| Patent application number | Description | Published |
|---|
| 20080247718 | FIBER OPTIC CABLE SYSTEMS AND METHODS TO PREVENT HYDROGEN INGRESS - Purging interior regions of a cable reduces or prevents hydrogen darkening of an optical fiber located in the cable. While hydrogen may permeate through an outer surface of the cable, fluid circulating through the cable purges the hydrogen from within the cable. This circulation of the fluid occurs between an inner tube containing the fiber and an outer tube surrounding the inner tube. | 10-09-2008 |
| 20080273849 | SINGLE MODE OPTICAL FIBER WITH IMPROVED BEND PERFORMANCE - Methods and apparatus relate to optical fibers suitable for use in sensing applications exposed to radiation environments. The fibers include a core of pure silica or chlorine doped silica surrounded by a fluorinated silica cladding. These glasses for the core and cladding utilize dopants that resist radiation-induced attenuation. A two step process for forming the cladding can achieve necessary concentrations of the fluorine by performing a soot deposition process in a different environment from a consolidation process where the soot is sintered into a glass. Concentration of fluorine doped into the cladding layer enables obtaining a numerical aperture that confines a mono-mode of the fiber to resist bend-induced attenuation. Dimensions of the fiber further facilitate bending ability of the fiber. | 11-06-2008 |
| 20090034920 | TERMINATION OF FIBER OPTIC CABLE - Apparatus and methods provide for cables with secured terminations. For some embodiments, a cable includes an inner tube surrounding an optical fiber, an aluminum tube surrounding the inner tube, and armor tubing surrounding the aluminum tube. The aluminum tube resists collapse of the inner tube at bends in the cable, inhibits or prevents hydrogen from reaching the fiber, and facilitates termination of the cable. For example, terminating the cable may include crimping the armor tubing to deform the aluminum tube into gripping engagement with an outside of the inner tube and an inside of the armor tubing. In some embodiments, a retention assembly secures the fiber relative to the inner tube and includes a retention tube secured to the inner tube and a packing sleeve squeezed into gripping engagement with the fiber by radial inward deformation of the retention tube where the packing sleeve is disposed in the retention tube. | 02-05-2009 |
| 20090310925 | PURE SILICA CORE, HIGH BIREFRINGENCE, SINGLE POLARIZATION OPTICAL WAVEGUIDE - Methods and apparatus provide for birefringent waveguides suitable for optical systems exhibiting polarization dependence such as interferometer sensors including Sagnac interferometric fiber optic gyroscopes (IFOG). The waveguides, for some embodiments, may offer single polarization performance over lengths of about a kilometer or more due to polarization dependent attenuation. According to some embodiments, the waveguides incorporate a pure silica core for resistance to radiation-induced attenuation (RIA). | 12-17-2009 |
| 20100142903 | FIBER OPTIC CABLE SYSTEMS AND METHODS TO PREVENT HYDROGEN INGRESS - Purging interior regions of a cable reduces or prevents hydrogen darkening of an optical fiber located in the cable. While hydrogen may permeate through an outer surface of the cable, fluid circulating through the cable purges the hydrogen from within the cable. This circulation of the fluid occurs between an inner tube containing the fiber and an outer tube surrounding the inner tube. | 06-10-2010 |
| 20100150497 | EVANESCENT SENSOR USING A HOLLOW-CORE RING MODE WAVEGUIDE - Method and apparatus enable optical evanescent sensing utilizing a waveguide with an annular core. The annular core can provide detectable sensitivity to a measurand due to optical interactions with contents along an inside surface of the annular core since optical properties of the contents vary with changes in the measurand. | 06-17-2010 |
| 20110088259 | TERMINATION OF FIBER OPTIC CABLE - Apparatus and methods provide for cables with secured terminations. For some embodiments, a cable includes an inner tube surrounding an optical fiber, an aluminum tube surrounding the inner tube, and armor tubing surrounding the aluminum tube. The aluminum tube resists collapse of the inner tube at bends in the cable, inhibits or prevents hydrogen from reaching the fiber, and facilitates termination of the cable. For example, terminating the cable may include crimping the armor tubing to deform the aluminum tube into gripping engagement with an outside of the inner tube and an inside of the armor tubing. In some embodiments, a retention assembly secures the fiber relative to the inner tube and includes a retention tube secured to the inner tube and a packing sleeve squeezed into gripping engagement with the fiber by radial inward deformation of the retention tube where the packing sleeve is disposed in the retention tube. | 04-21-2011 |
| 20110235984 | OPTICAL FIBER COATING TO PREVENT ADHESION AT HIGH TEMPERATURES - Embodiments of the present invention provide methods and apparatus for cables having one or more fibers that may function as a sensing device within a wellbore, wherein the fibers do not adhere to each other or to an inner wall of the cable during a high temperature operation, such as in a thermal recovery operation that may last over 30 days. | 09-29-2011 |
