Once all the boreholes were completed and the grout had cured, the sites were ready for the electronics package installation. All of the required items had been shipped from Dallas, the heavy items such as batteries, boxes and solar panels were shipped by motor freight while the electronics was shipped by air express. SMU technicians carried the seismometers in from Dallas in the back of a light truck. The 18 deep cycle lead-acid batteries dominated the weight of the shipment.
To install the equipment, a 4 person field crew
assembled and physically installed the 9 sites in 7 working
days. Once the equipment was physically installed,
the crew rotated and a 3 people remained an
additional week to complete the configuration and initial
checkout.
Assembly of the electronics package requires a minimum of
tools and expertise and is simple enough
to complete in the field. In this case all the borehole electronics
packages were assembled in a few hours. The well-head
enclosures had been completed during the prior week.
At this point, all of the seismometers are installed
in the borehole vaults, the well head enclosures are
attached with the batteries and solar panels. It requires
less than an hour at each site to complete the installation
of the borehole electronics.
The electronics is usually preconfigured prior to installation such
that a final configuration may be made from the hub if necessary. A
portable laptop computer can record and display short segments of waveform
to verify instrument performance, digitizer performance, radio circuit links,
and instrument calibration. It also provides text communication back
to the recording site. This allows technicians to verify an element
is working prior to leaving the site.
