Development of a bore-head GPR for Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) equipment

ORFEUS is a Specific Targeted Research Project (STREP), partly funded by the EC, that started in November 2006. One of the objectives of the project was to design and develop a radar mounted on the drill head of Horizontal Directional Drilling (HDD) machines to provide a real-time indication, to the operator, of obstacles in the drill path. The system consists of a GPR control unit (housed in a drilling rod) and two UWB antennas. These can detect buried infrastructure that the bore-head may strike and verify a clearance zone around the drill string to ensure that new pipes may be installed with a minimum separation from adjacent plant. During the 3 year project, several key technical problems, mainly concerning electromagnetic and mechanical compatibility issues, have been solved. The system was finally tested both in experimental and operational sites. These tests confirmed the capability of the equipment to provide useful information on the obstacles in the drilling path; detection range has been evaluated to be sufficient to generate a warning message to the operator to allow corrective action to be taken, thus enabling HDD equipment to be used in greater safety.