Seismic Refraction Method

Overview

Prepared by
Dr. Amin Khalil
TYPES AND PROPERTIES OF SEISMIC
WAVES

• There are two types of elastic body wave in a solid:

– P-Waves: compression waves
– S-waves: shear waves
• P-waves are the faster and are usually the ones studied in
simple seismic methods.
• Other waves (surface waves) also exist but are much slower.
It is these waves that do the damage in earthquakes.
• We will focus our attention on P-waves from now on.
Compressional (“P”) Wave
Identical to sound wave – particle
motion is parallel to propagation
direction.

Animation courtesy Larry Braile, Purdue University

 Shear (“S”) Wave
Particle motion is perpendicular
to propagation direction.

Animation courtesy Larry Braile, Purdue University

Velocity of Seismic Waves

Depends on density elastic

moduli
4
K
3 
Vp  Vs 
 

where K = bulk modulus,  = shear modulus, and

 = density.
Velocity of Seismic Waves

Bulk modulus = resistance to

compression = incompressibility
Shear modulus = resistance to
shear = rigidity
The less compressible a material is, the greater its p-wave velocity,
i.e., sound travels about four times faster in water than in air. The
more resistant a material is to shear, the greater its shear wave
velocity.
RIGIDITY

It a measure of how the medium resist the

change in shape. Hence, rigidity in fluids
and fluid-like media is zero. This mean
that no shear wave (S-waves) are
travelling in fluids.

This property help in the identification

that the outer core is liquid like shell.
Surface waves in an elastic solid
Seismic waves at an interface

What happen when seismic

waves encounters an
interface?!!!
We start by defining some important
phenomena:

1- Seismic wave propagation

in a media is dependent on
elastic impedance Z. The
elastic impedance Z is
defined by:

Z=  v
Where:
  density
v= seismic velocity
At an interface

Seismic waves exhibit number of

actions named collectively as
energy partition at an interface.
The seismic waves are reflected,
refracted and converted from P to
S and from S to P. The reflection
is governed by the reflection
coefficient which represent the
percentage of the energy that will
be reflected.
Energy Partition
REFLECTION Coefficient is
defined by:

z2  z1
R
z1  z2

Where Z1 and Z2 are the impedances for the

first and second layer respectivley.
Basic laws:

Snell Law

Reciprocity law
Snell’ law

This law control the refraction of seismic energy at an

interface:

sin( i1 ) V1

sin( i2 ) V2
Where i1 and i2 are the incident and refracted angles
and V1 and V2 are velocities of the first layer and
second layer respectively.
Primarily, refraction method depends on the
hypothesis that velocity increases with depth.
This is because refracted waves to be recorded by
an array of geophones on the surface should be
critically refracted, i.e. The refraction angle be 90o
, in this case the refracted energy propagate
parallel to interface with the speed of the faster
second layer. This type of propagation is called
head waves. Head waves itself acts as seismic
rays incident at the interface with 90o angle and
refraction back to the surface is then taking place
(see fig.)
 source geophone

ic
ic V1

V2

Ic is the angle of critical refraction and is given by:

Ic =sin-1 (V1 /V2 )

Snell’S laW
If V2>V1, then as i increases, r
increases faster
 Principal of
Reciprocity

• The travel time of seismic energy

between two points is independent
of the direction traveled, i.e.,
interchanging the source and the
geophone will not affect the seismic
travel time between the two.
END