Multiaxis inclinometer for in depth measurement of landslide movements

The paper aims to present a device devoted to detect and measure earth displacements produced by landslides. This device is an inclinometer type geotechnical instrument. It is widely known that landslides are categorized among the most destructive disasters that yearly produce huge damages and even human lives losses.

The principle of operation is based on measuring the deformation produced during soil layers sliding to a rod vertically mounted into the ground. The rod deformation is detected by highly sensitive strain gauges developed by authors using the stress impedance effect occurring in non-magnetostrictive magnetic amorphous microwires. The gauges are mounted in bridge configurations along the rod, beside the corresponding analogue and digital signal processing circuitry.

The landslide transducer is able to calculate the displacement of the soil layers at different levels of depth and the direction of the landslide. It has been tested in laboratory in terms of sensitivity and accuracy. A resolution of less than 1 mm has been achieved for displacement detection, whereas orientation may be calculated with about a maximum accuracy of less than 20 degrees.

Problems occurred in the manufacturing process of the gauges because of the quite large dispersion of the microwire parameters, as well as with gluing the gauges on the rod, that is compulsory to be well done, otherwise the gauges relaxation occurs with consequence in time stability decay.

With respect to other commercial devices, our inclinometer is characterized by high sensitivity and also by possibility of 3D measuring, it being able to gauge in depth the amplitude and orientation of the landslide.