Estimation of soil roughness parameters from surface height profile

In order to estimate soil roughness, evaluation of rough surface parameters, such as rms height and correlation length, using measured surface height-profile of finite length is often required. In an actual measurement situation, however, it is difficult to get the surface height-profile in pure form because mean and trend (or bias and inclination angle) of the measured data are unknown. In this study, we explain a method for estimation of the mean and trend of the measured surface height-profile, and discuss the error property arising from finiteness of the data. As an example, comparison between two different types of surface models with Gaussian and exponential correlation functions is made and error properties are examined.