History in the Making!
Laval Underground Surveys pioneered the concept of well camera inspection more than 70 years ago. Invented by Claude Laval, Jr., Laval borehole camera systems are now installed throughout the world, leading the way in video quality, ease-of-use and commitment to customer service and satisfaction. Today, Garrett Jones leads the company and continues to build on the foundation of innovation created by Claude Laval, Jr. We were the first. The original.
Claude Laval, Jr., following in his father’s footsteps as a commercial photographer in California’s San Joaquin Valley, was approached in the early 1940s by a local pump manufacturer who challenged him to develop a camera that could take pictures down in a water well. Rather easily, Mr. Laval waterproofed a camera and his first test pictures (taken of nuts and bolts in a drum of water) turned out perfect. Those first borehole pictures were black and white stereoscopic slides, taken in pairs and mounted for viewing through a device much like today’s “Viewmasters”, producing a 3D look of the downhole conditions. The early well cameras were about 8 feet long and weighed about 80 pounds, capable of taking pictures to depths of up to 1,000 feet. Technology led the way to further developments with the well camera, beginning in the 1960s when the stereoscopic slides gave way to live video (in black and white), in large part because of the breakthrough with small diameter, steel-armored cables, capable of handling power, video signals and the weight of the camera. By the late 1980s, Laval’s well cameras had become small enough to inspect water wells and boreholes as small as 2 inches I.D. Miniaturization was also applied to the various components of the systems, enabling operators to specify lightweight portable systems for a wide variety of purposes. The basic well camera also underwent some changes when, in the late 1980s, Laval engineers developed a variety of techniques for not only viewing directly downhole, but also a side-view within a water well. Today, the technology allows for Laval borehole video systems to reach new levels of sophistication, such as the package which is fully contained on portable cart system capable of full-color video to depths of 1,300 feet for remote water well inspection needs.
