GB1567886A

GB1567886A - Bore hole pumps

Info

Publication number: GB1567886A
Application number: GB7344/78A
Authority: GB
Original assignee: Mono Pumps Ltd
Current assignee: NOV Process and Flow Technologies UK Ltd
Priority date: 1978-02-23
Filing date: 1978-02-23
Publication date: 1980-05-21
Also published as: IN150823B; JPS54127003A; BR7901181A; AU4435979A; NL7901446A; DK76379A; ATA138079A; FR2418308A1; DK146304C; FR2418308B1; DE2907071A1; DK146304B; AU523985B2; SE7901606L; AT365313B; ZA79653B

Description

(54) IMPROVEMENTS RELATING TO BORE HOLD PUMPS (71) Wc, MONO PUMPS LIMITED, a British Company of Arnficld Works, Andenshaw, Manchester, England do hereby declarc thc invention which was communithereon, a drive shaft at one axial end of the pump and a tubular housing at the other axial end, the housing being engageable in the pump casing member and being remnvnhle PATENTS ACT 1949 SPECIFICATION NO 1567886 The following amendments were allowed under Section 29 on 4 March 1981.

Page I, delete lines 48 to 52 insert end, and interengageable means on the housing and the pump casing member permitting engagement of the housing in the pump casing member and removal therefrom by movement towards said one axial end and preventing rotation of the housing relative to the pump casing member, the lining pipes acting as the discharge pipe of the pump.

Page 1, delete lines 84 to 88 insert With such a construction, the said interengageable means on the housing and the pump casing member preferably comprise a radially inwardly extending lug on the casing member and a notch in the tubular housing at said other end of the pump, said notch being co-operable with the lug to prevent Page 3, delete lines 82 to 86 insert tubular housing at the other axial end, and interengageable means on the housing and the pump casing member permitting engagement of the housing in the pump casing member and removal therefrom by movement towards said one axial end and preventing rotation of the housing relative to the pump casing member, the lining pipes acting as the discharge pipe of the pump.

Page 3, delete lines 103 to 106 insert ing claim, wherein the said interengageable means on the housing and the pump casing member comprise a radially inwardly extending lug on the casing member and a notch in the tubular housing at said other end of the pump, said notch being co THE PATENT OFFICE 2 7 March 1 98I Bas 82000/9 oemg connectabfe dtrectty to one axial end of the casing member, a pump having a plurality of axially spaced impcllcrs and a plurality of boxxl elements interpose between the impellers each provided with fixcd wnes radially inwardly extending lug and the tubu lar housing is provided, at its lower end, with a notch co-operable with the lug to prevent rotation of the housing and the bowl elements, and the notch may have flared lead-in (54) IMPROVEMENTS RELATING TO BORE HOLD PUMPS (71) Wc, MONO PUMPS LIMITED, a British Company of Arnficld Works, Andenshaw, Manchester, England do hereby declare the invention which was commun cated from HUGH DOUGLAS NELSON a citizen of New Zealand of 15 manning Road, Dunkle Bay, Sydncy 2028, Australia, for which we pray that a patent may be granted to us, and the method by which it is to be performed, to bc particularly described in and by the following statement : The present invention relates to a bore hold pump assembly and to a method of providing a bore hold pump.

It is convcntional to providc bore hold pumping arrangements by drilling a bore hold, passing a lining pipe into this bore hold to prevent the earth collapsing back into the bore hole, and then the pump itself is low- ered downwardly through this lining. The pump may take many forms such as a hclical gear pump or an axial flow turbine pump and it is lowered into the bore hold by succes sively adding discharge pipe sections and drive shaft sections and lowering these in turn down into the lining. A drive motor or engine is provided at the surface and this rotates the drive shaft which drives the pump elements.

When it is desired to carry out some servic- ing on the pump, the drive shaft is disconnected from the motor or engine and the discharge pipe and drive shaft are pulled up, being disassembled into their several lengths as they are pullcd out.

It is now proposed, according to the present invention, to provide a bore hold pump asssembly comprising a pump casing member, a plurality of interconnectable bore hole lining pipes, the lowermost of said pipes being connectablc directly to one axial end of the casing member, a pump having a plurality of axially spaced impcllers and a plurality of bowl elements interposed between the impellers each provided with fixed vanes thereon, a drive shaft at one axial end of the pump and a tubular housing at the other axial end, the housing being engageable in the pump casing member and being removable by movement towards said one axial end, the lining pipes acting as the discharge pipe of the pump.

Such an assembly has several advantages.

Firstly it dispenses with the necessity for providing both a bore hole lining pipe and a pump discharge pipe, sincc the bore hole lining pipe acts as the discharge pipe for the pump. This gives a very substantial reduction in the overall cost of the bore hole installation. Secondly, when it is intended to service the pump, all that one has to do is to disconnect the upper end of the drive shaft from its motor or engine, and to pull this up, this action pulling the pump housing away from the pump casing member and thereby pulling the whole pump out. The real advnatage here is that one does not have to disconnect the discharge pipe sections as has hitherto been necessarv.

The casing member is preferably provided with two axially spaced internal seating surfaces, and the tubular housing is provided with two axially spaced spaced external seating surfaces co-operating with the internal skating surfaces to align the housing within the casing. These seating surfaces are advan tageously cylindrical and the diameter of the seating member remote from the one axial end of the pump (that is to say the lower seating surface) is smaller than that of the upper seating surface so that one can readily insert and remove the pump from the pump casing member.

With such a construction, the pump casing member is preferably provided with a radially inwardly extending lug and the tubular housing is provided, at its lower end, with a notch co-operable with the lug to prevent rotation of the housing and the bowl ele- ments, and the notch may have flared lead-in portion to facilitate the insertion of the lug into the notch. The arrangement should be such that the lug and notch are so positioned to ensure that the seating surfaces are engaged with one another when the notch is engaged with the lug.

A drive shaft is pivotably connected to a drive motor or engine by a connector such as collet connector, which enables the axial pos ition of the pump to be adjusted simply by lifting the drive shaft up slightly and clamping the collet or other ajustable connector.

The invention also relates to a method of providing a bore hole pump, comprising boring a hole into the ground, assembling a pump casing member onto the lowermost pipe section of a bore holc lining pipe, inserting the casing member and the lining pipe section into the bore hole, adding further lining pipe sections to said lowermost lining pipe section and continuing to insert the thus formed assembly into the bore hole to the desired depth, passing into the lining pipe a pump having a plurality of axially spaced rotatable impellers and a plurality of bowl elements interpose between the impellers each provided with fixed vanes thereon, and a drive shaft at the upper axial end of the pump and a tubular housing at the other axial end of the pump, so that the tubular housing is introduced first into the lining pipe adding drive shaft sections and continuing to lower the pump into the lining, until the tubular housing engages in the pump casing member.

Preferably the drive shaft is raised slightly, after installation and is then clamped e. g. by a collet connection, into the drive motor so that the axial loading of the pump element is removed.

Advantageously the drive shaft is provided with bearing elements, which are axially spaced along the drive shaft length, these bearings each comprising a hub having an axial bore therethrough for the passage of the drive shaft, a plurality of arms extending outwardly from said hub and two fingers on the end of each arm remote from the hub, the fingers diverging one on each circumferential side of the axial plane of the associated arm, the bearing means being dimensioned such that the fingers engage the inner wall surface of an adjacent bore hole lining pipe.

With this arrangement, the bearing can have such a dimension that it is a sliding fit in the bore hole lining pipe and will be readily insertable thereinto. Having inserted it in place, when the motor or engine is started up and the drive shaft rotates, there will be a tendency for one of the two fingers, depending on which direction of rotation is taking place, to engage firmly against the inner wall of the lining pipe, so that the bearing is accurately centred in the pipe.

In order that the invention may more read ily bc undcrstood, the following description is given, merely by way of example, reference being made to the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure 1 is a schematic cross-section through one embodiment of bore hold pump assembly according to the invention; and Figure 2 is a top plan view illustrating the bearing assembly for mounting the drive shaft in the bore hole lining.

Referring first to Figure 1, there is illustrated a bore hole 10 formed in the ground 11, this having extending within the bore 10 a lining pipe made up of a plurality of sections 12 which are threaded one onto the other. In the drawing only one lower section 12 has been shown and this is connected, via a large number of other sections to the top section 13 which serves to connect the bore hole lining to the prime mover, that is to say an electric motor or an internal combustion engine or the like, which is not shown in the drawing. The lower end of the section 12 which is shown has secured thereto, as by threading, a tubular pump casing 14. At the bottom end of this pump casing 14 a conventional filter or strainer 15 is provided and secured in the normal way.

An axial flow turbine impeller pump indicated by the general reference numeral 16 is slid downwardly into the bore hole lining pipe and this pump consists of a lower pump housing 17, and a series of bowls 18 stacked on top of the housing 17, the bowls having a number of vanes 19 extending inwardly to a hub member 20. A shaft 21 has mounted thereon axial flow turbine impellers 22 which are interposed between adjacent bowls 18, the impellers 22 having hubs 23 interfitting with the hubs 20 and also having blades 24 which project fluid to be pumped vertically upwardly, with the assistance of the vanes 19.

The pump casing is provided with lower and upper internal cylindrical bearing sur faces 25 and 26, the diameter of the bearing surfaces 25 being less than that of the bearing surface 26. The pump housing 17 has cylindrical surfaces of diameters to co-operate with these surfaces 25 and 26.

A lug 27 extends radially inwardly from one portion of the wall of the casing 14 and this s engageable in a notch 28 which has a flared opening 29 in the housing 17.

The drive shaft 21 is mounted centrally within the bore by a number of bearing elements 30 only one of which can be seen in Figure 1. This bearing element is shown in greater detail in Figure 2. In essence it comprises a hub portion 40 embedded in a resilient plastics material 41, and having three equiangularly spaced arms 42 each having a pair of fingers 43 and 44 diverging on opposite circumferential sides of a radial plane which is the plane of symmetry of the respec tivc arm 42. Such a structure is made so that it is a sliding fit in the bore hole lining pipe and, in use, when the shaft rotatcs, thc hub 40 will tcnd to rotate in the appropriate direction and the respective onc of the fin gers 44 or 43 of each arm will be forced into tighter engagement with the wall of the bore lining pipe.

At the upper cnd, the drive shaft 21 is provided with a collct connector 45 which includes two parts with co-operating tapering surfaces which enab) es the shaft to bc clamped. The upper of these two connector members is rotatablc by a motor 46 which has been shown very schematically.

In order to install the assembly of the prescnt invention, the bore holc l0 is bored, in the usual manncr, and thereafter the strainer 15 is fittcd onto thc pump casing member 14 and the first of the bore lining sections 12 is secured to the upper end of the pump casing I-4. The thus formed assembly is introduced into the top of the bore hole and lowered, and further pipe sections are addcd progres sively until the full length of the bore hole lining is complete and the strainer 15 is at the bottom of the bore holc.

With this arrangement in place, an outlet duct 50 is connected to the uppermost onc of the bore holc lining pipe sections, this having a discharge outlet 51. The pump itsclf which has been preasscmblcd is taken and the first or the first fcw drive shaft sections 21 arc connected tu it. The rotary pump elements or impcllers 22 arc momentarily immobilised with respect to the bowls 18 by introducing a frangiblc elemcnt, Such as a small piece of wood. into the top part of the pump 16.

The pump is then lowered by means of the drive shaft into the bore hold lining and further drive shaft sections are fitted until the bottom edge of the housing 7 engages the lug 27. The drive shaft is then rotated by the necessary amount for the housing to be rotatcci until the flared lead-in 29 of the notch'S cnganes thc lug. Thc pump housing, and thcref) re the drive shaft will then bc ablc to drop downvxardlv a little further until the pump takcs up the position illustratcd in the drawing with the lug fully engaged in the notch.

White the pump is being lowered, and additional drive shaft sections added these sections have fitted thereover the bearing elements 30 at appropriate axially spaced locations. The bearing has an outside dimension which allons s it to slide freely within the bore but, as indicated above, when the pump drive shaft is rotated, one of the fingers of each arm is pressed firmly against the inner wall of the bore liner pipe.

With the notch 28 fullv engaged on the lug 27, the housing itself is in the final position.

The fitter then grasps the drive shaft and pulls it upwardlv by an amount of say 5 mm.

This will have the effect of lifting the impel lers slightly off the bowl members and will remove substantially all axial loading in the location of the pump. If the collet connector 45 is then tightened up, this condition will be maintained. A top plate 52 may then be addcd and the assembly is then complete.

Claims

WHAT WE CLAIM IS: 1. A bore hole pump assembly comprising a pump casing member, a plurality of interconnectable bore holc lining pipes, the lowermost of said pipes being connectable directly to one axial end of the casing member, a pump having a plurality of axially spaced impellers and a plurality of bowl elements interpose between the impellers each provided with fixed vanes thereon, a drive shaft at one axial end of the pump and a tubular housing at the other axial end, the housing being engageable in the pump casing member and being removable by movement towards said one axial end, the lining pipes acting as the discharge pipe of the pump.
2. An assembly according to claim 1, wherein the pump casing member is provided with two axially spaced internal seating surfaces and the tubular housing is provided with two axially spaced external seating surfaces co-operating with said internal seating surfaces to align the housing within the casing member.
3. An assembly according to claim 2, wherein the diameter of the seating surface remote from the said one axial end of the pump is smaller than that of the other.
4. An assembly according to claim 3, wherein said seating surfaces are both cylindrical.
5. An assembly according to any preceding claim, wherein the pump casing member is provided with a radially inwardly extending lug and the tubular housing is provided, at said other axial end, with a notch co operatabte with said lug to prevent rotation of the housing and bowl elements.
6. An assembly according to claim 5, wherein the notch has a flared lead-in portion at said other axial end.
7. An assembly according to claim 3 or 4, and claim 5 or 6, wherein the lug and notch are position to ensure that the seating surfaces are engaged with one another when the notch is engaged with the lug.
8. An assembly according to any preceding claim, wherein the drive shaft consists of a plurality of interengageable shaft sections.
9. An assembly according to claim 8 wherein the drive shaft is associated with a drive motor or engine, the connection bet ween the shaft and motor or engine being provided by an axially ajustable connector to permit axial positioning of the impellers.
10. An assembly according to claim 9, wherein the connector is in the form of a collet connector.
11. An assemb ! y according to any preceding claim, wherein the shaft is rotatable within a plurality of axially spaced bearings, said bearings each comprising a hub having an axial bore therethrough for the passage of the drive shaft, a plurality of arms extending outwardly from said hub and two fingers on the end of each arm remote from the hub, the fingers diverging one on each circumferential side of the axial plane of the associated arm, the bearing means being dimensioned such that fingers engage the inner wall surface of an adjacent bore hole lining pipe.
12. A method of providing a bore hole pump, comprising boring a hole into the ground, assembling a pump casing member onto the lowermost pipe section of a bore hole lining pipe, inserting the casing member and the lining pipe section into the bore hole, adding further lining pipe sections to said lowermost lining pipe section and continuing to insert the thus-formed assembly into the bore hole to the desired depth, passing into the lining pipe a pump having a plurality of axially spaced rotatable impellers and a plurality of bowl elements interpose between the impellers each provided with fixed vanes thereon, and a drive shaft at the upper axial end of the pump and a tubular housing at the other axial end of the pump, so that the tubular housing is introduced first into the lining pipe, adding drive shaft sections and continuing to lower the pump into the lining, until the tubular housing engages in the pump casing member.
13. A method according to claim 12, wherein the drive shaft is raised slightly to take axial loading of the impellers.
14. A method of installing a bore hole pump substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to and as illustrated in the accompanying drawings.
15. A bore holc pump assembly substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to and as illustrated in the accompanying drawings.

@ A KEMP & CO