Aqua-Tronics S.D.A.D.II User manual

OPERATOR’S MANUAL
Directional Acoustic Detector
S.D.A.D.II
by Aqua-Tronics, Inc.
www.aquatronics.com

FIGURE 1
Electronics Showing Controls 1 through 5
1. On/O󰀨 (Push for On) (Hold ~ 2 sec. for O)
2. RED Direction to fault LED
3. Touch screen Display
4. GREEN Direction to Fault LED
5. Neck Strap “D” ring

1. Acoustic sensitivity control (Pre Set when powered on)
2. Time/Depth information window
3. Logic Trip sensitivity control (Pre Set when powered on)
4. Mode Selection (Time & Depth O󰀨 - Time=Msec. - Depth)
5. Battery Level Indicator
6. Red Direction To Fault Indicator
7. Ballistic Impulse Indicator
8. Green Direction To Fault Indicator
9. Ballistic Impulse Sensitivity Control
10. Reset (Resets Acoustic & Logic Trip to default settings)
11. Bluetooth Headphones Connected
FIGURE 2
More Detail of Electronics Showing 1 through 11

FIGURE 3
Headphones showing 1 through 5
1. This side - right ear
2. Power On/O󰀨
3. Micro USB charge receptacle
4. Volume - Push and hold | Up (+) Down (-)
5. Status Indicator
NOTE: Headphones come paired to the SDAD II electronics unit.
Any Blue Tooth headphone can be paired with the SDAD II by
following the pairing instructions with your aftermarket headphones.
NOTE: Make sure other Blue Tooth devices such as smart watches
or phone ear pieces are not near the SDAD II electronics unit wen
turning headphones on or trying to pair new headphones.

1. Mini USB receptacle
2. On/O󰀨 switch (Hold to ‘ON’ | Hold to ‘OFF’)
3. LED – microphone status
During Charging ------ Solid LED
LED o󰀨 = fully charged.
During Operation ----- Solid = paired to SDAD II
Slow ash = Seeking Electronics
2 quick ashes = pairing mode
4. Cord to microphone. (Red to Red and Green to Green)
Identied by switch color.
NOTE: Microphones supplied with SDAD II are paired and ready to
use. New microphones purchased must be paired prior to use.
FIGURE 4
Wireless Microphone Electronics (Red & Green)
Showing 1 through 4

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OPERATOR’S MANUAL
Directional Acoustic Detector
S.D.A.D.II by Aqua-Tronics, Inc.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
BATTERIES
Microphone Wireless Transmitters.............................................. 2
Headphones ............................................................... 2
Battery Replacement ........................................................ 2
SOUND
GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS ................................................. 3
Sound Traveling in Di󰀨erent Materials ........................................... 3
FACTORS AFFECTING SOUND IN FAULT - LOCATING EFFORTS
Location of the Fault on the Cable .............................................. 4
Soil Types ................................................................. 4
Temperature ............................................................... 4
Asphalt & Concrete Surfaces .................................................. 4
Buried Ducts & Pipes ........................................................ 5
Submarine Cables .......................................................... 5
MICROPHONES
Tri-Pods .................................................................. 6
Earth Probe Spike .......................................................... 6
FOOT PROBES
Tricks and Tips ............................................................. 7
FAULT LOCATION – PROCEDURES AND OPERATIONS
TRACE THE CABLE ROUTE .................................................... 7
FINDING THE GENERAL AREA OF THE FAULT.................................... 7
Ballistic Impulse – How It Works ............................................... 7
QUICK SEARCH WITH BALLISTIC IMPULSE ONLY ................................ 8
Automatic Ballistic Calibration ................................................. 8
LOCATING IN A NETWORK, OR ON A “Y” SPLICE.................................. 9
USING ONE MICROPHONE
Setting the Acoustic Sensitivity Control ..........................................11
FINDING THE EXACT POSITION OF THE FAULT
CONNECTING AND USING TWO MICROPHONES ................................ 12
Setting the Logic Trip Sensitivity .............................................. 13
“ZEROING IN” ON THE FAULT .................................................... 13
VERIFYING THE FAULT’S LOCATION .............................................. 14
WAGON WHEEL - LOCATE FROM OFF TO ONE SIDE................................ 16
DEPTH OF FAULT ............................................................... 17
WATER FILLED VAULTS ......................................................... 18
SERVICE & WARRANTY INFORMATION
Warranty ................................................................. 19
Service .................................................................. 19

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BATTERIES
SDAD II
Electronic receiver (UNIT) uses a rechargeable 9.6 V DC NiMh 4.0 AH battery
Battery level is indicated in upper right corner of LCD display. Four green bars
indicate a fully charged battery. One green bar ashing indicates battery must soon
be charged. Install the connector on the supplied smart universal battery charger to
the back cover of the unit and plug the wall cord into any 100 – 240 AC volt supply
for worldwide use.
The battery charger is set at 1.8 amps and should remain at that setting. A small green
LED on the charger will ash slowly if charger is not plugged into the SDAD II unit.
The red LED will be on during charging. The green LED will be on when the battery
is fully charged. The red LED will ash when the charger recognizes the battery is
damaged or the voltage is below 6 volts.
ATTENTION
Do not store the SDAD II where it is exposed to extremely hot conditions, such as the
window of a vehicle, or direct sunlight on a hot day. The battery could become over
heated. This can reduce battery performance and/or shorten its life.
MICROPHONE WIRELESS TRANSMITTERS ---- RED AND GREEN
A dual mini USB cable is provided to charge the microphone batteries. Plug the USB
cable into the provided 2 port USB wall hub. The mini USB cable plugs are plugged
into the wireless microphone transmitters. The red charge LED will light during charge
cycle and go out when the battery charge is complete.
HEADPHONES
A micro USB charge cable is provided for headphone battery charging. Plug the USB
cable into the two port USB wall hub and the micro USB end into the headphones. A
charging LED is red when charging and will go out when the battery is fully charged.
BATTERY REPLACEMENT
Batteries are not user replaceable. If new batteries are required, please send
instrument to the factory for service.

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SOUND
GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS
Sound is mechanical energy in the form of pressure waves. You cannot see sound
waves, but you can form a mental picture of how sound works by comparing it to
ripples moving out in water when a rock is dropped into a quiet water surface. As the
ripples move away, they lose energy and get smaller. If they strike a solid object, they
reect o󰀨 that object and start traveling back in the direction they came from. Sound
waves act very much like these ripples in the lake. They radiate out in all directions
from the source of the sound. They grow weaker and lose more energy the farther
they travel, and if they bounce o󰀨 objects, they will reect back in the direction they
came from.
Thumpers used to locate cable faults create sound waves which radiate out from the
fault in all directions. When the high voltage thumper pulse reaches the fault and arcs
from the conductor to neutral, it creates an “explosion” which is a rapid ionization of
air. If this occurred in open air, it would sound like a large caliber rie discharging.
Since the explosion caused by the thumper pulse occurs underground, the sound
waves are mu󰀪ed and what the operator will hear most often is a soft “THUMP”. Thus
the name for the high voltage impulse generator = “Thumper”
Many times, the sound of the thump is loud enough in the area of the fault that the
operator can hear it without using equipment to amplify the sound. Sometimes, the
voltage arc at the fault releases enough energy to actually move the soil at ground
level. In these cases, the thump can be felt with the operator’s foot or hand.
SOUND TRAVELING IN DIFFERENT MATERIALS
Sound travels at di󰀨erent speeds and with greater ease or di󰀩culty in di󰀨erent
materials. This can have an e󰀨ect on the operator’s e󰀨orts to locate a cable fault.
1. Speed of Sound and Sound Resistance: Sound waves travel at di󰀨erent
speeds in di󰀨erent materials. In open air, sound travels about 1,100 feet per
second (750 mph). In steel, sound travels at about 16,000 feet per second
(11,000 mph). In general, sound travels faster in hard or dense materials. Sound
waves also travel “easier” and with less loss in dense or hard materials. For
example, sound waves will travel farther in steel than in air before losing enough
energy that they can no longer be heard. For the same reason, sound travels
better in water than it does in air.
2. Sound Reections: Sound waves are reected when they hit any object.
Like ripples on a lake surface reecting o󰀨 a rock or oating object, the ripples
reected will be much smaller than the original wave that hit the rock. Sound
waves traveling through soil will reect o󰀨 building foundations, underground
pipes, sidewalks, or even o󰀨 the cement base of a pad mount transformer.

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3. Sound in Air: Compared to many other materials, air is a very poor conductor
of sound waves, or what we call “sound energy”. Place your ear on a railroad
track and you will hear a train several miles away. Stand up and you will see
the train before you hear it. This is the reason deep snow can be a problem to
a cable fault.
FACTORS AFFECTING SOUND IN FAULT-LOCATING EFFORT
LOCATION OF THE FAULT ON THE CABLE
1. Fault on top of the cable. An easy fault to locate as all of the thumpers energy
is coming straight up. You can normally hear this type without a listening device.
Most of the time you can feel the pressure wave with your foot or hand.
2. Fault on the bottom of the cable. This fault is sometimes hard to hear because
the thumpers pressure wave goes down and reects back up, much of the
energy is lost in the soil at the point of reecting.
3. Fault on the side of the cable and the thump is arcing into another cable
phase. The cable on the side will absorb most of the energy and very little of the
sound wave is available to the operator. The operator will not be able to hear the
thump without a good acoustical instrument of some type.
SOIL TYPES
Some types of soil can mu󰀪e the sound created by the “thump” more than other
types. Dry, porous soil like sand is a good example. Even though grains of sand by
themselves are dense and would be good conductors of sound if they were packed
together, sand is lled with tiny air pockets that are poor conductors of sound. After a
rain storm, the tiny pockets are lled with moisture and the overall sound conducting
ability will improve.
TEMPERATURE
Frozen soil is generally quite easy to locate in because the ground is quite hard
with ice frozen around the grains of soil and ice is a very good conductor of sound,
however this is not always the case. Repeated freezing and thawing can create air
pockets due to soil’s movement during the freezing and thawing process.
ASPHALT & CONCRETE SURFACES
How well a thump sound can be heard above an asphalt or concrete surface depends
on how rm this material is in contact with the soil, or how much air space is between
the soil and bottom side of the material the microphone is set on. Dead air spaces can
be created under these surfaces by soil settling or by soil surface movement caused
by freezing and thawing.

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BURIED DUCTS & PIPES
Because sound travels best along the path of least resistance, a duct will act like a
rie barrel. Instead of the sound going out in all directions, most of it will travel in both
directions and emerge at both ends of the duct.
In a quiet area where there is almost no back ground noise, try listening for the thump
over the route of the cable if it’s in a duct. IF THE BACK GROUND NOISE EXCEEDS
THE SOUND OF THE THUMP, YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO HEAR THE THUMP.
If it is a quiet area, higher acoustic sensitivity and logic trip can be attempted. The
settings explained later are for normal areas that do have some back ground noise.
The operator will know because of false tripping if the controls are set higher than
they should be for the area being searched.
SUBMARINE CABLES
Sound travels well in water with very little amplitude loss, so a thump can be heard
a great distance from the fault with a microphone placed below the water surface. If
the microphone is placed above the surface, no sound will be heard. When the sound
wave changes from water to air, the surface cannot vibrate or reproduce the noise.
Fault locating submarine cables in a small lake are normally very easy because a
lake does not have a current (water ow) passing by the microphone. The friction of
the water moving over a microphone can create loud noises to the operator. Water is
such a good conductor of sound and has so little loss in amplitude; the loudest sound
will be hard to pin-point. A two microphone directional system makes this easy.
A frozen lake can be a problem unless two microphones are used. When the sound of
the thump comes up from the cable and strikes the ice, the ice cover will act as a kettle
drum and the entire frozen surface will have the same amplitude. This is also true for
underwater microphone use. The sound can be heard from a great distance but the
operator will not be able to hear the di󰀨erence in amplitude. Using two microphones
that can produce direction that is not dependent on amplitude must be used.
SPECIAL MICROPHONES ARE AVAILABLE FROM THE FACTORY FOR
SUBMARINE CABLE FAULT LOCATING. THE STANDARD MICROPHONES
SUPPLIED WITH SDAD II WILL BE DAMAGED IF THEY ARE PLACED UNDER
WATER.