Concrete x ray vs. GPR
As a company that’s been in the utility locate industry for over 20 years, we’ve been asked a number of times whether we “do x-ray” or not. This usually starts a conversation with the prospective client about the differences and benefits of GPR vs. X-ray. While the benefits of x-ray technology can be immense, most of our clients will agree, that the ease of use, safety and lower cost of GPR makes it a much better choice for their needs; as detailed in the following.
GPR waves are much less harmful then x-ray and are controlled by FCC regulations due to them being in the radio bandwidth. They are roughly the same power level as cell phones. Concrete x-rays require high levels of PPE (Personal Protection Equipment) to keep the Technician safe and usually require an approximate 80 foot clearance area of any other people that may be working in the area. This often requires a shut down of other work or services that may be going on in the area.
GPR on concrete usually has the advantage of only needing one side of a concrete slab, while x-ray requires both sides of a slab; one for the film and the other side for the reflector plate. As a result, any slab on grade job can not be accomplished with concrete x-ray. GPR is not perfect in a slab on grade situation. If a slab is extraordinarily thick (18-inches or greater), a lower GPR frequency will have to be used resulting in a loss of resolution. However, slabs of such thickness are usually the exception rather than the rule.
One benefit that x-ray has over GPR is that, in most applications, x-ray does have higher resolution of targets within concrete. However, GPR has closed the gap with higher resolution frequencies as high as 2.6 GHz.
One final difference between the two technologies is cost. Concrete x-ray is much more costly to implement than GPR. And with advancements in software, GPR data is much more easy to process and cross various platforms.
As previously stated, x-ray can produce wonderful high resolution images that can be of great benefit. However, it is also an extremely costly technology that can be difficult to implement with success. With GPR, you have a much more inexpensive, user friendly option that provides quality data for the needs of municipalities and industry with much fewer limitations than x-ray. Whether locating conduit, rebar or various structures within and below concrete slab, contact US for all your location needs.