Continuous-function ground conductivity model for the determination of electric railway earth conductance

A method is described for the determination of ground conductivity as a continuous function of depth and frequency for applications along spatially linear structures such as railway tracks. The technique involves measurements of mutual resistance using a modified dipole array excited with AC currents up to audio frequency. After representation of the experimental data, by analytic functions, the ground conductivity-depth variation is obtained as a degenerate hypergeometric function. The determined ground conductivity is utilized to model the self and mutual conductance of and between the running rails in a single-track railway. The result is verified by experimental measurement