Gas turbine inspection system Foster Miller Inc

Through work with EPRI and various utilities, Foster-Miller has designed a specialty minimally invasive system for performing difficult visual inspections in gas turbines. Most gas turbine operators have used borescopes or videoscopes to inspect their equipment and are well aware of their limitations. Borescopes are too stiff to do a variety of inspection tasks, and videoscopes are too flimsy to be pushed very far into combustion cans or up rows of blading. Our custom-engineered tool overcomes these difficulties to provide access to the entire turbine from a few easily accessed ports, resulting in cost savings and reduced downtimes.

To perform a complete combustion system inspection, for example, conventional systems require a great deal of combustor disassembly, making them impractical. Our inspection system can be maneuvered throughout the entire combustion system through the easily accessed flame detector and spark plug ports.

From these access points, the tool can then be maneuvered up and down each combustion can from the fuel nozzles at one end to the first stage nozzles at the other end. The tool can go from can to can by using the cross-fire tubes connecting them. No other tool has the combination of stiffness and flexibility required.

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