Benchmarking Seismic Sensor Performance through On-Site Specification Calibration
摘要
In routine land seismic acquisition, sensors are commonly deployed tens of meters apart. Under such conditions, differences observed in recorded traces are strongly influenced by spatial variations in the incident wavefield, and sensor specifications cannot be directly evaluated from field data. However, if tens of sensors are deployed within a compact area that is much smaller than the dominant seismic wavelength, the mechanical input to all sensors becomes highly similar. In this case, variations in the recorded waveforms and spectra can be mainly attributed to sensor characteristics and coupling behavior. Based on this concept, we propose the Micro Box Wave (MBW) test as a practical and cost-efficient approach for in-field calibration and comparison of seismic sensor specifications. Spectral analysis of MBW data indicates that the frequency axis can often be divided into six characteristic bands, in which the dominant factors are typically limited to one or two specifications, such as sensor noise floor, low-frequency attenuation, sensitivity, coupling effect, and anti-aliasing filtering. This band-dependent behavior provides an opportunity to estimate sensor specifications and to define additional performance indices, including General Inconsistency and Lowest Faithful Frequency (LFF). Field experiments demonstrate that MBW can effectively quantify sensitivity differences among sensor types, evaluate waveform consistency, and calibrate the low-frequency attenuation response of moving-coil geophones by using broadband sensors as references. The MBW approach provides an efficient framework for sensor performance evaluation and quality control during both sensor development and large-scale seismic acquisition.