Improvements in SESRESAP and Automatic Removal of the Influence of Buried Metallic Structures from Driven-Rod Measurements

The application ribbon of SESResap exposes significantly more functionality to the user in version 20 of SES Software.

The Home tab, shown in the image below, now features buttons to add traverses by importing data from RESAP F05 files or Excel spreadsheets, or by combining, computing the average, or taking the maximum/minimum limits of existing traverses.

There are also new buttons to save all traverses to individual files, save only selected traverses to individual files, or save all selected traverses to the same file. The newly created RESAP files can either inherit the settings of the original project or have default settings. If the option Compute after saving is selected, the new files are executed in SESBatch right after they are created.

The Plot tab, shown in the image below, now features buttons to export the plot as an image in many formats like PNG, SVG and PDF, or save the plot as a SESPlot file, which can be viewed and edited using SESPlotViewer.

In addition to improvements to the user interface of SESResap, the Driven-Rod method has been enhanced to automatically remove the influence of buried metallic structures from the measurements.

Originally introduced in the 1980s as the “Variation of Depth Method” in IEEE Std 81, the Driven-Rod method has seen renewed interest for measuring soil resistivity, particularly in high-resistivity environments. This work focuses on a significant advancement to this method: the automatic mitigation of distortions caused by nearby buried metallic structures. This enhancement enables accurate soil model characterization even in complex, infrastructure-dense settings where traditional measurements are often compromised.

The updated SESResap interface shown in the following image, now fully supports this capability, offering a streamlined and user-friendly experience. Practical examples demonstrate the method’s effectiveness across a range of real-world scenarios. These improvements have been seamlessly integrated into the SES software suite, making the Driven-Rod method more accessible and reliable for both seasoned professionals and less experienced users.