We are committed to explore novel technologies that can enhance the value proposition for monitoring of geotechnical and structural projects. Our mandate is to deliver products that where possible disrupt the established practices for geotechnical engineering, many of which have existed for 50 years. We leverage Internet of Things core technologies related to sensors, micro-controllers, wireless telemetry (Bluetooth 5 and LTE-M/NB IoT),  micro-satellite backhaul, and of course  cloud data-storage. In recent years our innovation has accelerated  because as instruments and telemetry have become more integrated, power consumption has decreased, reliability improved, and cost has decreased.

YieldPoint’s advantage is to enable projects operating on a limited budget, to install more instruments that can autonomously stream richer datasets that will be analyzed using intelligent data management platforms to enable better design and construction decisions. Our instruments are easy and fast to install, vulnerable lead-wires are eliminated, individual readings are tagged with the instrument ID, and the transmitted data values are in SI units and fully calibrated. All components including data-backhaul gateways are battery powered and do not require instrument configuration. A smart digital architecture reduces instances of human error allowing engineers and technicians to focus on their geotechnical challenges.

The transition to this inter-connected vision involves deep collaboration with other vendors and service providers in the space. YieldPoint pledges to be receptive to integration opportunities, and to use our deep in-house electronics and embedded expertise  to be nimble in meeting our customer’s requirements.

YieldPoint digital instruments are based on our proprietary d-Tech embedded architecture. Every instrument has an on-board micro-controller which performs tasks such as signal processing, reporting a unique sensor ID, and conversion to real world units. The end-result is a ‘Plug-and-Play’ ecosystem  comprising  instruments, data-loggers, telemetry, and network gateways which aggregate readings to a cloud database.

More Powerful ARM microcontrollers, or more accurately SoC (System on a Chip)s, enable the integration of  on-board digital signal processing, datalogging, and Bluetooth 5.2  wireless telemetry  to create wireless/digital  instruments which we refer to as the BluTech Instruments. BluTech Instruments run for years on internal batteries while “beaconing” their readings every few seconds.  In addition, up to 30,000 readings can be buffered  on the instrument itself and any BluGateway device in range can receive  extended advertising packets from up to 16 BluTech  instruments of any type, and backhaul the data to the cloud database over WiFi, Ethernet, LTE-M or a micro-satellite network.  Consequently,  the long-established definitions  for  an instrument, a data-logger, and a gateway have been  well-and-truly disrupted.

More highly  integrated solutions means that the solution has never been more reliable! and at the same time, the cost of providing real time monitoring solutions for geotechnical projects has never been lower!

Authors: Samuel Freitag, Francisco Rodriguez, and Denis Flood

May 1, 2019

At Platosa Mine in Mexico YieldPoint dExto’s were used to monitor the back during the recovery of pillars. According to Samuel Freitag, the lead author, when the work was presented at the CIM conference(2019):

‘YieldPoint’s high resolution extensometers allowed us to monitor very small deformations. At first I thought that deformations less than a few mm were just noise, but because they appeared on multiple instruments and were synchronized with blasts we began to recognize and benefit from the high precision of these instruments”.

Working with consultants and researchers for the Colorado School of Mines, the project team at the mine was able to safely and confidently remove targeted pillars.

Case Study: Pillar recovery at Platosa Mine, Mexico