plugging in the system.
Hardware Features
Status Lights
As shown below, there are five LEDs on the front of the Paladin® IV digitizer.
Status LEDs and USB Eject button
Active
The Active LED blinks when the Paladin® IV hardware is working correctly.
Comm
The Communication LED indicates communication with a host program (HNAS™) via Ethernet. This is not an
ETHERNET indicator LED.
USB Active
The USB Active LED is on when a USB storage device is attached and operating normally. If a USB storage device is
plugged in that is nearly full, the USB Active LED will flash 5 times before becoming continuously lit. The USB Active LED
will turn off when the device becomes full, or when it is safe to unplug the USB storage device after pressing the USB Eject
button.
Time Sync
The Time Sync LED is on when a Paladin® IV is synchronized with a timing source. The timing source could be an internal
GPS, fiber or network time source (i.e. PTP).
PPS
The PPS or “Pulse per second” LED blinks when a timing pulse is received (either from the onboard GPS engine or from
an external source).

USB Eject Button/IP Reset
USB Eject
The USB Eject button is located on the front of the Paladin® IV unit. If a USB storage device is connected to the Paladin®
IV, it should be safely dismounted before it is removed. Removing a USB device without following the USB Eject pro-
cedure may corrupt the USB device and result in permanent data loss.
Please follow the following steps to safely remove a USB from the Paladin® IV:
Press the USB Eject button once. The USB Active LED will blink (4-5 times).
Remove the USB storage device after the USB Active LED has turned off for 10 seconds.
IP Address Reset
The Reset button is an IP address reset button. In the event that communication with the Paladin® IV is lost, or if the IP
Address is forgotten, the Paladin® IV IP address and other related network settings can be restored to their default values:
Press and hold the reset button down for two seconds, after which all the LED indicators will turn on and off sev-
eral times.
The Paladin® IV will then restart with the following IP address and settings:
Paladin® IV Default IP:192.168.1.254
Subnet: 255.255.255.0
Gateway: not set (blank)
If the username or password has been changed and forgotten, the Paladin® IV needs to be re-flashed by an ESG tech-
nician in order to restore the settings to default values. The default username and password are:
Username:admin
Password: esg
Settings and Inputs on Left Side of Paladin® IV Hardware Unit
Left side of Paladin® IV Hardware Unit
Main Power Connector: (+12VDC, GND)

This is the main power connection, The Paladin® IV requires +5VDC to +18VDC and a GND for normal operation. The
main power connector has reverse polarity protection built into it. If a reverse polarity condition does occur, the protection
circuit will prevent damage from occurring to the Paladin, however the power supply connected to the Paladin may exhibit
lower than normal voltage. The Paladin will not operate until the reverse condition is corrected. If the input voltage exceeds
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18 VDC, the protection circuit may limit the voltage, however, the fuse will likely blow to protect the Paladin. Do not exceed
18 VDC for power voltage.
Ethernet
Connect the Paladin® IV unit to a network using a standard Ethernet cable. The Paladin® IV can also be connected dir-
ectly to another computer using a patch (cross-over) cable.
GPS Antenna
Plug an external GPS antenna into the Paladin® IV GPS antenna port to use the internal GPS as the timing source.
Tilt Meter
This is a power and signal connector for two 3 channel tilt meters.
Utility Port
The utility connector is a 2 tiered 20-pin connector that allows access to the various specialized functions of the Paladin®
IV. ESG recommends that where possible these connections be made under instruction by ESG personnel. The functions
available are as follows:
Pinouts for the Utility Port

AIN1 Spare Analog Inputs – Two general purpose analog inputs for periodically recording voltages from
0V to 5V. (usually used as temperature monitoring via thermistors and a temperature interface
AIN2
module).
IO1 Spare Digital IOs – Two general purpose digital IOs which can be programmed as inputs, outputs,
or bidirectional pins. The IOs operate on 3.3V logic and are 5V tolerant. (not currently used)
IO2
TIME0 Time Zero Input – Accepts a 5V digital pulse to mark the beginning of a blasting event. The time
mark appears in all data channels as 4.1V amplitude spike which lasts two sample points. The min-
imum width of the input pulse should be two sample points.
PPSIN External Time Signal Inputs – Accepts time synchronization signals from a Paladin Timing Source,
Timing Receiver, or another time synced Paladin. To use these inputs as the time source, select
GPSIN
“External” as the PPS/GPS Source in the “Time” configuration tab on the Paladin’s web page.
Precision Timing Protocol (PTP) is an alternate to using a timing fiber and is the recommended
setup.
PPSOUT Time Signal Outputs – Outputs the time synchronization signals from either the internal GPS
engine or the external time signals inputs, depending on the PPS/GPS Source selected in the
GPSOUT
“Time” configuration tab on the Paladin’s web page.
RELAYPWR COM Relay Driver – this control signal output is a communications watchdog, which opens a relay
to cut power to local communications. If the Paladin® IV is unable to communicate through its Eth-
ernet port it will attempt to reboot the local communications device (e.g. client radio or DSL
modem). The minimum coil resistance of the relay should be 25 ohms.
USB Port
A USB 2.0 port accommodates additional memory (in the form of USB memory sticks).
Settings and Inputs on Right Side of Paladin® IV Hardware Unit

A Paladin® IV unit may have either three or six channels enabled.
Right side of Paladin® IV Hardware Unit
On the Paladin® IV unit, there are two banks of three channels. Each bank can connect to either three uniaxial sensors or
a single triaxial sensor.
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Sensor Bank 1
Connect an appropriate triaxial sensor or up to three uniaxial sensors to the Paladin® IV triaxial port, channels 1 to 3.
Sensor Bank 2
Connect an appropriate triaxial sensor or up to three uniaxial sensors to the Paladin® IV triaxial port, channels 4 to 6.
Serial Communications Port

Diagnostic port for internal ESG use only.
Hardware Protection
Environmental Considerations
The Paladin® IV Data Acquisition System is engineered to provide years of reliable service. However, it should be treated
with the same care and protected in the same way as any other valuable piece of electronic equipment.
To prevent fire or shock hazard, do not expose the hardware to rain, snow or moisture. Avoid locations with high levels of
dirt, dust or smoke.
Electrical Protection
Electrical surges and spikes can cause serious damage to the system. Power spikes can enter through the any unpro-
tected input (Power-in, sensors, etc.) damaging anything that is connected to the system.
A power filter provides protection against many types of voltage spikes that can travel on the power line, but does little to
block lightning strikes. For example, lightning can travel on a phone line connected to a modem and destroy the modem
and the system unit connected to it.
WARNING! If severe weather or an electrical storm threatens, unplug the entire system from the power and
telephone lines before the storm starts.
If lightning damage is of concern, lightning protection may be installed. Please contact ESG Solutions for more inform-
ation.

Paladin Web-interface
Overview
The Paladin® IV’s internal software is known as the Hyperion™ Distributed Acquisition System (HDAS™). HDAS™ can
be controlled and configured remotely via a web browser such as Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. Internet Explorer version
9 or higher is recommended.
Monitoring and Configuring Web Pages

Monitoring and Configuring the Paladin® IV can be accomplished through the web-interface.
Connecting to the Paladin® IV via the Web

To connect to the Paladin® IV via a web browser:
1. Enter its IP address in the address bar of a web browser. The default IP address is 192.168.1.254.The Paladin®
IV login dialog, shown below, will be displayed.
2. Enter the user name. The default user name is “admin” (no quotes)
3. Enter the password. The default password is “esg” (no quotes).
Paladin web-interface login screen
Once successfully logged on, the Paladin® IV interface web page will display.
Note: The user name and password may be changed in the web interface.
The Paladin® IV Data Acquisition System Data Storage Screen will open by default.
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Storage Screen
The Storage screen for the Paladin® IV is shown below. A listing of events is displayed on this screen.
Storage Window View
The Storage screen presents storage statistics for information and options for configuring parameters that affect data
storage. It also has controls to allow data to be downloaded. The Triggered events storage is shared with the continuous
data. Keep in mind that settings for triggered events storage will affect available storage for continuous data. If triggered
events storage is not needed, then set to zero.
Triggered events storage

Basic information about the data stored on board the Paladin® IV is listed. These are:
Available storage (MB) - This is the amount of storage that is available on the internal storage.
Storage size limit (MB) - This can be set to the accommodate storage requirements.
Events count limit - Setting this value will tell the Paladin® IV how many triggered events should be stored at a
time.

Storage statistics
Total trigger count - The number of triggers that have been generated.
Events in Storage - The number of events that are stored on the Paladin® IV
Storage Used (as percentage of onboard storage) - Percentage of the internal storage that is currently used.
Actions when storage is full

A set of option buttons allows the user to select a method for automatic response when remaining storage becomes low.
The options are:
Delete oldest event.
Delete smallest event.
Stop acquisition.
Only one option may be selected. This option will remain in effect until it is reset by the user. Action is taken only when a
new event occurs and there is insufficient room to store it.
Event Chart
When an individual event date/time hyperlink is clicked, an Event Chart will be displayed. An Event Chart shows event data
for each of the channels of the station. A vertical scroll bar allows the display of up to six channels within the window.
The Event waveform data can be downloaded in .pnf (Paladin® IV Network Format) or .hsf (Hyperion Seismic Format) by
selecting the appropriate format and clicking the Download Event button. These files may be imported into WaveVis™ for
inspection and processing.
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Event Chart Window
Waveform Type
The Waveform type dropdown box allows the data to be displayed in various ways:
Voltage at Sensor - The waveform will be displayed as the voltage received at the sensor without amplification.
Raw Voltage - The waveform will be displayed as the voltage received at the sensor plus any supplementary gain.
Physical units - Depending on the sensor type the waveform will be displayed in m/s (meters per second) or m/s².
Waveform Scaling
The Waveform Scaling dropdown box scales the data in various ways:
Event Maximum - The maximum event amplitude will be shown for each channel.
Channel Maximum - The maximum channel amplitude will be shown for each channel.
Download Format
The Download Format drop box allows the data to be saved in one of two formats:
1. .pnf file format is a format that WaveVis™ can read when supplied with a sensor file
2. .hsf file format is a format that WaveVis™ can read when not supplied with a sensor file.

When these options have been selected, click the Download Event button. The File Download dialog box, as shown, will
be displayed allowing the user to open, save or cancel the download.
Confirm Download using File Download Dialog
Download Storage
Events stored on the Paladin® IV appear as a list of hyperlinks that identify date and time of occurrence. The maximum
amplitude in mV and the file size in kB are listed alongside each link. A vertical scroll bar will be automatically added to the
display when the number of events exceeds the available display area.
The option to download all the event files from the Paladin® IV as a single Paladin® IV storage file (.psg) also exists. When
the Download Storage button is clicked, a Windows File Download dialog will be displayed allowing the user to save the
.psg file.
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Save File Dialog
Paladin® IV Storage Files

Paladin® IV Storage files (file type .psg) are made up of all the event files currently stored on the Paladin® IV. Since the
event files are combined as they are downloaded, the .psg file does not come into existence until all files have been down-
loaded onto the computer— it cannot be opened directly across the web for this reason.
Once downloaded, the files may be opened using ESG’s WaveVis™ program.
Cleanup Storage
The Cleanup Storage option erases the events currently stored on the Paladin® IV station. When the Cleanup Storage
button is clicked, the following warning message will be displayed allowing the user to continue or abort deleting all files in
storage.
File Deletion Warning

It may be important to delete data if Paladin® IV configuration has changed. Discrepancies in the number of enabled chan-
nels can cause adverse effects.
Continuous Data Storage

Options exist for configuring internal/external continuous data storage on the Paladin® IV unit. Basic information about
continuous data storage is listed:
Frequency (Hz) - Sampling frequency of data.
Available time span (hrs) - Maximum available storage in hours.
Current time span (hrs) - Selected storage in hours.
Ring Buffer Modes:
No continuous storage
On-board net backup
USB net backup
USB ring buffer
USB HSF buffer
Note: The default setting is to have the Storage option disabled. For users who wish to connect a USB ring buf-
fer drive, the screen changes upon selecting the USB Ring Buffer option as illustrated.
On-board net backup

This option is for when the Paladin® IV is temporarily disconnected from the network. In this situation, the Paladin will cre-
ate a temporary ring buffer on the internal SD card. When the network connection is resumed,the ring buffer on the
internal SD card will send the data to HNAS™.
USB net backup
This option is for when the Paladin® IV is disconnected from the network for an extended time period. In this situation,
the Paladin will create a temporary ring buffer on the connected USB key. When the network connection is resumed, the
ring buffer will send the data to HNAS™.
USB ring buffer
Continuous data is written to the USB drive for the duration selected in the "current time span" text box. To select a date
and time at which to stop acquiring data to the Ring Buffer, select the Stop recording at checkbox.
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Continuous data – Stop Ring Buffer at checkbox selected
Select a date and time (hours and minutes) using the drop down menus. Hours are given in 24-hour format.
Click Update to save any changes to the Ring Buffer settings. A confirmation window will appear confirming the changes
to the Ring Buffer parameters.
Paladin® IV Ring Buffer Confirmation Screen
USB HSF buffer

The USB HSF buffer saves continuous .hsf files to a USB device. You can set a recycle percentage that deletes the oldest
files to make room for the new files. This happens when the USB device reaches the percent that has been selected.
USB Storage
Status of USB drive: Once a USB device is connected, the status will change from "disconnected" to "connected." The
screen will then change to give two options: Format as EXT3 and Cleanup USB.

USB Storage view when devices is connected
Format as EXT3
Note: The Format as EXT3 option only appears if the USB drive is not formatted as EXT3 already .
When Format as EXT3 is selected, a dialog box warning appears requesting permission to continue. Selecting OK will
allow the Paladin® IV to begin formatting the USB device.
Format Warning
Cleanup USB
Cleanup USB will clear the USB device of any data that is stored on the device. When the Cleanup USB button is selected,
a warning dialog box appears requesting permission to delete all files. Selecting OK will begin the cleanup process.
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Cleanup Warning

Diagnostics Screen
The Paladin® IV Diagnostics screen is shown below.
Diagnostics Window View
The following statistics are displayed on the Paladin® IV Diagnostics screen:
Current information
Last data trigger - Last data trigger displays the last time the acquisition hardware notified the microprocessor that
data was ready. The date and time (24 hour format) are listed.
Number of seconds lost - Number of seconds lost indicates potential issues with the CPU usage.
Time synchronization - Time synchronization indicates the status of incoming signals: Pulse-Per-Second (PPS)
and GPS TIME (Valid or Invalid). Normally with a GPS connected this indicator should say “PPS ok, Time Valid.”
Otherwise, if no GPS is connected, the status will read “Time invalid”
Temp sensor - The three temperature sensor are used to help diagnose problems with the Paladin® IV. They
should all run around the same temperature. The temperature will vary depending on the weather conditions the
Paladin® IV is in.
50
Supply voltage - The four voltages that are shown should all run around the voltage number that is given.
Input voltage - The input voltage number should be 12v when plugged into an a/c power source. When plugged in
to any other power source the supply voltage can range from 5v-18v.
Diagnostics tests
Drop-down menu
Pulse - This test sends full scale voltage pulse to the geophone. The geophone deflects the pulse to let Paladin®
IV know that the geophone is working properly.
Instruments - Tests instruments connected to the Paladin such as temperature, pressure, vibration etc.
Geophone - This test sends a series of small-scale pulses to extract the sensitivity and natural resistance of the
geophones.
Resistance - Checks the resistance of the geophone.
Leakage - This test will check the resistance between each channel to the shield. This test should return infinite
resistance if the shields are connected properly.
Run Test
The test button is used to run the selected test. For example, when a Pulse Test is selected, the following confirmation win-
dow is displayed:
Generate Pulse Window
Schedule a pulse test

By default, the "Do pulse test at" checkbox is unchecked. If it is checked, the user can schedule a daily test pulse. Drop-
down boxes representing hours and minutes allow the user to select the time of day. Press the Schedule button to save
the time of the test pulse.

Do pulse test at: from Paladin® IV Diagnostics Screen
Note: The test pulse will not operate correctly if an accelerometer or a third party external amplifier is attached.
Volt. /Temp
Internal Temperature, °C
The Internal Temperature, °C radio button indicates the last temperature measurement taken in units of °C. Click on this
button to view a historical graph of Paladin® IV on-board temperature:
Historical Graph of Paladin® IV on-board temperature
52
Input Voltage, V
The Input Voltage, V radio button indicates the last supply voltage measurement taken.
Historical View of Supply Voltage
Note: Notice that the diagnostic history page is the same for temperature and voltage. The user is able to
select between Temperature andInput Voltage
Waveform

When the Waveform button is clicked, a box to the right showing a live feed of plots for each of the station’s channels is
opened. There is a choice to select span of 1 sec, 2 sec, and 3 sec. In the left hand corner there is a Play/Pause button.
Selecting this will allow you to pause the frame for a snapshot view.
A 1 second Snapshot window is provided.
Acquisition Snapshot Window
The Acquisition Snapshot Window can be tailored by selecting:

Waveform type - Choose options Voltage at Sensor, Raw Voltage or Physical units from the dropdown list.
Waveform scaling - Choose scaling option Channel Maximum or Event Maximum from the dropdown list.
GPS Info
54
If the Paladin® IV is equipped with an onboard GPS, a GPS Info button will be visible on the left-hand side of the screen.
This button can be used to check the GPS status. On the right, a graphical depiction of available and used satellites and
vital GPS statistics will be displayed.
Paladin® IV on-board GPS Information Screen
The nine vital statistics presented in the window are described below:
Statistic Description
GPS Type Is the Type of GPS unit that is inside
GPS Status Indicates OK if the GPS is working properly
GPS Time Indicates the exact time that the status was checked
Timing Accuracy Indicates the accuracy
GPS solution Valid or Invalid
Satellites available: A number from 0-12
Satellites used: The number of satellites actually used to calculate the time and location
solution. These satellites are indicated in green.
Geodetic Latitude, Longitude: These are the physical coordinates and elevation calculated by the GPS unit.

Note: If the solution is invalid, then the data produced by the Paladin® IV will have the Time-Invalid bit set in
the data set. If used with a host program such as ESG’s HNAS™ software, the data will appear red in color.
GPS Satellite Signals

The GPS needs to have 5 green signals to get time sync. Once the time has been sync'd, only one satellite is necessary to
keep the time in sync.
Green means that the signal with this satellite is strong.
Yellow means that there is a weak signal but the GPS is still connected to the satellite.
Red means that the GPS knows the satellite is there but it cannot connect to it.
White means the GPS thinks there should be a satellite there but it cannot find it.
Reset GPS
The Reset GPS button updates the GPS Information screen with the current information
Reset GPS window
Paladin® IV log
The Paladin® IV log is used for diagnosing errors on the Paladin® IV. It keeps track of resets and errors
Reboot Paladin® IV
When the Reboot Paladin® IV button is clicked, the following dialog is displayed allowing the user to continue or cancel
rebooting the Paladin® IV station:
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Reboot Confirmation Dialog

Triggering Screen
A close up of the Paladin® IV Distributed Acquisition System Triggering Screen is shown here. The Paladin® IV is capable
of storing discrete seismic events internally, but the user needs to configure the parameters that control recording. The
onboard triggering parameters shown on the Triggering page specify the conditions under which the Paladin® IV will
record and store a discrete event.
The Triggering screen will also have 3 tabs on the left side to choose from. They are Acquisition, Web Relay, and
Response Spectrum.
Triggering Window View
Acquisition > Trigger parameters

To trigger the system, a set number of individual channels must trigger with a given time span (the trigger window). There
are a few methods available for triggering (recognizing) an event. These are:
Manually controlled threshold triggering
Automatic controlled threshold triggering
STA/LTA triggering (Short-Term-Averaging/Long-Term-Averaging)
The STA/LTA method can only be used in conjunction with threshold triggering. In this method, a ratio of the average amp-
litudes between a leading short term window and a trailing long term window is used to identify an event. For further
information refer to the Glossary in the HSS manual.
Parameters Controlling Triggering
58
Some of the parameters listed here apply to all triggering methods, while other parameters are only used to configure spe-
cific trigger algorithms.
The following parameters apply to all methods:
Maximum event length (sec)
Trigger Window (ms)
Number of Channels to Trigger
Pre-trigger length (ms)
Post-trigger length (ms)
Note: These settings are independent of the triggering routines used in the HNAS™ and HDDR™ software.
The events stored on-board the Paladin® IV may be downloaded to a computer for analysis using the controls
on the Event Storage screen.
Maximum event length

The Maximum event length is the maximum duration of an event file.
Trigger window
The Trigger time window is for multi-channel triggering. It defines a period in milliseconds within which trigger thresholds
must be surpassed on a given number of channels.
Number of channels to trigger
This value specifies the number of channels which must individually trigger in order for the system to trigger.
Pre-trigger length and Post-trigger length
When the system triggers to store a seismic event there are specified time windows before and after the trigger point that
will be included in the stored event file (Pre-trigger length and Minimum post-trigger length, respectively). The event dur-
ation may exceed the sum of the pre trigger and post trigger windows if the trigger conditions persist for some time. Non-
etheless, the event duration may not exceed the Maximum event length defined above.
LTA window
A text box allows the user to enter Long Term Averaging in milliseconds. The number should accommodate several cycles
of the dominant frequency of the seismic waveform.
STA window
A text box allows the user to enter Short Term Averaging in milliseconds. The number should accommodate one or two
cycles of the dominant frequency of the seismic waveform. The LTA window is usually longer.
STA/LTA threshold ratio
The method uses the ratio of average energies in the short term window to the long term window. Typically when this ratio
exceeds 5 to 10, it indicates the onset of a microseismic event.
Threshold auto level
With the Threshold auto level set to the “On” position, the Maximum Event Rate (events/min) edit window becomes
available. The setting in this box will keep the event rate below the Maximum Event Rate by adjusting trigger thresholds.
Maximum Event Rate

When this number of channel triggers occurs, the trigger thresholds are adjusted upward. As the number of channel trig-
gers drops, this automatic threshold will gradually be lowered.
Background record interval
Threshold Adjustment
Manual mode (Threshold auto level OFF) - In manual mode, threshold adjustment treats the trigger thresholds
displayed at the top of the window as fixed. Triggering occurs every time the threshold is exceeded.
Automatic mode (Threshold auto level ON) - In automatic mode the Paladin® IV treats these trigger thresholds as
variable. The Paladin® IV may automatically adjust the trigger thresholds upward in order to avoid excessive trig-
gering during periods of high background noise and lower them when if background noise is low. The auto-
matically adjusted thresholds will never go below the values set in the text boxes.
The following parameters are used for STA/LTA triggering:
Note: If the optimalSTA/LTA values are unknown, it is recommended that the values in the LTA window and
STA window edit windows should be left at 0 (disabled).
Channel Thresholds (mV)

All channels connected to the Paladin® IV are displayed on the right of the Triggering Screen. The user may select which
channels will be used for triggering by entering a value in the text boxes beside the channel number, where the channel on
the top represents channel 1, and channel number progresses to bottom. (Note that all current Paladin® IV units have
only one acquisition card with up to six channels.) If any channel has its threshold value set to zero, that channel will be
disabled. Unused channels or channels showing consistently noisy data may be disabled for triggering purposes. Unique
threshold levels may be set for each channel. These values are used when Threshold auto level is set to OFF. When
Threshold auto level is set to ON, an additional textbox labeled Maximum Event Rate, (events/min) becomes available.
Enter a value in the textbox to represent the maximum event rate allowable before trigger thresholds should be auto-
matically raised to reduce the rate of triggering.
Trigger Thresholds
For each channel, a threshold is set in millivolts. If this threshold is exceeded, that channel is triggered. If the threshold is
set manually it must be exceeded, but if the threshold has been set automatically, the threshold is variable; that is, it is
raised when background noise is increased, but will be lowered if noise levels decrease. It will not decrease below the set
threshold.
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Trigger thresholds for each channel
Disable Triggering
If the Paladin® IV is connected to HNAS™, onboard triggering is unnecessary because HNAS™ is pulling the continuous
data for remote processing.
Onboard triggering is often disabled because it is somewhat resource intensive. However, if a network connection is inter-
rupted, data may be lost if on-board triggering has been disabled. To prevent this, the Disable Triggering if Network Data
Link is up checkbox option allows the Paladin® IV to trigger only while the network connection is down. These triggered
events can be picked up by HNAS™ when the connection is restored.
Set screen
Once the user has made parameter changes, the Update button can be clicked to apply and save the changes. The fol-
lowing message will be displayed to indicate that the changes were successfully committed.
Updated Parameter Message

Paladin® IV Web Relay > Web relay setup
The Paladin® IV unit has the ability to control an external web relay device. A series of three relays may be closed depend-
ing on peak amplitude values recorded on the Paladin® IV. This functionality may be used to set external alarms depend-
ing on ground vibration levels.
The following configuration screen opens upon selection of the Paladin® IV Web Relay button on the Triggering Window.
The Paladin® IV Web Relay configuration screen is used to set threshold values for amplitudes which are to be mon-
itored.
Paladin® IV Web Relay Configuration Screen
Enter the IP address of the WebRelay device and the associated password into the textboxes provided. Make sure to
select the Enable Web Relay checkbox to enable this functionality.
The status of the peak amplitude relays are expressed by the color of the symbol in the relay status column. User-defined
threshold values for peak amplitude correspond to an activity level classification (Excessive, severe or moderate). Enter
threshold values into the appropriate textboxes.
The system may be wired to take advantage of a fourth relay which indicates if the system is functioning properly. If the
Paladin® IV and Web relay are powered and communicating, then the fourth relay light is “ON” and the relay is open. If
this is not the case, then the fourth relay will be closed causing a system-failure alarm.
At any time the relay system can be tested or reset by selecting the Test or Reset buttons. Select Update settings to save
any changes to the Paladin® IV Web Relay configuration.
Response Spectrum
This is an advanced feature.
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Configuration Screen
The Paladin® IV Distributed Acquisition System Configuration screen is shown below. Modification and commission of
device parameter changes are facilitated by this interface.
Configuration Window View
Acquisition > Acquisition Configuration

The Configuration page has three drop-down menus that allow the user to change sensor settings.
The Sampling frequency drop-down menu

allows the user to select a sampling frequency
of discrete values ranging from 50Hz to
20kHz.
The Position units drop-down menu allows the

user to select either metric or standard (feet)
as the units for information in the Sensor Con-
figuration grid
The Z Axis Orientation drop-down menu

allows the user to choose either Depth or
Elevation
The Sensor Configuration frame contains three elements:

1. The Download sensor configuration button,
2. The Setup instruments button, and
3. The Sensor configuration grid displaying information regarding the settings of the sensors and allows the user to
easily change the configuration and sensor coordinates.
Download sensor File
The Download sensor file button is used to export a sensor file which WaveVis™ will request when loading a Paladin® IV
Storage file (.psg).

Sensor configuration grid
The Sensor configuration grid has twelve columns which display information and facilitate altering sensor characteristics.
Sensor Configuration Grid
64
Heading Cell Contents
ch # The Paladin® IV distributed acquisition system has 3 or 6 channels.

(Channel) Column 1 lists channel numbers 1 to 6.
Triaxial sensors transmit on three channels while uniaxial sensors require a single chan-
nel.
Type This column indicates whether the sensor is a Geophone (G), Accelerometer (A),
Force Balanced Accelerometer (FBA), Strong Ground Motion Sensor (SGM) or Micro-
(Sensor Type)
phone (MIC).
The number of axes is also listed. A uniaxial sensor is indicated by a 1, while a triaxial
sensor is indicated by a 3.
(As shown in the example, information apart from sensor component orientation for tri-
axial sensors is presented in a single row, with the following two rows left blank.)
Northing The next three columns are used to set up the orientation of each sensor channel.
Sensor positions are indicated using Northing /Easting /Depth (or Elevation) units.
Easting
For triaxial sensors, a single sensor position is entered.
Depth
Gain For each sensor (in the case of triaxial sensors, all channels), this value is used to pro-
gram the amount of amplification applied to signals. The amount is indicated in dBs.
Sens-ty (Sensitivity) Sensitivity is used for conversion from voltage to the sensor units:
Geophone – volts/meter/sec
Accelerometer – volts/g
Fr - lo (Low Frequency) Lo and High Frequency values are used for filtering events. The values are set when a
sensor is added to the system. Initially, these default settings are set to 1% and 25% of
Fr - hi (High Frequency)
original sampling frequency, for Low and High Frequency respectively.
These values are not automatically adjusted when the user changes the sampling fre-
quency, but changes may be made by manually entering alternate values.
Or. N., Or. E. , Or. D On the N/E/D axes respectively, the values in these columns are directional cosines
which indicate the orientation of each sensor or each component of the sensor for tri-
axial sensors.
Note: High Frequency should not be set above 50% of the sampling frequency.
Save changes to configuration

When all configuration changes have been made, click the Update button to commit the changes
Note: A Paladin® IV Storage file (.psg) contains all the data downloaded from the Paladin® IV using the Down-
load Data button on the Data Storage page.

DSP Filtering
Quarter bandwidth
The quarter bandwidth filter is set to 3dB. It is cut off at 1 quarter the sampling rate.
DSP Filtering with Quarter Bandwidth
Aggressive
The aggressive bandwidth is max filter with a max bandwidth.
66
DSP Filtering with Aggressive Bandwidth
On-board ADC
The on-board ADC does not use an on-board microprocessor. An analog to digital built in hardware is used when; there
are other processing tasks that need to be used but the microprocessor.

DSP Filtering with On-board ADC
Instrumentation
The Instrumentation button is used to identify various instruments which may be connected to a Paladin® IV unit and
opens the Paladin® IV Instrumentation Window shown below.
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Setup Instruments Window
The Setup instruments window contains various drop-down menus listing potential instruments. Options for general instru-
mentation include:
None
Thermistor (14-5)
Thermistor (J50000)
Thermocouple (Type K)
Voltage
Thermistor (504RG1K)
Thermistor (504RG1K_I)
Pressure (SEN1000)
Pressure (Rosemount)
Roctest PSW
PSW Multiplexer
CL-1
CL-1 Multiplexer
RTD Multiplexer
Water Level Multiplexer

Network Configuration Screen
The Paladin® IV Distributed Acquisition System Network Configuration screen is shown below. Network configuration
options are displayed and can be modified on this screen. There are 3 different tabs to choose from. Each tab will take you
to new screen.
Network Configuration Window View
Ethernet
Use DHCP
Check this option to allow the Paladin® IV to communicate over a network which assigns IP addresses dynamically. Select-
ing this option may require the user to set up an alias for the Paladin® IV so that the IP address is mapped to the alias.
Note: It is expected that the Use DHCP option will be useful in rare circumstances. In almost all cases, the
Paladin® IV will have a fixed address.
Paladin® IV name

This textbox displays the name of the currently connected Paladin® IV. The user can enter a new name for a unit that is
currently networked by typing it in this box.
70
Paladin® IV IP address
Each Paladin® IV unit that is connected to HNAS™ must have a unique IP address. When a new unit is added, the user
must enter a new IP address for it in this textbox.
Network mask
The network mask is the local part of a network. It is used to define the IP addresses within the local network.
Gateway
This is the address through which the local network communicates outward.
Data transmission port
In computer networking, a port is an endpoint of communication in an operating system. A port is always associated with
an IP address of a host and the protocol type of the communication. The port is identified by a number (in the example,
12345) .
HW Address
The HW address is the Paladin® IV Media Access Control (MAC) address.
Paladin Web Access
These textboxes allow the user to change the password that is used to access the monitoring and configuration screens
that reside on your Paladin® IV. ESG has set the default user name to “admin” and default password as “esg” on the
Web-based screen that can be changed at any time using the Change Web password and Confirm new password text-
boxes.
Enable Watchdog
This is an internal feature used by ESG for diagnostic testing.

Time Screen
The Paladin® IV Distributed Acquisition System Time screen is shown below. Time synchronization configuration inform-
ation is displayed and modified on this screen.
Timing Mode
The screen provides the following options for time synchronization:
GPS
The preferred method of time synchronizing the Paladin® IV station is to use its Onboard GPS receiver, which includes a
one pulse per second (PPS) synchronization signal.
Time Synchronization Using GPS
Internal GPS Timing

For an above-ground Paladin® IV select the Internal option for both PPS Source and GPS Source.
External GPS Timing
The GPS antenna will not work underground. For a Paladin® IV that is installed underground select the External option
for both PPS Source and GPS Source.
Note: When the Paladin® IV is located underground, the time can be taken from a Paladin® IV Timing
Source or a Paladin® IV Timing Receiver connected to a Paladin® IV Timing Source. The Paladin® IV Tim-
ing Source is a piece of networked hardware that obtains accurate time via GPS. Either of these devices can
mimic an external GPS when connected to a Paladin® IV.
72
Enable NTP server
The Paladin® IV station may also be time synchronized using network time protocol (NTP). There are two options for net-
work timing: Paladin® IV Network (PPS) and NTP (no PPS).
Enable PTP server
The Paladin® IV station can use the PTP which allows the PTP master to send Ethernet packet information back and forth
between PTP slaves to calculate the network delays and update the slaves' time.
Force valid mode
If this option is selected the Force valid mode will tell the Paladin® IV that the time that is set on the Paladin® IV is correct
Paladin® IV Network (+PPS)
If this option is selected, the time is determined using the NTP protocol and that time is linked to an accurate Pulse Per
Second (PPS) signal produced by the onboard GPS receiver of one of the devices. NTP time will either be taken from a
single Paladin® IV station acting as a timing server, or if several Paladin® IV units are set up as peers, then the timing is syn-
chronized to a combination of Paladin® IV stations' clocks. For example if several stations are in close proximity, one of the
Paladin® IV units may act as the time server for the other units, and its PPS signal will be used to improve the accuracy of
the time synchronization.
Synchronizing Using Time Server with PPS
Peer/Server IP
Text boxes allow the user to enter the IP address of one or more devices whose NTP servers will be used by the timing
algorithm to synchronize this Paladin® IV.
A networked computer configured as an NTP or SNTP server can also act as the source.
Server only

Check the Server only checkbox if the adjacent IP address represents a more reliable time source. Selecting Server only
means that only that device will provide timing information.
Local stratum
The Stratum indicates the reliability of the timing source. Higher strata numbers may imply less accuracy. The drop-down
box allows the user to select stratum number 10 to 16. Devices having the same stratum number will be treated as peers,
unless one of the devices is marked as Server only. The timing algorithm will use a device with stratum number 10 over a
device with stratum number 16. In some cases, a computer, particularly a PC, will have a higher NTP stratum (lower NTP
reliability) than the Paladin® IV station, in which case the Paladin® IV would not take time from the computer. Raising the
Paladin® IV’s stratum to 16 would allow the Paladin® IV to use the computer’s time.
NTP (no PPS)
Paladin® IV s™ may also directly use an Internet time server by selecting the NTP (no PPS) option, although this
increases the risk of time shifts, because there is generally some network delay. This method is not recommended if the
system consists of more than one Paladin® IV. The precision is to within several milliseconds, which may be insufficient for
synchronizing a micro seismic system.
Synchronization Using Internet Time Server
NTP Server IP
Text boxes allow the user to enter the IP address of devices whose internal clocks will be consulted.
PTP
Precision Time Protocol (PTP) is a protocol that is used to improve the time synchronization accuracy that is obtainable
over a Local Area Network (LAN)
74
Precision Time Protocol
When you select the Precision Time Protocol (PTP) option it will also have more information available under the Dia-
gnostics tab. You will see a PTP info button appear beside the Waveform button. Choosing this option will display PTP dia-
gnostics on the right side of the screen.

Precision Time Protocol (PTP) settings
PTP Configuration > Slave mode

Selecting the slave option will tell the Paladin IV ™ that it’s a slave. It will never become a master and will follow the master
Paladin® IV time.
PTP Configuration > PTP stratum
Enter a number in the box that represents which Paladin® IV has the most accurate timing. It is used to negotiate which
Paladin® IV will become master if the current master is lost and "slave mode only" is unchecked. A smaller number implies
more accurate timing. The current Master takes stratum 1. The maximum stratum is 255.
PTP Configuration > Maximum HOPs
The Maximum HOPs are the number of switches, routers and hubs the Paladin® IV is away from the master. The Palad-
in® IV can calculate the HOPs on its own, but it needs an initial number to converge sync. HOPs are used as a tolerance to
tell the Paladin® IV when it should become unsynced.
Manual time setting
Finally, the Paladin® IV may be synchronized by selecting the Manual time setting option button, and periodically clicking
the Sync to PC Time button.
Sync to PC time
When the Sync to PC Time Button is clicked, the following dialog will display to allow the user to continue or abort setting
the Paladin® IV system time.
Sync Paladin® IV Time with PC Warning Message
Once the user clicks the OK button and the Paladin® IV System Time has been set, the following message will display indic-
ating a successful system time update.
System Time Successfully Updated Message
76
Set
When the Update button is clicked, the following message will display to indicate success:
Update Success

SIB
SIB Configuration
The SIB Configuration button is used to configure the SIB card. (Sensor Interface Board) It allows you to see what chan-
nels you have the geophones connected on.
SIB configuration screen
Channel number
The Channel number is the channel that you have the device plugged into.
Mode
There are two different modes
1. Auto: Tells the SIB to not auto detect the device that is plugged into the Paladin® IV
2. Override: Tells the SIB that you want to select what device that you have plugged into the Paladin® IV
Type
There are three different sensor types
1. Geophone: 4.5 Hz, single 15 Hz, or dual 15 Hz geophone is automatically detected or manually set
2. Accel (A1-30): ESGs A1-30 accelerometer sensor powered through 200Ω resistors
3. Accel (CCD): all other accelerometers powered through current controlled diodes
78
Status
Can have five different statuses
1. Blank: no sensor plugged in (auto mode)
2. Connected: sensor is connected and detected successfully.
3. Reverse polarity: accelerometer connected in reverse polarity
4. Line shorted to ground: one or both of the sensor lines are connected to ground/shield (auto mode only)
5. Lines shorted together: accelerometer lines are shorted together (auto mode only)
SIB Events log

This event log will give the time and date when an event occurs. It will also let the user know which channel is connected to
which device. It also lets the user know the status of the sensor.
Status Description
Connected If the device is connected.
Disconnected If the device is disconnected.
Trap Conflict, Need H/W Reset, Watchdog Timeout Indicates that the SIB experienced an un-handled excep-
tion that the SIB will automatically recover from.
How to remove the Daughter card

1. Disconnect the 12 Volt power connector from the Paladin® IV, and remove the Paladin® IV from the junction box.
2. With a small Phillips screwdriver, remove the two front screws from the Daughter Card.
Removing screws on the face plate of the daughter card

3. Using a flathead screwdriver or the Daughter card removal tool, place it in the front notch on the Daughter card.
Gently pry the Daughter card out from its recessed bay.
Using daughter card removal notch
4. Once the Daughter card has been dislodged from the Paladin® IV chassis, it can be removed by hand. ESG
recommends discharging yourself on a grounded point (such as the Paladin® IV junction box.)Avoid direct con-
tact with the circuitry.
Note: While using the flathead screwdriver to loosen the Daughter card from the chassis, it is possible to acci-
dently disconnect the SD card if the adhesive foam bumper has been removed. To ensure that the SD card is
properly seated in its correct position; completely remove the SD card from the card holder, and reinsert the
SD card until it clicks into position. If the adhesive foam bumper is in place, this is not necessary.
How to replace Daughter card with Paladin® IV SIB card

1. Line the SIB/PDC card up with the corresponding rails in the Paladin® IV chassis. Completely insert the SIB/PDC
card into the Paladin® IV. (May require slight wiggle to get into correct position)
Note: It is important to not force the SIB card into the Paladin® IV; the SIB/PDC card should slide into position
with minimal effort.
80
Daughter card rails
2. Once the SIB/PDC Card is fully inserted into its correct position, the front two screws can be tightened down to
hold the SIB in the Daughter card port.

Precision Timing Server (PTP)
Introduction
The IEEE 1588 Precision Time Protocol (PTP) allows two or more devices to synchronize their time to within nanosecond
accuracy. The Paladin IV has a built-in PTP engine that allows it to synchronized to any PTP Server. ESG’s PTP-Server is
a cost-effective timing master that connects to all Paladin IVs on a PTP Compliant LAN.
PTP Server
ESG’s PTP-server offers the IEEE 1588 outstanding timing accuracy for data acquisition systems located underground
and other areas where direct GPS synchronization option is costly or not feasible. The PTP-server is typically installed in a
server rack on surface which uses GPS for time synchronization (other timing options are available). Timing syn-
chronization is provided over a TCP/IP Ethernet network* for all PTP-compatible devices such as the Paladin IV.
ESG PTP Server
PTP Server Interface
Front panel of the PTP-server
82
# Function Description
1 Power Button Toggle switch to turn the power off (O) and on (I).
2 Power LED Solid green light indicator that the power is on.
3 PPS LED Blinking green to indicate a pulse-per-second is being generated or received.
4 RESET Button Recessed reset button. Hold for three seconds, release when TSYNC
flashes.
5 TSYNC LED Solid red light when the unit is synchronized. Blinks red while booting.
6 Display Top row indicates synchronized mode.

GPS(i): internal GPS engine using external GPS antenna
GPS(e): external GPS/PPS transmitted into the utility port
Bottom row shows current time in UTC.
Back panel of the PTP-server
# Function Description
1 ETHERNET Port Standard RJ45 TCP/IP Ethernet connection.
2 GPS Female SMA GPS antenna connector, powered internally by 5 V.
3 UTILITY port GPS Internal
4 POWER Input power, 6-18 V, 1 A.
5 FUSE Fuse protecting the device from incorrect power supply or surge.

Utility Power (Pin 1 is on the left)
Pin # Function Description
1 PPS Input Input PPS signal used in GPS External mode.
2 PPS Input ground Ground for pin 1 signal
3 GPS Input Input GPS signal used in GPS External mode. Used with PPS Input.
4 GPS Input ground Ground for pin 3 signal.
5 PPS Output PPS is repeated in this pin. (Both internal or external mode.)
6 PPS Output ground Ground for pin 5 signal.
7 GPS Output GPS is repeated in this pin. (Both internal or external mode.)
8 GPS Output ground Ground for pin 5 signal.
9 No Connect Reserved for future use. Do not connect.
10 No Connect Reserved for future use. Do not connect.
Web Interface
Please see the "Paladin Web-interface" on page 40for descriptions of the features shown below.
PTP Web Interface - Configuration Tab, GPS settings
84
PTP Web Interface - Configuration Tab, PTP settings
PTP Web Interface - Network Tab

PTP Web Interface - Status Tab
86
Troubleshooting
Troubleshooting – Booting
Problem Cause Solution
LEDs never stop cycling back and SD Card is not in place Remove Daughter Card/pop
forth (Cylon mode) OS is doing a file system SD out and put back in.
(Paladin® IV did not boot) check Wait 3 minutes
Hardware fault/Corrupt SD Try a new SD card or return
Software crash/Driver did to ESG
not load Connect through serial or tel-
net. Check processes
Active LED stays on, turns off every 3 Paladin® IV is locked due to Pull out and replace
minutes Daughter Card license fail- Daughter card or put new
ure Daughter card
LEDs do not turn on when connecting Power supply is less than Use power supply between
power 3.9V 5.3V and 18V
Power was connected Turn power off then on
before ground

Troubleshooting – Timing Issues
PPS LED is off Synchronization by PTP is Create a PTP master or

enabled without a master change to internal GPS
Synchronization by external Attach an external PPS sig-
GPS is enabled without an nal to the utility port or
external PPS source change to internal GPS
Internal GPS has mal- Return to ESG
functioned webpage shows Reboot Paladin® IV, check
“PPS invalid” LED during cycling. Return
LED is burned webpage to ESG
shows “PPS OK”
Time SYNC LED does not come on Paladin® IV is not synced, GPS antenna is not con-
webpage shows “Time nected, or is not visible to
Invalid” satellites
88
Troubleshooting – Seismic Data
Seismic Data has 1-second gaps ADC for that channel was Re-commit Configuration set-
not set correctly tings
Paladin® IV station does not connect Paladin® IV locked due to Pull out and replace
to HNAS (COMM LED is inactive) Daughter Card license fail- Daughter card, check license
ure info, or put new Daughter
IP address is wrong card in
Network connection had Change IP in webpage

Paladin® IV IP assigned to a Disable then enable the net-
different MAC address work connection
Hardware failure Return to ESG
The Ethernet cable could not Unplug and re-insert the Eth-
be connected. ernet cable
Ethernet could not be con- Check all the switches to
nected to the switch make sure that the Ethernet
cable is plugged in
Channel receives no signal Hardware failure Return to ESG

ADC for that channel was Re-commit Configuration set-
not set correctly tings
Channel is not licensed Check License info. Update
licensing.

Troubleshooting – Other
Data not saving on the USB storage There is other save data Put USB storage device into
device from a different Paladin® IV a computer and format it
on the USB storage device. before using it again or it can
You do not have USB stor- be formatted through the
age selected Paladin® IV in USB Storage.
Go to the storage tab and
select USB storage, USB
ring buffer, USB net backup,
or USB HSF buffer
Pulse test is not working Pulse test does not work if Connect the geophone
the geophone is not plugged device to the Paladin® IV
in
Some of the tabs are not showing on The Paladin® IV does not Contact ESG for more
the Paladin® IV have the license required to information on licenses.
show those features
90
CHAPTER 4
Hyperion Software Suite (HSS)
The Hyperion Software Suite includes a number of programs designed to record, filter, process, visu-
alize and report seismic data. The software suite works together to perform five main tasks:
1.Data Acquisition
2.Data Processing
3.Data Analysis
4.Data Storage
5.Diagnostics and Alerting
HNAS 92
WaveVis - Waveform Visualizer 99
SeisVis - Seismic Visualizer 107
PalDiagnostics 117
SeisWatch 130
SeisAlert 147
HNAS
The Hyperion Network Acquisition System (HNAS™) collects and processes data acquired on a number of remote, net-
worked data-acquisition stations. HNAS pulls continuous data streams from Paladin® units and writes this data to its con-
tinuous ring-buffer. The ring buffer is configured to contain a series of one-hour files for each Paladin® station, and is large
enough so that data spanning several days can be stored before it is overwritten. HNAS™ scans through the ring-buffer
data and identifies data associated with seismic events based on criteria established by the user. When an event is found,
an event is said to be “triggered”. Event data is then transferred to the processing PC and permanently stored in date-dir-
ectories to be processed at a later date. Date directories are found in the form:
C:\esg\SiteDSN\YYYY\MM\DD.
HNAS™ uses TCP/IP protocols for communication across the network. HNAS™ was primarily designed for use with
Paladin® stations, but can also accommodate data streams from other systems saved in certain standard data formats
(e.g., SegY and Seg2).
Overview
HNAS™ allows users to view a list of all of the Paladin® stations that are connected to the software in the left-side of the
main screen (Station View). The right-side of the screen (Daily View) displays a summary of the data that is being recor-
ded to the HNAS™ ring-buffer.
HNAS main screen
Station View
Expanding each station reveals the sensors which are connected to each Paladin® , and even lists the individual channels
associated with each sensor. The status of each station and sensor are color coded for quick assessment.
92
HNAS Station view
Menus for the stations, sensors and channels can be opened in the Station View using the right mouse button. From these
menus the user can add, delete, enable, disable and configure the stations, sensors and channels.
Station Icon Color Legend:
Icon Description
Color
The station is online and HNAS™ has a successful network connection to it.
The station is disconnected from the HNAS™ network, but still enabled.
The station is both disconnected from the HNAS™ network and disabled.
The network connection between the HNAS™ and the remote station has failed.
The station is connected, but the time is not synchronized.
Shown for SuperHNAS stations in which the original Paladin® is not available on the network, but data is
being provided from the HNAS™ server.

Daily View
The Daily View provides a visual summary of the data from the Paladin® stations. The background color of the Daily View
indicates the status of the data stream. The amplitude of the data stream is represented as a red trace in the daily view. If
an event is triggered, the amplitude will increase to generate a peak and a vertical bar will be inserted by HNAS™ into the
data stream. Clicking on this vertical bar with the left-mouse button allows the user to view the waveforms associated with
that event directly in WaveVis™.
Color Legend for Daily View:
Daily View Description
Data Stream - The data stream itself is represented by a red line indicating the peak amplitude within
each data frame.
Events – A vertical green bar indicates a triggered but unprocessed event.
Events – A vertical blue bar indicates a triggered and processed event.
Green - All data received and processed properly.
Pink - At least one station is time-unsynchronized.
White - No data.
Yellow - Some data was partially processed before all the data was pulled from the ring buffer. This sec-
tion of the data stream can be reprocessed.
Hatched – Missing data from at least one station. Color of hatched pattern (Green, Pink, Yellow) indicates
the status of remaining stations as outlined above.
HNAS Toolbar
The HNAS™ toolbar allows the user to easily select a frequently performed task by clicking on its icon. Currently, five icons
are provided. Their use is described below.
94
Start/Stop Data Transmission
To connect or disconnect from the remote station(s), click the Start/Stop Data Transmission toolbar button (shown
at left).
Note: Starting and stopping affects all stations.
Use Calendar to Browse for Daily Views

This button brings up a calendar that facilitates the search for daily views for the selected date.
Search by Date Calendar
Reload Events
The Reload Events button reloads triggers for processing.
Listen to Selected Channel

Press this button to listen to audio data.
Enable Event Selection

When toggled on, the Enable Event Selection icon enables individual events to be opened in WaveVis™ by placing
the mouse cursor over the event in the Daily View pane, and clicking the left-mouse button. Mousing over an
event also enables a tooltip, revealing event information such as the time of the event, magnitude, location and the
processing status.
Limit Acquisition Triggering

When toggled on, acquisition triggering is limited using trigger parameters defined in Configuration > Acquisition >
Trigger parameters > Trigger limiting.

Limit Reproc Triggering
When toggled on, reprocessing data is limited using trigger parameters defined in Configuration >
Acquisition > Trigger parameters > Trigger limiting.
Show f/w version

When toggled on, the Show f/w version icon opens a dialog box showing the current firmware version for
all Paladins.
Current Paladin firmware
Common Configuration Steps

Disable a Station:
1.Click the right-mouse button over the station to open the station menu
2.Select the disable station option
96
HNAS - Disable a station
Add New Sensor:

1.Click the Stop all stations button or select Stop all stations option from the Action menu to halt data acquisition
2.Click the right-mouse button over the station to open the station menu
3.Select the configuration option
4.Select the Add new sensor option. An Add sensor dialog box will open.
HNAS - Add new sensor
Add New Station:

1.Click the Stop all stations button or select Stop all stations option from the Action menu to halt data acquisition
2.Click the right-mouse button anywhere in the blank space in the Station view
3.Select the Add station. An Add Station to HNAS dialog window will open.

HNAS - Add new station
98
WaveVis - Waveform Visualizer
HNAS saves information associated with a microseismic event in a "hyperion seismic file" or .hsf file. These .hsf files can be
opened in WaveVis™ to view the waveform data associated with the microseismic event. To open event data for a specific
event, first select the date on which the event occurred using the calendar option on the toolbar or in the file menu. Use the
drop-down event list to select data for the desired event.
WaveVis main screen
Manual Processing
Adjusting P- and S-picks
It may be helpful to adjust the P- and S-pick arrival times for an event to improve the accuracy of source locations or other
source parameters. To move or assign new P- and S-picks, select either Pick P-wave mode or Pick S-wave mode from the
picking menu, use the icons on the toolbar or keyboard shortcuts (F2 for P-wave picking, F3 for S-Wave picking). The
mouse pointer will change to a cross-hair and clicking and dragging an existing p-pick will allow you to adjust the arrival
time. If no pick has been assigned, clicking on the waveform will place a pick at that moment in time.
Once the P- and S-picks have been adjusted, the modified data can be re-processed using a processor created in
SeisProcTree™. Load this processor by selecting Event Processor from the File menu and navigating to the correct pro-
cessor (.prc) file.
Re-locating events
To re-process data from one event, select Locate Event from the Event menu or use the shortcut icon on the toolbar.
Alternatively, if data from multiple events need to be re-processed, select Batch Process or MultiDay Batch Process from
the Event menu

WaveVis - Processing events
WaveVis™ Toolbar
The WaveVis™ Toolbar provides a selection of icons that can be used to invoke the most commonly used features. Tool-
bar icons will be displayed beside the appropriate menu options as they are described.
WaveVis™ Toolbar
Open
Opens a standard Windows Open dialog box and is used to start or change a WaveVis™ session. To start a
new session, open a configuration file with the extension .ini or .wvc. <Ctrl+O> is the shortcut key.
Select Events from Date

Opens the Select Events from Date dialog box. Choose a date to view all events for that date.
100
Select Events from Date dialog
Select the month and year from the drop-down menus and click on the day of the month. To view the events for the selec-
ted day, click OK.
To check if data exists for the selected day, click the Check for Data button. To find the next available data set, click Find
Next Data. To find the first data prior to the selected day, click Find Previous Data. To select the events for the current day,
click the Today button.
Appearance/Daily Status
No daily information
This option immediately updates the calendar but does not automatically mark which dates have events.
Days with data
This option causes days with data to be emphasized in bold font. This option may cause slight delays in updating the cal-
endar.
Daily count as tooltip
When this option is selected, moving the mouse over a date brings up a tooltip with the number of events for that date.
Days with data are marked by bold font. This option can significantly slow the process of updating the calendar if there are
many events on each day.
Browse for Path
The Browse for Path button enables the selection of an .hsf file from a given path, rather than a date. This capability can
be used if a subset of interesting data has been stored to some specific path.
Save
Save changes/results for current event.

Choose station sorting method
The WaveVis™ display can be tailored to show stations sorted on a variety of criteria. This button brings up the
Sort by…dialog box which presents the available sorting options, including Station Number, P-arrivals, S-arrivals,
Theoretical arrival, Amplitude, Station Type, Residual, and Sensor Depth, Easting and Northing coordinates.
The Sort by…dialog also contains a checkbox to indicate that disabled sensors are to be shown last, regardless of sorting
criteria.
Fixed amplitude range scaling

By default, amplitude is scaled differently for each sensor to show the greatest detail within the allocated waveform
pane. Selecting this option changes the amplitude scaling so that the trace for every sensor is shown in the same
user-defined scale. For example, each trace may be shown on a scale that ranges from –0.005 to 0.005 volts.
To define the range of the user-defined amplitude scale, go to Menu Options>Options Menu>XY Scaling.
Event amplitude scaling

Selecting this button imposes the same scale on all event traces as determined by the minimum and maximum
value over all the traces for that event.
Event Selection List
Each event is listed by date and time and number in the drop-down list. Particular events can be selected for viewing and
processing.
An asterisk “*” symbol indicates that an event listed in the Event Selection List has been source-located.
A letter beside the event number such as “e”, “b” or “u” indicates that the event has been classified based on the
type of event.
An event which is highlighted in pale yellow indicates that the event was processed manually.
Event locations (N,E,D) and magnitudes are also provided for each located event in the drop-down list when that
event is clicked.
An event which is highlighted in cyan indicates that it was an SGM compared event.
An event which is highlighted in purple indicates that it was a remotely processed event.
To change the format of the items in the Event selection list, see Menu Options>Options Menu>Data Options.
First event
Displays the first event in the list. This option is not available while the first event is being displayed.
Previous event
Displays the previous event in the list. The option is not available when the first event is being displayed.
Next event
Displays the next event in the list. The option is not available when the last event is being displayed.
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Last event
Displays the final event in the list. Once the final event is displayed, the option becomes unavailable.
Auto P-picking
Performs automatic P-wave arrival picking for all sensors.
Auto S-picking
Performs automatic S-wave arrival picking for all triaxial sensors.
Rotation Window Picker

Use to select the range of data points to view in the Rotation Window.
Erase picks
Opens a dialog box with options to erase picks based on type (P-picks, S-picks or both P- and S-picks) or to erase
rotations. Note that this option will erase the picks for all sensors.
Undo last picking

Opens a dialog box offering options for undoing picks (i.e., to return them to their previous values in the session).
This button returns the picks for all sensors to previous locations.
Set Event Type
This button opens the Set Event Type dialog box that allows the user to specify the type of event.
Standard event types include: Event, Blast, RockBurst/Reported, Noise and Unknown. Select the appropriate
option to set the Event type.
Set Event Type dialog

It is possible to configure additional “Custom Event Types” using the ESG DBEditor™ program. Many additional event
types may be added to the list or existing event types can be renamed using options in ESG's DBEditor™ program. If more
than this number of event types have been defined, a drop-down list will contain a list of remaining event types available for
selection.
For more details on how to create customized event types, see the help documents for Seismic Database™.
Customized Set Event Type dialog
Kill Event
The Kill events option removes all picks, source location, and source parameter information for events that are
deemed to be noise. It erases this information from the copy of the event that WaveVis™ has, but does not erase
the waveform data. If the Show previously “Killed” events option is not selected in Data Options, the event is
removed from the event list.
Note that “killed” events may not be archived, depending on the Archiver.exe settings. Such events can be permanently
lost after archiving. <Ctrl+Delete> key is the hotkey.
Restore Killed Event

This allows the user to easily restore the most recently “Killed” event.
Event Restored Message
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Note that if the user wants to restore more than one event or restore events “Killed” in a previous WaveVis™ session, then
the user should select the Show previously killed events option in the Data Options dialog box accessed by the Option-
s>Data Options menu item and then edit and save the events to be restored.
Zoom in around P-wave picks

This allows the user to zoom in on P-wave picks so that the pick placement on the waveform can be viewed in more
detail.
Autofit Sensor Height
Attempts to scale the height of the sensor windows to a size to fit all sensors into the frame. The Minimum trace
height limits the minimum height of the waveform and is set through Menu Options > Options Menu>Layout.
If auto fitting all sensors would have caused the height to be less than the minimum trace height, then the height will be set
to this minimum value and not all traces will be visible in the frame.
Process event
Apply event processor to current event.
Processor 2
Apply alternate processor to current event.
Batch Process all events

Apply batch processor to current event.
Batch Process Data from Several Days

Apply batch processor to all events spanning across several days.
Note that holding the shift key and selecting one of these processor buttons allows the user to quickly go to the con-
figuration for each button to set up the processor options.
Move to previous day with data

Change the WaveVis™ screen to show the previous day for which data is available.
Move to next day with data

Change the WaveVis™ screen to show the next day for which data is available.
Compare with events from strong-ground-motion system

Compare the current event with events recorded on a strong-ground-motion system.
Filter setup
This button brings up the Filter Selection dialog window that is used to select filters to be applied to the cur-
rent data. Filter selection is described in detail in the Menu Options>Options Menu>Filter Setup section of
this help document.

Filter ON/OFF
Turn on/off filtering on all channels.
FFT ON/OFF
Apply or deselect Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) on all channels in the selected zoomed in area.The resulting
waveforms will be displayed as a frequency amplitude spectrum as shown below.
Waveform data displayed in frequency domain with FFT turned on
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SeisVis - Seismic Visualizer
Seismic Visualizer (SeisVis™) is an interactive 3D visualization tool which allows you to observe sensor locations, event loc-
ations, and source parameters as they relate to site geometry. Events and parameters can be filtered or scaled by symbol
size and color. Further analysis can also be performed using SeisVis™ to analyze trends in seismicity.
SeisVis™ main window
Changing the Display Window

There are a variety of ways in which to manipulate the orientation or magnification of the visualization window to better
understand the location and patterns in seismicity. Use the following toolbar icons to aid in changing the SeisVis™ viewing
mode.
SeisVis Home View
Returns the SeisVis™ view to the view that is classified as the Home view. Home view is set by selecting the View item
from the Options menu, and clicking the Set as SeisVis Home View checkbox.
Default View
Returns the view to the default calculated for the drawing file.
Zoom Mode
Click and hold the left-mouse button, and move the mouse pointer (now a magnifying glass icon) across the view to zoom
in or out. Move the mouse up to increase the magnification (zoom in), or down to decrease the magnification (zoom out).
Using the mouse wheel also activates the zoom option.

Zoom Window Mode
Click and hold the left-mouse button while dragging the mouse down over the area to be magnified. A “window” will be cre-
ated. Release the mouse button, and the view is magnified. To zoom back out, double click the view.
Pan Mode
Pan moves the image in any direction without changing the aspect or view angle, rotation, or size. Click and hold the left-
mouse button, with the mouse pointer (now a hand) over top of the image. Drag the image to the desired location. Also
use the third mouse button to pan the view.
Walk Mode
Walk moves the image toward or away from the viewpoint without changing the zoom factor or camera distance. Click and
hold the left-mouse button, and drag the mouse pointer across the screen to walk the image. This will affect the point about
which the image rotates in Rotate mode.
Rotate Mode
Rotates the image. Click and hold the left-mouse button, with the mouse pointer anywhere on the screen. Drag the mouse
pointer slowly to rotate the image.
Event Selection
There are a number of ways in which to select and view information for specific events.
Event selection mode allows the user to select individual or multiple events. To select individual events, left-click on each
event symbol. To select a group of events, hold down the left mouse button and drag the mouse to create a selection rect-
angle. All events within the rectangle will be selected. To select all events, right- click anywhere on the screen and select
Select All Events from the pop-up menu. To select events from a list, right-click on the screen and choose Select from List
from the small menu that appears. The Select events dialog will open.
Right-click Menu
After selecting event(s), right-click anywhere on the screen to bring up the Event Selection Menu. Using this menu it is pos-
sible to perform common tasks such as editing event properties or adding comments, reprocessing in WaveVis, calculating
a b-value for a group of events and exporting files to SRC or CSV format.
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SeisVis™ - Right-click menu in event selection mode
Event Selection when not in Event Selection Mode

When SeisVis™ is not in event selection mode, a single event may be selected by clicking the mouse near the centre of the
event symbol. When an individual event is selected, right-click on the event or the screen to open the Selected Event
Information/Action dialog box. From this dialog box, WaveVis™ can be opened to display the waveforms for the event.

SeisVis™ - Event information
Events may also be selected from the drop down event list in the SeisVis™ Toolbar with the help of the calendar option to
select events occurring on certain dates.
SeisVis™ - Event Listing
Sensors, Junction Boxes and Instruments

The location of sensors, junction boxes and instruments may also be configured to be visible in SeisVis™. Select the
options to show sensors, junction boxes and instruments from the View menu, or make sure that the Sensor Edit, Junction
Boxes and Instruments toolbars are visible by selecting them from the Toolbars item in the View menu.
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Features and Display Modes:
Adding or Changing a View:
Selecting the View option from the Options menu opens a View Options dialog where you can enter information for a new
SeisVis™ view, or edit details about an existing view. Drawing files can be associated with the view to visualize the site geo-
metry by browsing to the appropriate files when prompted.
The coordinates and orientation of a block defining the view can be entered into the dialog, or a previously configured block
can be used by specifying the path to the seismic database where the block is defined for event selection.
SeisVis - Changing views
Block dimensions and position can be manually adjusted by unlocking the block and using the mouse to click-and-drag the
block outline. Access further details of the view by selecting "View" from the Options menu.
SeisVis - View options dialog

Event Display:
Configure the types of events to show in SeisVis™, the symbol size and color, the source parameters to use for scaling
events using the Event Display Options dialog opened from the Events item in the Options menu.
Event Display Options dialog
Time Span:
Configure the time span of events visible in SeisVis™ using the Time item from the Options menu. Events occurring within
a specific time span can be viewed as a static image in the SeisVis™ view (with each event located and visible in relation to
the site geometry), or as a time lapse video showing each event as they occur in time, using the VCR video playback
options.
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Time Options Dialog Box
Playback Mode:
The Playback toolbar allows seismicity to be examined as it develops over a period of time using a time-lapse (Playback)
mode. It is possible to replay videos of weeks or months of seismicity in a few minutes to aid in understanding the response
of the rock mass due to changing stress conditions at the site.
To access this option, make sure that the Playback toolbar is visible in SeisVis™ by ensuring that Playback toolbar is selec-
ted under the Toolbars sub-menu in the View menu.
The Playback Toolbar
Once Playback mode has been activated, the Playback window will appear in the upper-right corner of the SeisVis™
screen.

Playback Window
Rewind
Move the event display back to the start of the configured time period.
Reverse Play
Play the event display from the current point backwards in time.
Back One Frame

Move the event display back one step as configured in the Time Options dialog.
Pause
Stop playing the event display at its current position.
Advance One Frame

Move the event display forward one step as configured in the Time Options dialog.
Play
Advance the event display normally through its time window.
End
Move the event display to the end of the configured time period.
Playback Mode (On/Off)

Toggle the Playback mode on or off.
Playback Progress Indicator

Shows current position of the playback in the time window. The pointer may be moved
manually to change the playback position.
Playback Display Window

The grey bar shows the current time span for displayed events in the playback
mode (also displayed as text). This is superimposed on a histogram showing the
event rate over time. The playback step size determines the histogram time
divisions. If playback comments have been created they will be displayed directly
below this window.
Configuring Playback Settings

Black bars indicate the number of events within each time step. The time span for the events currently being displayed
appears in text to the left of the histogram, and graphically by highlighting the group of events with a grey background on
the graph.
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Time Span (min)
For each "frame", events from this period are shown.
Time Step (min)

Defines the number of minutes per frame that the animation advances. If SeisVis™ is in online mode, the fast forward but-
ton will keep the time window at the current system clock time and update the events every few seconds. The Time Step
also defines the bin size for the on-screen event-rate histogram.
Histogram Scale
The Histogram scale determines the vertical scale of the histogram. Setting this value will dictate the number of events
which are visible for each vertical bar in the Histogram.
Pause Playback Indefinitely
Select the Pause Playback Indefinitely checkbox to enable the playback to pause indefinitely rather than the default setting
which is to pause for 120 seconds after the last mouse movement.
Show Playback comments

Displays user-defined comments below the histogram at specific dates and times during playback.
Setup Comments
Click on the Setup Comments button to add or edit comments to the playback. The Setup Playback Comments dialog will
open.

Setup Playback Comments dialog
If desired, the .txt file that will contain the comments can be created from within this dialog as follows: Click on the Browse
button and navigate to the location where you wish to save your comments. In the File name dialog, type the name for your
comments file and click on Open. Disregard the Comments file not found message and click on OK to return to the Setup
Playback Comments dialog. The comments file now exists in the specified location and is ready for comments to be input.
Enter your comments by clicking the + button to open the Playback Comment dialog box.
Playback Comments dialog
Select the correct date and time, type comment in the box, and click OK. Continue adding comments as desired. When
done, click OK to exit the Playback Comments dialog and save the comments.
The comments file can also be created using a text editing program such as Notepad. Create it as a tab-delimited text file
with the date and time formatted as follows: yyyy-mm-dd/hh:mm:ss.
Note: To display the latest events with SeisVis™ in online mode, leave the Playback control in "play" mode.
Events from the last "time span" will be displayed and events from the most recent time step will flash on and off.
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PalDiagnostics
The Paladin® Diagnostics software allows users to quickly and easily check the status of HNAS™ and associated Palad-
in® acquisition stations from a single Windows based PC.
Alarms display on the diagnostics system if certain user configured conditions are met:
The number of operating sensors falls below a minimum value
The system becomes unsynchronized
No events are processed for ‘x’ number of hours
Alerts can be sent by email message if an alarm is displayed.
Overview
The PalDiagnostics™ software can be used to check sensor status in an easy-to-read table format. The interface is
arranged with a station view on the left-side and a sensor view on the right-side. The station and sensor icons are color-
coded to represent operational status.
PalDiagnostics Main Screen
Paladin® Station View

Looking at the Station View of the main Paladin® Diagnostics window, it is possible to open an information dialog box spe-
cific to each Paladin® Station.
Double-clicking either the station icon or the station description in the tree view will open the
following Station Configuration Information dialog box.
Button images indicate whether a sensor is uniaxial or triaxial

uniaxial or triaxial

Station Configuration Information Dialog Box
The Configuration Information dialog box includes:

DSN: Site specific name as defined in the site.ini file
Box ID: Name of the Paladin® station as defined in the HNAS™ database
IP Address: IP address of the Paladin® station
Number of Sensors: Number of sensors for this Paladin®
Number of Channels: Number of channels for this Paladin®
Paladin® Sensor View

Individual sensors are displayed in Paladin® Diagnostics according to the type of sensor (uniaxial or triaxial) and the status
(functioning, not functioning or disabled). The following icons are used to describe the sensors:
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Description
A green button indicates that the sensor is functioning properly.
A yellow button indicates that there is some problem with the sensor. For triaxial sensors, a yellow button
indicates that there are problems, but at least one channel continues to function normally.
A red button indicates that the sensor has failed (not working). For triaxial sensors, a red button indicates
that all three sensors have failed.
Grayed-out buttons indicate sensors that have been disabled.
A dark green button indicates a uniaxial or triaxial geophone is connected to the Paladin station, but PalDia-
gnostics™ has not been configured to monitor geophones.
Information specific to individual sensors connected to a Paladin® Station can be obtained in two ways:
Clicking on a sensor button in the Sensor View of the main Paladin® Diagnostics window will also
open the Sensor Information dialog box. From here, details about the current and historical per-
or formance of the sensor is available. Voltage thresholds for the sensor can be set and historical
data can be observed in chart format for the following parameters:
Bias voltage
Pick counts
Maximum wave amplitude
Residual time (the difference between the theoretical and actual P-wave arrival time)
Clicking on an individual sensor icon in the Sensor View will open a Sensor information dialog.

Sensor Information dialog (for accelerometer)
The triaxial sensor button associated with the Sensor Information dialog box above would have appeared green in color
because all of the three channels are functioning properly. Sensor buttons only appear red when all channels have failed.
Sensor buttons appear yellow when a problem exists, such as if one or two channels of a triaxial sensor is not functioning
within specifications.
Note: Note: For a uniaxial sensor, the dialog box above would look almost identical, except that only one chan-
nel would be listed under the Current day information section.
Selecting a sensor button associated with a uniaxial or triaxial geophone in the Sensor View of the main Paladin® Dia-
gnostics window will open the Sensor Information dialog box specific to geophones. In the columns under the Current day
information, notice how values for amplitude and frequency are provided for the geophone channels rather than bias
voltage for accelerometers.
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Sensor Information dialog box for Geophone
System Health
Clicking on the icons in the PalDiagnostics™ toolbar will either change the sensor view to reflect one of three parameters
(Sensor voltage, picking efficiency or residual time) or open a system health history chart that maps the performance of
these parameters over time.
Sensor Health
Sets the Sensor View of the PalDiagnostics™ window so that sensor status is displayed with respect to user-defined
voltage thresholds. Green sensors are functioning within the normal voltage range, yellow sensors have measured a
higher or lower than normal voltage, and red sensors are considered to be not functioning properly, for example with an
open or short circuit.
Picking Efficiency:
Sets the Sensor View of the PalDiagnostics™ window so that sensor status is displayed with respect to the picking
efficiency. Picking efficiency looks at the average number of picks per day on the specific sensor and compares that to the
average number of picks per day averaged for all sensors. If a particular sensor gets a small fraction of the number of picks
compared to the average for all sensors it will be flagged as getting a low picking efficiency. Depending on the relative pos-
ition of the sensor, this may or may not be an indication of a problem.

Green sensors are functioning within the normal efficiency range, yellow sensors have get less than half the average num-
ber of picks, and red sensors get less than 1/10th the average number.
Residual Time:
Sets the Sensor View of the PalDiagnostics window so that sensor status is displayed with respect to residual time.
The residual-time calculations determine the average residual time and standard deviation of residual times for all sensors
over a specified time period. If the average residual time for a specific sensor is greater than the overall average plus a
given number of standard deviations, then the sensor will be flagged as problematic or bad with regard to residuals. This
may be an indication that the sensor position is incorrect, or that there is noise on the sensor that is causing arrival-time mis-
picks.
Green sensors are functioning within the normal residual range, yellow sensors have average residuals that are greater
than one standard deviation above the overall average, and red sensors get average residuals greater than two standard
deviations higher than the overall average.
Recorded/Located Events:
Selecting the Recorded/Located Events option will open a graph with the number of events (y-axis) plotted over
time (x-axis) as shown below. The red line represents the total number of recorded events while the blue line identifies only
those events which were located by the processing software.
The two option buttons in the lower right-hand corner determine whether events are displayed for the past 30 days, or for
the past 6 months. The graph is re-populated automatically when a new time interval is selected.
Select the Show Grid checkbox to overlay a grid on the data. The Print button allows the graph to be printed.
Note: This feature is only available if PalDiagnostics is always running in the background.
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Recorded/Located Events Plot
Picked/Used Channels:
Selecting the Picked/Used Channels option will open a graph with the number of channels picked (red line) and the
number of channels used in the source location (blue line) plotted over time as shown below. These values are used to
determine the pick efficiency.

Picked/Used Channels Plot
Residual Time:
Selecting the Residual Time option will open a graph with the residual time for the system plotted over time as
shown below.
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Residual Time Plot
Alerting
System alerts are distributed via emails. To configure these settings, select the options item in the Configuration menu.
From here, a dialog will open where you can:
Configure the frequency with which the software will perform a diagnostic check of the system
Configure criteria for triggering a system warning
Set the email address where the alerts are sent
Set times for delivery of warnings that result from diagnostics checks to the System Administrator
Set the time when the diagnostic software will write its findings to the Diagnostics database

Paladin Diagnostics Configuration dialog
Advanced Mode
Selecting the Advanced Mode changes the display of right-pane of the Paladin® Diagnostics window and displays all
sensors associated with a particular DSN in numeric order according to HNAS™ and their status based on color.
Advanced mode provides information about the channels health around the border and the center fill corresponds to chan-
nel enabled status. Showing this combination of information allows the user to catch situations like improper disabling, too
many channels enabled for triggering on a triaxial, disabled sensors that are working properly, and channel by channel
information for a triaxial to eliminate ambiguity in information.
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Advanced Mode Sensor View
Fields in a triaxial sensor icon
Fields in a Uniaxial Sensor
Sensors
Individual sensors are displayed in PalDiagnostics according to the type of sensor uniaxial or triaxial and the status. Clicking
on a sensor button will also open the Sensor Information dialog box. The following icons are used to describe the sensor:
Sensor Type

Accelerometer Uniaxial
Accelerometer Triaxial
Geophone: Uniaxial
Geophone: Triaxial
Sensor Health
Information about the sensor channel health is displays in the border. The center fill corresponds to the sensors enabled
status for processing and triggering.
Green border - The sensor is functioning within diagnostic specifications.
Red border - The sensor channel currently has diagnostic test out of the specified range.
Dark Green Border - The sensor is connected to the Paladin station, but PalDiagnostics™ has not been
configured to monitor it and the sensors health is unavailable.
Note: When looking at a triaxial sensor the area within the border is divided up into three equal horizontal sec-
tions that represent the three channels. When looking at a uniaxial sensor the entire area within the border rep-
resent the single channel. See examples below.
A partial red border indicates one channel, in this example the first axis is out of spec.
Disabled triggering
A light grey vertical line indicates that triggering has been disabled. In this example, triggering has been dis-
abled on the 2nd axis and triggering is enabled on the 1st axis and the 2nd axis.
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Disabled Processing
A dark gray bottom half with a light gray top half indicates the channel has been disabled for pro-
cessing. In this example processing has been disabled on all three channels.
Channel is disabled for triggering and processing.
A dark gray top half with a light gray bottom half indicates the channel has been disabled for processing and
triggering. In this example processing and triggering have been disabled on all three channels.
In this example, processing has been disabled on all three channels and triggering has been disabled on
channel 2.
Disabled Zone -1
When a sensor is fully disabled, or set to trigger zone in HNAS, the entire sensor icon interior changes to a dark
gray.
Sensor Status Summary

The Sensor Status Summary provides information about the health, status and type of the sensors.
Sensor Status Summary

SeisWatch
SeisWatch™ serves as a Large Event Monitoring tool and has been designed specifically for use as part of a Rockburst
Re-entry Protocol.
Immediately after a rockburst or large blast has occurred and personnel have been evacuated from the affected areas
underground, SeisWatch™ is used to monitor several key parameters, on-line and in real-time, permitting an operator to
compare them to known background levels or typical event processes.
Rockbursts or large blasts alter the stress distribution within the rockmass and regions may remain unstable for a period of
time as the rockmass attempts to re-establish equilibrium. Using real-time monitoring of key parameters permits oper-
ators to observe the status of a specific mine block and use the information provided by SeisWatch™ to gauge when para-
meters have decayed to background levels. In this manner, if an operator is satisfied that the parameters have decayed to
background levels, he or she may use this information as an indicator that it may be safe to re-deploy personnel under-
ground.
Quick Start
There are two ways to start SeisWatch™:
From SeisVis™:
1. From the Tools menu, select the SeisWatch item. SeisWatch™ will open and, display the associated data.
2. If an event was selected in SeisVis™ when SeisWatch™ was started, the time of the selected event will be set as
the large event time in SeisWatch™. Otherwise SeisWatch™ uses its previous settings.
Note: When SeisWatch™ is opened directly from SeisVis™ the program will close when SeisVis™ is closed.
As a stand-alone application:
1. Double-click the SeisWatch™ icon in the ESG folder.
2. Select the DatabaseSetup item from the Options Menu. A dialog box will open prompting you to select a seismic
database. Navigate to the correct path where the seismic database (.mdb) file is located and select whether to
exclude blasts from the analysis.
3. Select Large-Event Time from the Options menu, and set the time and volume constraints. Click the OK button to
display the selected data.
SeisWatch Charts
Five different charts are produced by SeisWatch™.
1. Seismic Work / Work Rate Chart
2. Clustering Chart
3. Strain Rate Chart
4. Event Decay Rate Chart
5. Event Frequency Histogram
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Seismic Work / Work Rate Chart
The Seismic Work chart is displayed by default whenever SeisWatch™ starts. Clicking on a tab at the top of the chart win-
dow will open another chart.
The cumulative plot of Seismic Work is useful in determining unstable (critical phenomena) and stable periods (back-
ground levels) during the process of seismic event generation. This provides information on the rate of seismic event
generation. For instance, when the slope of the curve is non-linear, conditions may be unstable, while a linear slope sug-
gests that the seismic event rate is stable.
Seismic Work/Work Rate Chart
Another mode that can be used for this parameter is to plot Seismic Work Rate. This allows the user to view the slope of
the cumulative plot in real time which can be compared to the background level (light blue zone) as shown below in Figure
2. The Seismic Work Rate mode can be enabled/disabled in the Seismic Work Chart Configuration dialog which is opened
by selecting Configure Seismic Work Chart from the Options menu or by using the toolbar icon shown below.
Toolbar icon to calculate Seismic work rate
SeisWatch™ plots several lines on the Seismic Work charts indicating different. A legend including the name and color of
each line and what it represents can be found to the right of the chart.
Seismic Data (red solid line)

The Seismic Data graph shows the cumulative seismic work since the time of the selected large event.

Event Time Zero (vertical dashed blue line)
The start of the event is marked with the event time zero line. This is entered by the user in the Large Event Time Options
dialog box obtained by selecting the Large–Event Time item in the Options menu.
Smoothed Data (black solid line)

A plot of smoothed seismic work data may be superimposed on the chart. This menu option can be selected or the toolbar
button “display data smoothing” can be enabled/disabled in the toolbar area at the top of the window.
Toolbar icon to add a smoothed seismic work rate line
Typical Event (pink solid line)

The Typical Event line is a theoretical plot of the seismic work which might be expected after a large event. This plot may
be enabled/disabled in the Seismic Work Chart Configuration dialog.
Background (dark blue solid line or light blue zone)

Background plots the typical trend of seismic work in the absence of a large event. For the cumulative seismic work plot
this would be a sloped blue line (figure 1) or a light blue zone indicating minimum/maximum background levels.
Linear Regression (dashed red line)

Linear Regression is a best-fit of the data over the last few hours. It is used to compare current levels to background levels.
The time used in the linear regression can be set in the Seismic Work Chart Configuration dialog (opened by selecting Con-
figure Seismic Work Chart from the Options menu or by using the toolbar icon) or in the Charts’ Options dialog box found
under the Options menu. A steep regression line indicates high levels of seismic activity.
Reference Event (black dashed line)

Reference Event shows data from a previous period to compare to the current data. The time and date of the reference
event and whether that data is displayed on the plot may be configured using the Options-Reference Event menu item. If
the smoothing option is selected, then the reference event data displayed will be smoothed.
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Seismic work chart with reference event visible
Configure Seismic Work Chart

To open the Seismic Work Chart Configuration dialog, select Configure Seismic Work Chart from the Options menu or use
the Configure current chart options toolbar icon.

Seismic Work Chart Configuration dialog
There are a number of configurable settings for the Seismic Work chart:
Typical Event Seismic Work Equation
This equation relates seismic work (W) to the time after a large event (t). A and B are constants. This gives a typical reac-
tion to a large event to compare to the time period in question. It appears on the Seismic Work chart plotted along with the
seismic work plot calculated from the seismic data. This plot may be disabled using the Display Typical Work Curve check
box.
Background Seismic Work Equation
This equation calculates a straight line that relates the cumulative work (W) to the time after a large event (t), where C and
D are constants. This will show the seismic work during a period of little mining activity. Select the Autofit D-value checkbox
to let SeisWatch™ automatically fit the D-value.
Plotting Parameter
Choose to display the Seismic Work chart or the Seismic Work Rate chart.
Regression Period
The Regression Period is the number of hours before the current time or end time of the graph to use in fitting a line to the
recorded Seismic Work. The default value is 2 hours.
Smoothing
Choose whether to display a smoothed plot and the number of points which are used to calculate the smoothed plot.
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Clustering Chart
The Clustering chart shows the percentage of clustering over time, relative to the large event. SeisWatch™ calculates the
number of events occurring within a cluster dimension and displays this value over a period of time following the large
event.
This parameter will provide a measure of how seismic events are dispersed in space and is used to quantify spatial ‘order’
of seismicity. For example, a high event ‘clustering’ parameter may indicate that seismicity is focused along a feature such
as a fault zone or other geological structure. It could also indicate clustering around a critical underground opening.
Clustering chart displays the degree of event clustering over time
SeisWatch™ plots the calculated clustering value versus time on the Clustering Chart. It also shows some guidelines for
normal activity and the time zero for the beginning of the period of interest. A legend including the name and color of each
line that is plotted can be found to the right of the chart:
Seismic Data (solid red line)

The Seismic Data plot shows the clustering percentage calculated from the seismic source locations from the period just
before and after the selected large event.
Background Maximum and Minimum (light blue zone)

The background maximum and background minimum plots reveal the highest and lowest clustering percentage that is
expected from normal background activity, respectively. These values are set by the user in the Clustering Chart Con-
figuration dialog or the Charts’ Options dialog. Both can be found in the Options Menu.

Event Time Zero (vertical dashed blue line)
The start of the event is marked with the event time zero line. This is entered by the user in the Large Event Time Options
dialog box obtained by selecting the Large–Event Time item in the Options menu.
Smoothed Data (black line)

A smoothed plot of the clustering percentage can also be included in the chart. To add the smoothed plot select the Dis-
play Smoothed Plot option from the Clustering Chart Configuration dialog or click on the tool bar button shown below.
Configure Clustering Chart

To open the Clustering Chart Configuration dialog, select Configure Clustering Chart from the Options menu or use the
Configure current chart options toolbar icon.
Clustering Chart Configuration dialog
Clustering
Clustering options are used to set the number of events to use in the clustering calculations as well as the cluster
dimension. The option to display the smoothed plot can also be selected. Specify the number of points to use to create the
smoothed plot.
Background Clustering, %
136
Background Clustering, (%) sets the typical minimum and maximum background clustering level, as a percentage. These
values are displayed on the Clustering chart.
Strain Rate Chart

The Strain Rate Chart provides information on how the rockmass deformation is changing in a particular region resulting
from a series of microseismic events compared to background strain rate levels. A high seismic strain rate is an indication
of ongoing seismicity in the region.
The Strain Rate parameter relates the sum of Seismic Moments in an event sequenceto the ellipsoid volume and time win-
dow over which the events occur in. HIGH Strain Rate values indicatesa period when there is a more concentrated occur-
rence of stronger events over a shorter period of time compared with LOW Strain Rate periods when weaker events are
occurring over a larger volume and longer time span (Figure 6).
Note: Strain Rate is a calculation of seismically induced strain. It is not directly related to strain in engineering
units.
Strain rate chart
SeisWatch™ plots several lines on the Strain Rate Chart. A legend including the name and color of each relationship that
is plotted can be found to the right of the chart:
Seismic Data (solid red line)

The Seismic Data graph shows the strain rate before and after the time of the selected large event.

Smoothed Data (solid black line)
The Smoothed Data graph shows a smoothed version of the strain rate before and after the time of the selected large
event. Displaying this plot is optional. To add the smoothed plot select the Display Smoothed Plot option from the Clus-
tering Chart Configuration dialog or click the tool bar icon.
Reference Event (black dashed line)

The Reference Event graph may be shown to compare the current data to data from a previous large event for
comparison. If data smoothing is displayed for the current seismic data, then the Reference event data will also be
smoothed. Displaying this plot is optional, configurable using the Options menu, Reference Data option.
Background Maximum and Minimum (light blue zone)

The background maximum and background minimum lines reveal the maximum and minimum expected strain rate asso-
ciated with background conditions, respectively. This value is set by the user in the Strain Rate Chart Configuration dialog
or the Charts’ Options dialog. Both can be found in the Options Menu.
Event Time Zero (vertical blue dashed line)

The time of the selected large event is marked with the event time zero line. This is entered by the user in the Large Event
Time Options dialog box obtained by selecting the Large-Event Time item in the Options menu.
Configure Strain Rate Chart

To open the Strain Rate Chart Configuration dialog, select Configure Strain-Rate Chart from the Options menu or use the
Configure current chart options toolbar icon.
138
Strain Rate Chart configuration dialog
Strain Rate
Strain Rate sets the number of events to use in the strain rate calculation. The option to display the smoothed plot can also
be selected. Specify the number of points to use to create the smoothed plot.
Background Strain Rate
Background Strain Rate sets the minimum and maximum strain rate. These values are displayed on the Strain Rate chart
as a light blue zone.
Event Decay Rate

The Event Decay Rate chart shows the number of events which occurred after a large event as a function of over time,
where the number of events are displayed on a logarithmic scale. The event rate is expected to decay with time at a rate
which follows the typical Omori process plot (illustrated in green). This typical process plot represents the expected tem-
poral decay of recorded events following a large event; therefore any event rate that remains higher than the typical decay
may indicate that the area is still seismically active.

Event Decay Rate chart
A legend including the name and color of each relationship that is plotted can be found to the right of the chart:
Seismic Data (Red Solid Line)

The Seismic Data graph shows the cumulative decay rate since the start of the selected large event.
Omori Typical Process (Green solid curve)

A typical process plot is calculated that represents the expected temporal decay of recorded events following a large event.
Best-Fit Omori Process (red dashed curve)

The current seismic data can be used to calculate a best-fit Omori process, illustrating if the decay rate follows the same
shape as the Omori typical process.
Background Event Decay Rate (light blue zone)

The background maximum and background minimum lines reveal the maximum and minimum expected event rate asso-
ciated with background conditions, respectively. This value is set by the user in the EventDecay Chart Configuration dialog
which can be found in the Options Menu.
140
Event Decay Rate Configuration dialog
To open the Event Decay Chart configuration dialog, select Configure Event-Decay-Rate Chart from the Options menu or
use the Configure current chart options toolbar icon.
Omori’s Law
Omori's Law relates the number of events (N) to the time after a large event (t). C and P are user-supplied constants.
Fit to data
The constants used to calculate the best-fit Omori process plot are provided and can be compared to the actual constants
used to calculate the Typical Omori Process plot.
Background
Background sets the minimum and maximum event rate. These values are displayed on the Event Rate chart as a light
blue zone.
Event Frequency Histogram

The Event Frequency Histogram is a bar graph histogram displaying the frequency of events with respect to the depth/el-
evation at which they occurred. This tool to relate where after-shock events may be occurring in depth profile following a

large event and how the depth pattern relates to events to the pattern prior to the event (background) and immediately
after the large event.
These events are categorized as:
First Hour Data (red bars)

Events which occurred within the first hour after the large event.
Last Hour Data (green bars)

Events which occurred within the last hour of collected or available data.
Two Days Before Data (blue bars)

Background events. The Two Days Before Data plot is based on the average hourly activity for the period two days before
the selected large event time.
Event Frequency Histogram
142
Note: To set the Depth/Elevation Level shown along the y-axis, select Configure Event-Depth Chart or select
Charts from the Options menu. The Frequency Histogram Range settings are located in the bottom left-hand
corner of the Chart Options dialog box. Set the minimum and maximum depth to show on the histogram, and
the step size between points on the Depth/Elevation axis on the histogram.
Options Menu
The Options Menu contains a number of menu items which allow the user to configure a variety of program options.
Large-Event Time
If the program was called from SeisVis™ with an event selected, the time and source location of the selected event will be
automatically configured. If SeisWatch™ is started in stand-alone configuration, this information will need to be entered
into the Large Event Time Options dialog.
Large Event Time Options dialog
Large Event Time Zero

This pair of date and time boxes set the "time zero" or origin time and date of the large event. Click on the arrow beside the
date to open the calendar menu:

Calendar menu
Monitoring Time Span

Set the length of time for which the SeisWatch™ charts will display information for a particular site. The monitoring period
refers to the number of hours/days after the large event that seismic data will be visible. The Pre-event option refers to the
number of hours that data will be visible prior to the large event, to give an idea of the background conditions immediately
before the event.
On line Monitoring
SeisWatch™ can monitor events either on-line (i.e., as they occur) or off-line (from the database). To monitor events as
they occur, select the On Line checkbox. The Update interval option will become enabled, allowing for selection of the fre-
quency (in minutes) at which the SeisWatch™ data will be refreshed on-screen. Values can be selected between 1-300
minutes.
Blocks
It is possible to easily observe seismic conditions for specific blocks in SeisWatch™. To import blocks into SeisWatch™,
use the Select button and choose a block from the seismic database.
144
Block Configuration dialog
Selected blocks will then be visible in the Block Name drop-down menu. Identifying a default starting block will ensure that
data for the default block will appear on-screen in SeisWatch™ when the program is opened.
It is possible to view data for different blocks by selecting a block name in the drop-down menu in the Block Configuration
dialog, or by using the drop-down menu on the SeisWatch™ toolbar.
Note: Be aware that there are many other setup parameters used to define typical background activity levels
for the charts. These parameters may be quite different depending on the volume of interest, so the users
should not change the volume without recalibrating the other parameters for the new volume.
Determination of Background Levels

SeisWatch parameters are derived based on statistical analyses of the actual microseismic data, which are assumed to be
homogeneously recorded in each block volume, specified by the client.
SeisWatch parameters are known to occur in certain statistical distributions:
Seismic Work Rate: normal distribution
Clustering Rate: log-normal distribution

Strain Rate: normal distribution
Event Decay Rate: gamma distribution
The most frequent or common value of a SeisWatch parameter distribution is assumed to be the representative value for
that parameter and the block volume of interest.
Background data range is defined as in one standard deviation above or below the mean of an observed parameter dis-
tribution, which is also considered to be bounded by the “maximum” and the “minimum” of that background parameter dis-
tribution (Figure 8).
Calculation of the background level of seismicity
146
SeisAlert
SeisAlert™ is an ESG software component that runs in the background and is designed to monitor microseismic activity
coming from within one or more predefined spatial regions (Mine Blocks). Checks are performed as new data occurs;
alerts will occur no more often than 5 minutes. When large magnitude event occurs or if there is an increase in the rate of
activity within any of these blocks above a user-specified threshold set for that block, an alarm is sounded on the computer.
Options are also available for the application to send an email alert to a list of recipients specified in the email configuration.
Adding a Site to Monitor

Use the following steps to add a site to monitor using SeisAlert.
1. The first step to setup the program is to add a site for alerting. Click on “add/remove sites” and “configure” in the
main menu. This will bring up the dialog as shown in the image below:
Step 1 –Add/Remove Sites dialog
2. Click on the “Add/Remove” buttons to add or remove sites for monitoring. In the example shown in the image
above, “BigMine” has been added by highlighting the name to the left and clicking on “Add”. After the user
chooses ‘OK’ for this dialog the site name should appear as shown in the image below.

Step 2 – Main dialog showing new site added (disabled)
3. To configure the site, click on the button to bring up this dialog box as shown in the image below:
Step 3 – Main configuration options dialog
The key features in the ”Configuration Options” dialog are:
148
General Section Enable checkbox to enable SeisAlert monitoring
Option to include events flagged as blasts
Delay configuration options
Event Rate Set up alert if no located events for X minutes

Set up alert if no triggered events for X minutes
Setup instrumentation alerts
Set options for alert interval
Spatial Region Add blocks from database

Define criteria thresholds for monitoring
Configure Email Button Provides options for configuring alert emails to be sent
Setting up Alert Criteria

Use the following steps to configure alert criteria in SeisAlert.
1. Click on the site/DSN button to bring up the “configuration options” dialog (See Step 3 in previous section)
2. Click on the “Add” button in the upper right hand section called “Spatial region for Large Event and/or Event Fre-
quency Monitoring” to add a new block and bring up the dialog shown below:
Step 2 – Choosing block type for monitoring
For this example we will show how to setup an aligned block (i.e. one that is aligned to the north/south grid of the mine
coordinate system)
3. Click OK.
4. Now a list of pre-defined volumes should appear as shown in the image below (note: these can be created in
SeisVis). Choose the block you wish to setup alert criteria for and click “OK”

Step 4 – Choosing a block for the monitoring volume.
5. Now the block should appear in the drop down of the main dialog as shown in the image below:
Step 5 – Setting thresholds for the chosen mine block
6. In order to setup monitoring criteria for receiving alerts on this block, click the “Set Thresholds” button. The dialog
will appear as shown in the image below:
150
Step 6– Settings event parameters and setting thresholds for the alarming conditions
Note that the default criteria shown above are defined such that any event which occurs that has at least 10 picks and a loc-
ation error<2000 will trigger an alert.
7. Click the “Edit Thresholds” button to setup the alarming conditions. Important points are:
The conditions are all “AND”
To exclude a condition for triggering, set the condition to a value which is below the range of possible
values. For example, setting a magnitude threshold to “-10” will remove this condition for triggering
The check boxes DO NOT enable or disable the conditions, they only serve as a flag to display the para-
meter in an alert email
When you have setup the alert conditions you want, press the SET THRESHOLDS button before clicking
OK otherwise your settings may be lost
In the first example shown in the image the conditions have been setup as follows:
Alert on any event above Moment Magnitude 0.5 and location error less than 2000 meters
Only display the Moment Magnitude and #Sensor Picks in the alert message details

First example shows typical threshold conditions for alerting on a large magnitude event occurring within a block
(Moment Magnitude > 0.5)
In the second example shown below, the alarm conditions for VolumeB is setup as follows:
Alert on any an increased rate of events in this block, specifically if the number of events recorded in this block
exceeds 20 events per hour
Only display the Moment Magnitude and Location errors for the alert message details
152
Second example shows typical threshold values for alerting on an increase in the event rate within a block (number of
events per hour > 20)
Many other combinations are possible for setting up alerts, but setting up a few simple, independent alerting blocks that
alert strictly on either 1) a single magnitude threshold value or 2) on increases in event rates is the best approach.
8. Once you have setup all the blocks you want to alert on, you can click OK to exit the “Event Parameters” dialog and
return to the main “configuration options” window.
9. In order to enable the alerting on these blocks and to start monitoring, click the “Enable Alerts” button in the top left
corner of this dialog:
Step 9 - Enable alerts
When the program is monitoring but no alerts have happened within the last 12 hours, the program will look like the image
below:

SeisAlert main dialog when monitoring (no alert conditions within last 12 hours)
If the user clicks on the configuration button again the status bar will show “Paused” as shown below:
SeisAlert main dialog when paused for configuration changes.
If a new alert is triggered, the status bar will turn red (see image below) and the program will begin beeping once per
second.
154
SeisAlert main dialog when Alert occurs (software will also beep once per second)
Clicking on the RED status bar the program displays the list of events that satisfied the alert conditions within the last 12
hours as shown in the image below:

Result after clicking on red status bar showing summary of all events that meet alert threshold conditions within last 12
hours.
Once the user clicks “OK” the beeping will stop and the program will be reset to alert according to the re-alerting period set
up in the configuration dialog.
Setting up Email
Use the following steps to set up email alerting:
1. Click on the site button to bring up the “Configuration Options” dialog.
2. Click on the “Configure Email” button above the OK/Cancel buttons in this dialog:
Step 2 - Click on Configure Email button
3. A dialog box will now open. Enter appropriate configuration options for receiving email alerts.
Step 3 – Entering email settings
The details of the configuration options are:
156
Administrators emails addresses – this is where the user inputs the email addresses to which they wish to send
the alerting emails. A list can be entered in this dialog separated by commas.
SMTP Server & Port – This is the email server that is used to route emails from the machine running SeisAlert.
Contact your IT administrator to obtain this information.
Credentials – Contact your IT person if this is required for authentication on the SMTP server
A sample alert email is shown below:
-----Original Message-----
From: SeisAlert@esg.ca [mailto:SeisAlert@esg.ca]
Sent: June 29, 2016 5:39 AM
To <MyBoss@gmail.com>
Subject: SeisAlert message for BigMine
Configuration Block:VolumeA
Database Path: Seismic_BigMine @ mgs\mgs
Site: BigMine
Mine Block: PILLAR
Time: Wed, Jun 29, 16, 05:38:10
Type: Event
Northing: 7451.6
Easting: 10244.5
Depth: 9213.3
Moment Magnitude: 0.9
System Alerts
SeisAlert can also be setup to sound an alarm if no located or triggered events have occurred within a specified number of
minutes. This feature can be used to notify the user that the seismic system has not sent any triggers and/or location for a
certain threshold period of time. Access this option in the main configuration options dialog.
In the example below, the user has chosen to receive an alert if the system has not triggered for 1 hour or if no events have
been located in 3 hours:

Section of main configuration box used to setup system alerts. Alerts will be sent if i) no triggers occur within 1 hour or ii)
no located events occur after 3 hours.
Below are some examples of the system dialog boxes and alert emails that would be received in the configuration scenario
shown in the image below:
Alert initiated when system has not triggered any events in the past hour.
EMAIL #1 – No triggered events:
Sent: July 11, 2016 3:24 PM
To: <MyBoss@gmail.com>
No triggered events for site BigMinein over 60 minute(s)
158
Alert initiated when system has not located any events in the past hour.
EMAIL #2 – No located events:
Sent: July 11, 2016 3:24 PM
To: <MyBoss@gmail.com>
No located events written to database for site BigMine in over 180 minute(s)

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Engineering Seismology Group Canada Inc.

Microseismic Monitoring System User

Overview: Hardware Components 6

1. Sensors: Triaxial 4.5Hz geophones and a mix of uniaxial/triaxial 15Hz geophones.

Paladin® Microseismic System Components

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Paladin 2-Viper Digitizer that converts analogue signal from sensors

Sensor Interface Box (SIB) for Paladin 2-Viper Powers accelerometers

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Paladin Timing Source (PTS) Installed on surface and connected to a GPS

Precision Timing Server (PTP Server) Connects to IEEE1588 PTP-compatible network,

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Rackmount Watchdog Monitors the status of critical software (data acquis-

Desktop Watchdog Serves the same purpose as a Rackmount Watchdog

Watchdog (Third Party) Interfaces with ESG software (SoftDogService) to

Processing PC (Third Party) Handles data processing (manual/remote), trans-

Monitoring ranges associated with different types of sensors

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

G1-1.1-1.0 / G3-1.1-2.0 15Hz Omni-directional Uniaxial/Triaxial Geophone

G3-1.1-2.0-HP / G3-2.2-2.0-HP 15Hz Omni-directional High Pressure Triaxial Geo-

G3-0.7-2.5 / G3-0.7-4.0 4.5Hz Directional Triaxial Geophone

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

A1-30-1.0 Uniaxial Accelerometer

A3-1.0-1.25 Triaxial Accelerometer

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Recommended Specification for Seismic PCs

CHAPTER 1│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

What do we want to measure?

Diagram depicting P-wave and S-wave particle motion

How are microseismic waves measured?

Schematic of a geophone cell

CHAPTER 2│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Near-field and Far-field Effects

Cable Length Effects for Geophones

CHAPTER 2│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Example of 60Hz noise on sensor signal in WaveVis

CHAPTER 2│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Incorrect shielding Shield must be continuous from a sensor to a Paladin junc-

Exposed splices Use a splice junction box with sensor terminals.

Severed cable Accelerometer:

Severed cable Accelerometer:

Paladin Swap the channel with the sensor with working

CHAPTER 2│Microseismic Monitoring System User Guide

Stand-Alone Paladin® IV

Networked Paladin® IV Systems

Operating Temperature -20°C to + 70°C (-4°F to 158°F)

Dimensions (L x W x H) 17.5cm x 13.2cm x 4.1cm (6.9” x5.2” x 1.6”)

Weight 0.89 kg (1.9 lbs.)

Power Supply Voltage 5.3-18 V DC

Power Consumption (w/GPS) 3.2 W maximum

Time Synchronization Internal/external GPS, IEEE 1588 PTP (optional)

Recording mode Continuous (ring buffer) or triggered events

Storage capacity 4 GB SDHD card internal; optional external USB 2.0

Triggering mode Threshold level, STA/LTA

Configuration Standalone or multi-station network

System interface Web- enabled configuration for all parameters

Communication Ethernet TCP/IP via cable, wireless, radio, fiber, internet

Seismic Channel Characteristics

Seismic channels 1 to 6channels

Sampling frequency In steps from 50 Hz to 20 kHz (programmable)

Bandwidth DC to ½ sampling rate

Resolution 32-bit (24-bit or 32-bit modes available)

Effective resolution 24.4-bit

Effective number of bits (ENOB) 22.6-bit