Study on the Use of Ground-Penetrating Radar Technique to Recognize Tin deposits in Bangka Island

Abstract

Bangka Island, which is situated in the east of Sumatra, is included in the Indonesian tin belt, spanning from the Malayan Peninsula to the southeast direction until Bangka Island. After ten years of exploitation, intensive exploration to locate new tin deposits is needed to add new tin reserve from available resources. This research is aimed at applying Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR) technique to recognize tin deposits at some location onshore. GPR method is selected among other geophysical methods due to its potential to image subsurface effectively, both in time and campaign cost. GPR Mala RAMAC system equipped with 100 MHz antenna came to use. Three blocks of 200m x 200m area comprising of around 9 in-line and 9 cross-line profiles were investigated. The acquired data were then processed using careful processing steps, including dewow, Butterworth bandpass as well as f-k filtering to avoid information loss. The processed data were then analyzed by using nine characteristic frequencies which are determined in frequency as well as in time domain. With the aid of borehole log data from all of measurements locations, we recognize specific signature associated with Tin layers at depths of 5 - 10 meters.