ASEG Extended Abstracts

ISSN: 2202-0586 (Print) (Online) Journal homepage: www.tandfonline.com/journals/texg19

Recent advances in nodal land seismic acquisition

systems

Tim Dean & Denis Sweeney

To cite this article: Tim Dean & Denis Sweeney (2019) Recent advances in nodal
land seismic acquisition systems, ASEG Extended Abstracts, 2019:1, 1-4, DOI:
10.1080/22020586.2019.12073232

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Published online: 11 Nov 2019.

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Recent advances in nodal land seismic acquisition systems
Tim Dean* Denis Sweeney
Curtin University – Exploration Geophysics SuperSeis Pty Ltd
Bentley, West Australia Queensland
tim.dean@curtin.edu.au denis.sweeney@superseis.me

recording (rather than radio triggered recording). Although it

SUMMARY
Early on in the history of seismic acquisition the
advantages of being able to acquire data without the
impediment of cables was identified. Despite the
introduction of numerous systems since the 1970s nodal
land acquisition systems have only relatively recently
become popular. We begin this paper by looking at the
history of nodal land seismic acquisition systems. We
then look at the rapid developments that have occurred
over the last 10 years, including reductions in weight,
increases in recording duration, and the increasing
popularity of integrated systems. The question of which
nodal system to use depends to a large extent on the
survey location and requirements. Overall, we see a trend
towards using larger numbers of lighter nodes.
Key words: Nodal acquisition, land seismic.
continuously recorded data it still required time
synchronisation messages to be sent via radio. The first non-
radio real-time data system introduced was the VibTech (later
Sercel) Unite, which used a mesh Wi-Fi system to transmit
data.
The first ‘blind’ (i.e. no real-time data or QC status) system
was the Geospace GSR launched in 2007. This approach was
enabled by the introduction of low-cost GPS chips that
enabled time synchronisation across multiple disconnected
units. As with the Ultra G5, it incorporated continuous
recording with the shot records being extracted or ‘combed’
based on source GPS times after the data had been manually
downloaded. The system utilised a digitiser unit with
separate geophone and battery (Figure 2) and this was the
approach taken with other systems introduced at this time
including AutoSeis, iSeis Sigma, and INOVA Hawk.

INTRODUCTION
Early on in the history of seismic acquisition the advantages
of being able to acquire data without the impediment of
cables was identified (Burg 1941). Often cabled systems
suffer down time due to cable problems (e.g. connectors
becoming unplugged, line boxes losing power, cables being
cut) so the removal of the cables promised to improve the
reliability of the system. Unfortunately, cables are also the
method by which data is transferred from the sensors to the
recording system so early systems required a wireless method
to transfer data. Early wireless or nodal systems therefore
relied on radios to transfer data. Initially, data was Figure 1. Diagram showing the use of a node to acquire
transferred sequentially from each recording unit after data as part of a transition zone survey. Reproduced
acquisition of a record, but later systems could transfer data from Olofin and Will (1989).
from multiple units in real-time. Due to their bulk, limited
battery life, and limited channel count, the use of such
systems was typically limited to transition zone surveys
where conventional, cabled, land systems were unsuitable
and the water was too shallow for a marine streamer survey.
The nodes were typically mounted on floats attached to
anchors with the sensors themselves placed in the water
(Figure 1).

The first system extensively used for land acquisition was the
Seismic Group Recorder or SGR introduced in the early
1980s (Shave 1982). The SGR differed from other systems
in that the data was recorded internally on tape.
Development of radio systems continued through the 1990s,
such systems either sent the full dataset in real-time or sent
limited QC data with the full data being downloaded
manually later.
Figure 2. Photo of the Geospace GSR (courtesy of
Geospace).
The next major innovation occurred with the introduction of
the Ultra G5, which was the first to utilise continuous data

AEGC 2019: From Data to Discovery – Perth, Australia 1

Recent advances in nodal land seismic acquisition systems Dean and Sweeney

Downloadable (or blind) nodes all work in a similar way.

The nodes are deployed into the field programmed to record
continuously during the standard acquisition times. The GPS
times of the sources are then recorded by the source control
system. Once back in camp the data from the nodes is
downloaded or harvested, usually by placing them into racks,
and, if required, the batteries recharged. Individual records
are then separated or combed from the continuous time
datasets using the source initiation times. The resulting
common-receiver gathers are then sorted into the more
familiar common-shot gathers for further processing.
Figure 4. Photograph of the five new integrated nodal
The next major advancement came with the introduction of systems. From left: ZLand, SmartSolo, Quantum, GCL,
the Fairfield ZLand. This system incorporated the digitiser, and NuSeis.
geophone, and battery into a single integrated unit (Figure 3
left). This had the disadvantages of being limited to
recording a single geophone type and being unable to change
the battery to keep the digitiser in use (it takes a lot longer to
charge a battery than download the data) but the simplicity of
the approach made it highly successful at the time.

Figure 5. SmartSolo split into its two sections, the section

on the left contains the battery and the one on the right
the geophone and digitiser.

Figure 3. Photograph of the original ZLand node (left)
and the latest version (right).
MODERN SYSTEMS
Since 2014 ten new nodal acquisition systems have been
introduced. In this section I will briefly describe each system
and its peculiarities. We begin by looking at the five new
integrated systems. The first of these is an upgraded ZLand
which has an increased battery life (12 to 40 days), lighter
weight (2.2 to 1.8 kg), and smaller case (Figure 3 right).
The SmartSolo system differs from the others in that it splits
into two sections as part of regular operations (Figure 5).
The lower section contains the battery and the spike which
also serves as a screw to secure the two sections together,
while the upper section contains the digitiser and geophone.
This has the advantage, similar to external battery systems, in
that the battery can be changed allowing the digitiser to be
used more efficiently, but obviously requires the unit to be
disassembled (although this gives an added advantage in that
there are no exposed download/recharge contacts). An
additional advantage is that the battery section can be
replaced with a higher capacity (although larger) battery
and/or the sensor section with a 3-component unit (Figure 6).
Figure 6. Photo of the different SmartSolo battery and
sensor configurations (from left), single component with
standard battery, 3-component with extended battery, 3-
component with standard battery, single component with
extended battery.
The INOVA Quantum node (Figure 4) is the lightest
commercially available node at 650 g and also has the longest
battery life (100 days). It has a unique method of switching
on, with the unit recording data whenever it is placed
vertically. Similar to SmartSolo, the GeoSpace GCL node
(Figure 4) also dispenses with external connector pins but in
this case, it is charged and downloaded via inductive
coupling.
The final integrated node is the GTI NuSeis (Figure 4). This
node clearly has a different form factor to the others and has
been specifically designed to ensure that the node is well
coupled to the ground (the node is inserted into the ground up
to the metal collar, although it can also be fully buried). To
enable the node to be planted special tools are used to create
an appropriately sized hole in the ground into which the node
is placed.

AEGC 2019: From Data to Discovery – Perth, Australia 2

Recent advances in nodal land seismic acquisition systems
Three new eternal sensor systems have also been introduced
(Figure 7). These include the Geometrics Atom, which has
been designed for small-scale surveys and thus has limited
battery life (3 days) but does allow data to be harvested via
WiFi and charging via USB. The Geospace GSB is an
evolution of the GSR that includes an internal battery
(although the use of an external battery is still an option).
Finally, the INOVA HawkHD is the latest version of the
Hawk system and has a lighter weight (0.9 vs. 1.7 kg) and
lower battery consumption (155 vs. 309 mW for a single
channel unit). The RT3 system also has the option to connect
an external sensor but this is unlikely to be the preferred
configuration.
Figure 7. Photograph of the three new external
sensor/sensor & battery systems. From left: Geometrics
Atom, Geospace GSB, and INOVA HawkHD.
Finally, real-time data and QC nodes are limited to the
Wireless Seismic RT3 and the Sercel WTU508 respectively
(Figure 8). The RT3 is an evolution of the RT2 system,
which was fully radio-based, that uses WiFi to move data
from sets of receivers to a radio backbone. The WTU508
system also uses WiFi but utilises a network hoping
architecture between units so doesn’t require a backbone.
The WTU508 has an additional advantage in that it offers the
ability to wirelessly harvest the data from the nodes. The
Hawk system offers the ability to wirelessly harvest QC data
and most of the other systems offer some form of wireless
system check (typically obtained using Bluetooth).
Figure 8. Photographs of (left) the RT3 real-time data
system and the Sercel WTU508 real-time QC system.
Note that unlike Figure 4 and Figure 7 these units are not
shown to scale.
THE FUTURE
One of the stated advantages of nodal systems has always
been a reduction in weight, but as the weight of nodes has
come down so has the weight of cabled systems. Figure 9 is
an adaption of a graph given in Lansley, Laurin, and Ronen
(2008) that shows the current weight of a modern cabled
system (Sercel 508XT) compared with that of modern nodes
depending on the station interval. The station spacing at
which nodes are lighter has decreased, previously it was more
than 50 m, but it is still between 8 and 30 m, i.e. at small
station intervals cabled systems are lighter.
AEGC 2019: From Data to Discovery – Perth, Australia
Dean and Sweeney
Figure 9. Weight per channel comparison for cabled and
nodal acquisition systems. The red and green lines are
taken from Lansley, Laurin, and Ronen (2008). The light
blue line is a modern cabled system and the dark blue box
current nodal systems. Reproduced from Dean, Tulett,
and Barnwell (2018).
The Sercel 508XT cabled system also overcomes issues with
cable breaks that have affected previous cabled systems by
having memory inside the line boxes that buffers data. If the
line is broken then the system automatically finds an alternate
route to transmit the data back to the recording truck
(assuming one exists of course).
A new non-commercial system, first introduced in 2018, is
the ‘nimble node’ system designed to be used as efficiently as
possible to enable crews employing hundreds of thousands of
channels (Brooks et al. 2018, Manning et al. 2018). The
node itself is 13 x 4 cm and weights just 150 g. To avoid
external connectors, it employs optical downloading and
inductive charging. The node does not employ a geophone
but its size and expected cost, does allow for denser receiver
spacing thereby providing equivalent or better data quality.
The Nimble node, like the NuSeis node, has a form factor
focused on optimising sensor ground coupling.
Figure 10. Nimble node (left), charging/download rack
(right). Adapted from Manning et al. (2018).
Another acquisition system currently under development is
METIS (Multiphysics Exploration Technologies Integrated
System). METIS is specifically designed for overcoming the
logistical issues of acquiring surveys in the jungle of Papua
New Guinea and is an acquisition philosophy that covers
geometry, sources, and receivers. On the receiver side the
3
Recent advances in nodal land seismic acquisition systems
system employs nodes that are dropped into position by
drones (Figure 11). The darts are based on the Wireless
Seismic RT system 2 that transmits data in real-time to
Figure 11. Photo of a Metis node or DART (Downfall Air
Receiver Technology).
DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSIONS
Nodal seismic acquisition systems have developed rapidly
over the last 10 years. Hardware wise, node weights have
decreased dramatically whilst recording durations have
increased. Although systems with separate batteries,
digitisers, and geophones were common ten years ago, most
recently introduced systems incorporate these elements into a
single unit. This removes any remaining issues with cables
and connectors (the cause of many issues on cabled crews)
and makes the systems simpler to use. As developments
progress we expect that these nodes will continue to get
smaller and lighter, consistent with the new Nimble Node
(Figure 10). The continued move to integrated nodes is
coupled with an increasing trend to replace analogue strings
with individually recorded sensors.
Of course, having smaller nodes is only part of the solution in
some areas, the development of METIS shows that survey
efficiency also comes from how you deploy, collect, and
harvest the nodes. Particularly with the interest in higher
channel count crews we expect all these issues to be
addressed, to some extent, through automation.
The question of which nodal system to use depends to a large
extent on the survey location and requirements. If weight is
the biggest concern (e.g. for heliportable crews) then clearly
one of the lighter nodes is advantageous. If different sensors
need to be deployed then a node that supports multiple types
of external sensors (Figure 7), or that can be adapted to
employ external sensors (NuSeis, RT3) would be required.
Overall, we see a trend towards using larger numbers of
lighter nodes. Coupled with these advances in hardware
technology will come changes in the way that nodes are
handled in the field, with a greater emphasis on automation.
Data comparisons that we have acquired to date suggest that
the use of nodes has data quality as well as logistical
AEGC 2019: From Data to Discovery – Perth, Australia
Dean and Sweeney
advantages (Dean and Sweeney 2019b, a). The acquisition
geometries that these nodes might enable is also an area of
future study.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks to the various equipment companies. In particular to
Geophysical Technologies Incorporated (GTI) who provided
a test system to Curtin University.
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D. Ablyazina, V. Zhuzhel, E. Holst, and V. Husom. 2018, 3D
field trial using a new nimble node - West Siberia, Russia.
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Dean, T., and D. Sweeney. 2019b, The use of nodal seismic
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Dean, T., J. Tulett, and R. Barnwell. 2018, Nodal land
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