RESON’s SeaBat 8150: All previous track records beaten

The results of recently conducted sea trials with RESON’s SeaBat 8150 full-ocean echosounder system turned out to exceed expectations – both in accuracy and in swath coverage.
RESON’s SeaBat 8150 demonstrated its deep-water capability during sea trials carried out in the hot and salty water of the South China Sea.
After the installation of a SeaBat 8150 12 kHz 1° x1 ° system on board the research vessel RV Xiang Yang Hong 14 at the end of August 2004, a number of test surveys were performed in five different areas of the South China Sea progressing from 1000 m depth to 4300 m depth.
The main purpose was to demonstrate to the State Oceanographic Administration, (SOA) that the installed SeaBat 8150 system performed according to the company’s specifications.
A detailed characterisation of the entire multibeam system should enable SOA to subsequently plan their surveys knowing what performance to expect. Besides, the tests allowed RESON to make an assessment of the optimum survey speed related to vessel noise.
An important part of the sea trials was to determine the accuracy of the entire installation. This includes the motion and heading sensors, the positioning system, and the SeaBat 8150 deep-water multibeam.
A box survey was conducted in 4300m water depth. The result of this survey showed that within a swath of ± 60°, the complete system accuracy was measured at less than 0.3% of water depth.
RESON’s SeaBat 8150 cowers water depths from 10 m shallow areas and all the way down to the very deepest parts of the ocean at 12000 m below sea level.