SoundTrak acoustic formation measurements

Get real-time access to critical formation information while drilling with the Baker Hughes SoundTrak™ acoustic formation measurement service. By providing highly accurate and flexible acoustic measurements while drilling, the SoundTrak service gives you the real-time insights you need to maximize drilling efficiency and wellbore placement.

Superior acoustic logging in both slow and fast formations

Advance your logging-while-drilling data measurements with the SoundTrak service’s proprietary acoustic technology. This technology directly measures valid formation slowness and incorporates multifrequency excitation to ensure high data quality in both fast and slow formations, as well as in a wide range of hole sizes.

Use these measurements for real-time and post-well applications, including:

• Seismic time-depth tie to precisely determine formation depth and thickness
• Formation strength calculation to identify sanding potential and early-onset borehole stability issues

In extremely soft (slow) formations, the SoundTrak service offers a unique quadrupole excitation that provides direct shear slowness measurements, thus eliminating the need for large dispersion corrections typical for LWD dipole acoustic tools.

The service enhances the quadrupole signal-to-noise ratio through the use of azimuthal receiver array configuration and stacking as well as a mechanical acoustic isolator.

Avoid drilling hazards as they arise

Use the SoundTrak service as a direct input into pore pressure prediction to help mitigate potential drilling hazards in real-time. The service also affords real-time updating of pre-drill models when suitable data for pore pressure prediction are available.

Borehole acoustic velocities provide accurate pore pressure predictions, without being sensitive to the formation water’s salinity and temperature variations. The real-time compressional slowness can be used with resistivity measurements to further reduce the uncertainty of updating pore pressure models while drilling. As a result, drilling efficiency is optimized and the potential for stuck pipe incidents is significantly reduced.

Pinpoint your wellbore position through seismic tie-back

The SoundTrak service’s real-time compressional slowness measurements also provide a reliable method for correlating and updating pre-well seismic models. This facilitates the location of the bit relative to the seismic section, thus affording more precise wellbore placement and increasing hydrocarbon recovery.

The SoundTrak service places its advanced array technology inside a rugged tool housing—ensuring you accurate and reliable logging performance comparable to advanced wireline measurements—in some of the industry’s most challenging drilling environments.

Contact us to learn how the SoundTrak acoustic formation measurement service can optimize your drilling operations with critical real-time data.