JPH055084B2 - - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION [Technical Field of the Invention] The present invention relates to a guide tube for an endoscope, which is used when performing an internal inspection of, for example, a gas turbine engine using an endoscope.

[Technical background of the invention and its problems] In recent years, endoscopes have been widely used not only in the medical field but also in the industrial field.

When observing or inspecting the inside of a gas turbine engine using the above endoscope, there is a hook that fixes the distal end of the endoscope insertion section inserted into the engine, and a hook that fixes the distal end of the endoscope insertion section inserted into the engine. An essential element is a guide tube to guide the turbine blade to the target turbine blade.

An endoscope using the above-mentioned hook was published in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 1986-
As disclosed in Publication No. 78127, the hook protrudes from the tip of the endoscope, so there is no problem when inserting it into the guide tube, but when removing it, the tip of the hook gets caught on the end of the guide tube and the guide tube is damaged. You will not be able to pull it out. Therefore, 1
After inspecting one engine, the endoscope must be pulled out along with the guide tube, and the process of inserting the guide tube along with the guide tube into another engine must be repeated. If a guide tube and an endoscope are installed together in each engine, the operation becomes cumbersome.

In addition, when pulling out the entire guide tube through which the endoscope has been inserted, the tip of the hook that is caught (or protrudes) from the guide tube is likely to get caught on the surrounding blade walls, etc., and there is a risk of damage. There is. For this reason, there was a problem that the pulling operation had to be performed with care and that the pulling operation was time-consuming. Similarly,
Even when an endoscope with a protruding hook is inserted from the beginning and the endoscope is inserted along with the guide tube, the hook gets in the way, making it difficult to insert the endoscope.

Furthermore, there is a problem that it takes time to remove the endoscope and guide tube from the engine and then perform the process of removing the endoscope.

[Object of the Invention] The present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned points, and it is possible to easily hold the endoscope without the hook getting caught when inspecting the inside of a gas turbine engine using a hook for fixing the endoscope. The purpose of the present invention is to provide a guide tube for an endoscope that can be freely inserted and removed.

[Summary of the invention] The present invention provides a bent portion on the distal end side of the tube,
In addition, by forming a guide tube with an inclined part on the distal end surface, when the endoscope is pulled out, the hook is guided to the bottom side by the inclined part, and the tip of the hook is guided inside the guide tube at the bent part. This allows the endoscope to be pulled out of the guide tube without the hook getting caught.

[Embodiments of the Invention] The present invention will be specifically described below with reference to the drawings.

1 to 4 relate to a first embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 1 shows the first embodiment with the endoscope insertion part inserted, and FIG. 2 shows the inside of FIG. 1. The distal end side of the endoscope is shown in an enlarged manner, FIG. 3 is an enlarged view of the first embodiment, and FIG. 4 is for explaining the operation of the first embodiment.

As shown in FIG. 1, an (industrial) endoscope 1 for inspecting the inside of a gas turbine engine, etc. includes a flexible and elongated insertion section 2 and a rear end side of the insertion section 2. It is composed of a large-diameter or wide-width operating section 3, an eyepiece section 4 provided at the rear end of the operating section 3, and a light guide cable 5 extending from the side of the operating section 3.

The endoscope 1 has an insertion section 2 as shown in FIG.
An observation optical system 6 and an illumination optical system 7 are formed at the tip. The illumination optical system 7 is configured to emit illumination light (from a light source device, not shown) transmitted through the light guide cable 7 from its front end to illuminate a range that can be observed by the observation optical system 6.

Further, the insertion section 2 of the endoscope 1 is formed with a hollow channel 8 through which a treatment instrument can be inserted, and can normally be inserted through an introduction port 9 on the side of the operating section 3. On the other hand, if the distal end of the hook 10 for fixing the endoscope cannot be inserted into the channel 8, insert it in the opposite direction, protrude its base from the insertion port 9, and insert the hook from the outlet side of the channel 8. The distal end side of 10 can be projected forward.

The shaft of the hook 10 is made of an elastic member such as a tightly wound coil that exhibits a restoring force against bending, and a blade is hooked onto the tip of the shaft to fix the endoscope 1. For example, a U-shaped hook portion 10a is formed on the side.

By the way, the guide tube 11 of the first embodiment is used for inserting the endoscope 1 and guiding it to a desired object.
As shown in FIG. 1, the guide tube 1 is formed of a hollow tube with an appropriate inner diameter through which the insertion portion 2 of the endoscope 1 inserted through the hook 10 can be inserted.
1, as shown in FIG. 3, a bent portion 12 is formed so that the portion from the tip to a portion having an appropriate length is bent so that the axial direction thereof is oriented in a different direction from the rear end side. At the end of the guide tube 11 where the bent portion 12 is formed, an inclined surface 13 is formed as shown in FIGS. 2 and 3.
There is a long groove-shaped notch 1 at the deepest bottom of the
4 is formed.

When the endoscope inserted through the hook 10 is pulled out, the sloped surface 13 is brought into contact with the sloped surface 13 by the pulling force when the tip of the hook 10 is caught on the sloped surface 13. The tip of the hook 10 is allowed to slide on the inclined surface 13 and guided to the bottom side of the inclined surface 13 (the state shown in FIG. 4b). Incidentally, this inclined surface 13 is formed by cutting from a direction perpendicular to a plane containing the central axis of the guide tube 11 (for example, the paper plane in FIG. 4). In other words, the inner side in the bending direction is the most The bottom has a large notch, and therefore the notch 14 formed in this bottom is provided at the inner end in the bending direction.

The notch 14 has a groove width that allows at least the tip of the hook 10 to pass through. However, the lever notch 14 is provided to prevent the tip of the hook 10 guided to the bottom side of the inclined surface 13 from getting caught when the endoscope 1 is pulled out. The tip of hook 10 reaches
Due to the restoring force of the shaft of the hook 10 (inserted through the bent part 12 of the guide tube 11), the hook 10 moves from the bent inner side of the notch 14 position to the outer side of the bend (inner direction of the guide tube 11). (state shown in Figure 4c).

The operation of the guide tube 11 of the first embodiment configured in this way will be described below.

The endoscope 1 with the hook 10 inserted into the channel 8 is inserted into the gas turbine engine (not shown) through the guide tube 11, guided in the direction of the target turbine blade by the guide tube 11, and protruded from the endoscope 1. The distal end of the hook 10 is hooked onto the turbine blade to fix the endoscope 1 so that it does not wobble, and the observation optical system 6 of the endoscope 1 can be used to inspect for cracks in the turbine blade, etc.

After the inspection, the hook 10 is removed from the blade, and the endoscope 10 is then removed as shown in FIG. 4a.
The endoscope 1 is pulled together with the hook 10 while maintaining the length of the distal end side of the hook 10 protruding from the distal end of the guide tube 11 to be approximately the length of the bent portion 12 of the guide tube 11. Then, in many cases, the hook portion 10a on the distal end side of the hook 10 protruding from the endoscope 1 gets caught on the periphery of the distal end of the guide tube 11.
Since this tip is formed into an inclined surface 13, the tip of the hook 10, which is caught by the pulling force, slides down the inclined surface 13 toward the bottom side and reaches the part where the notch 14 is formed. That is, as shown in FIG. 4b, for example, what was caught as shown by the one-dot chain line is moved to the bottom notch 14 side as shown by the solid line. When being guided into this notch 14, the hook 10 is inserted through the bending part 12 of the guide tube 11, so that the distal end side of the hook 10 protruding from the endoscope 1 is bent in the bending direction of the bending part 12. As the hook 10 is constantly trying to return in the opposite direction to the bending direction due to the restoring force of the shaft, the tip of the hook 10 reaches the notch 14 and is no longer caught, and the hook 10 as shown in FIG. As shown by the arrow, the direction in which the bending is released, that is, the tip of the hook 10 rotates and moves inward of the guide tube 11.
Even if an item that is caught on the slope 13 of the guide tube 1 is simply pulled out, it can be smoothly removed from the guide tube 1.
It is stored inside 1.

Therefore, if the endoscope 1 is pulled further, the hook 10
At the same time, the endoscope 1 can be removed from the guide tube 11.

Although the groove-shaped notch 14 is provided in the first embodiment, other shapes, such as triangular notches, may also be used.
As in the embodiment, the end portion of the guide tube 21 on the side where the bent portion is formed is notched to form the sloped surface 22, and the bottom side of the sloped surface 22 is notched to further increase the slope angle. A device with a portion (or notch) 23 formed therein may also have substantially the same function. In addition, the above notch 14
Alternatively, the inclined surface 1 is not provided with the inclined portion 23.
Even if only 3 and 21 are used, by setting the length and bending angle (bending shape) of the bending part 12 to appropriate values,
When moving toward the bottom side of the inclined surfaces 13 and 22 with the tip of the hook 10 being caught, the hook 1
The portion slightly rearward from the tip of the 0 comes into contact with the inner wall surface of the bent portion 12, and the amount of the hook gradually decreases, and the hook becomes disengaged midway through, and further the inner wall of the bent portion 12 It is also possible to move the portion that contacts the wall so that the tip end of the hook 10 is housed inside the guide tube.

Note that the bent portion 12 and the inclined surfaces 13, 22, etc. are not limited to those formed only on one end side of the guide tube, but also belong to the present invention if they are formed on both sides of the guide tube. When provided on both sides in this way, it is also possible to make them suitable for hooks having different shapes, external shapes, etc., respectively.
Further, the end on the proximal side can be made to have an inclined surface to facilitate insertion.

Incidentally, the notch 14 is not limited to the bottom, but is provided at a portion in front of the bottom so that when the engagement is released at this position, the notch 14 is stored inside the guide tube by the restoring force. You can also do that.

It should be noted that the hooks that can be applied to the present invention are not limited to those shown in the drawings, but can also be applied to hooks with different tip shapes. Further, the entire shaft portion of the hook may be made of an elastic member that recovers from bending, such as a coil, but at least the vicinity of its tip (length of about 12 or more bent portions) is made of an elastic member. If so, the present invention is applicable.

The present invention is not limited to gas turbines, but can be widely applied to cases where blades or other members are housed in a lumen or the like, and where the blades or other members are to be hooked for observation, inspection, or repair.

In addition, the part to be bent may be formed by bending an appropriate length part on the tip side into an arc shape, or it may be formed by bending (like bending) only a part of an appropriate length from the tip with that part as a boundary. good.
Of course, there may be a plurality of bent portions.

[Effects of the Invention] As described above, according to the present invention, the end of the guide tube is formed into an inclined surface, and the bent portion is provided at the rear portion of the inclined surface, so that it is easy to use the hook. By simply pulling out the endoscope, the endoscope can be pulled out from the guide tube without the distal end of the hook getting caught in the guide tube. Therefore, the troublesome and time-consuming extraction work can be completed in a short time. Moreover, it can be realized at low cost.

[Brief explanation of the drawing]

1 to 4 relate to the first embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 1 is a perspective view showing the endoscope inserted into the first embodiment, and FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of the distal end side of FIG. 1. 3 is a perspective view showing the guide tube of the first embodiment, and FIG. 4 is a perspective view showing the guide tube distal end side for explaining the operation of the first embodiment when pulling out the endoscope. 5 and 6 relate to the second embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing the tip side of the second embodiment, and FIG. 6 is a side view of FIG. 5. show. 1... Endoscope, 2... Insertion section, 3... Operation section,
6... Observation optical system, 7... Illumination optical system, 8... Channel, 10... Hook, 11, 21... Guide tube, 12... Bent part, 13, 22... Inclined surface, 14... Cut Notch, 23...slanted part.

Claims (1)

[Scope of Claims] 1. A guide tube for performing endoscopy using a fixing hook having an elastic shaft that can be inserted into a channel of an endoscope, including a bent portion on at least one end side; , an inclined surface having a bottom on the inside in the bending direction at the end of the bent portion, and a notch or the inclined surface at the bottom of the inclined surface that allows the tip of the fixing hook to be drawn into the guide tube by the elastic shaft. What is claimed is: 1. A guide tube for an endoscope, characterized in that a notched inclined portion is formed with a larger inclination angle than the surface.