Coming into View: TC company is top seller of video borescopes in North America | Business

TRAVERSE CITY – For a company that specializes in finding difficult locations, ViewTech endoscopes are incredibly unobtrusive.

The brick building on Barlow Street is behind a brick wall with the company name on it.

A newly built apartment complex lies north and east. Most of the traffic in public parking lots comes when people miss the turn to the US State Department office near the South.

A moving camera winds its way down, up again and out of the elongated “V” in the company’s first letter. It is the only indication that Inside is the top seller of video endoscopes in North America.

But for those who need to visually check small spaces, the importance of ViewTech Borescopes and its Traverse City office is clear. Because no matter how hard the office is to find, employees in aviation maintenance and engine inspection know that one of the company slogans often throws an LED light on an important topic: “You can’t repair what you can’t see.”

“Anywhere you can use your eye, but your head doesn’t fit,” said Sean O’Connor, founder and managing director of ViewTech Borescopes, of another look on the company’s face.

The ViewTech Borescopes handheld device has controls just below a video screen. The tungsten-braided insertion tube is available as standard in four different diameters (2.2, 2.8, 3.9 and 6 millimeters) and five different lengths (1, 1.5, 3, 5 and 8 meters). Each unit has an LED light at the end.

The choice depends on the particular task that the joint endoscope – called an industrial endoscope in Europe – has to perform. But one rule applies when it comes to durability, resolution and size of the light in the end.

“You want to get the shortest, largest diameter, insertion tube that you can still inspect,” said O’Connor.

O’Connor said the largest uses for ViewTech Borescopes are in aerospace maintenance (20 percent) and power generation (18 percent), but said that “all automobile factories have our uses.”

Tim Lechota, chief mechanic at North Flight Aero Med in Traverse City, said that ViewTech endoscopes are used 30 weeks a year for both helicopter and aircraft inspection.

“We’re busy,” said Lechota. “It’s a very, very practical device. There are many nooks and crannies in the helicopters and our planes, and with a videoscope we can see a few eyes where it would otherwise be much more difficult. “

Lechota said he has used ViewTech endoscopes for nearly six years and later borrowed one from Aero Med Grand Rapids before buying one for the Traverse City office in September with the added convenience of being able to collect it in person.

“I’ve used hers so many times, we got our own,” said Lechota.

Nick Summerland, Health Safety Environmental Manager at Lambda Energy Resources in Kalkaska, said the oil and gas industry has “several different uses” for the ViewTech endoscopes. Summerland said the Houston-based company purchased one this summer for use in Michigan.

“There are a variety of features that enable pipe inspection and internal engine inspection, be it cylinder heads, piston tops, or actual cylinders inside an engine,” Summerland said.

“It was easy to use. It seems pretty robust, not that we’d abuse it, and able to stand up (use). It’s something anyone can use, even with short training sessions. I was trained to use it by the seller in about five minutes. “

ViewTech endoscopes are manufactured in a factory in Shenzhen, China and are sold from the Traverse City office. O’Connor said that Duncan White, director of sales and marketing, is in charge of day-to-day operations. White and the 10 employees used to work at OneUpWeb as a team with customer relationship management software.

With a four-person sales force unable to visit all of North America, ViewTech employees visit nearly two dozen trade shows annually and send thousands of emails daily to sell the endoscope.

O’Connor said ViewTech currently has around 150 demo units in the field for customers to try, which they keep if they decide to buy.

“Four to five units go out every day for people to rate,” said O’Connor.

ViewTech sells more than 500 of its endoscopes annually, which, according to O’Connor, “cost several thousand dollars and prices vary widely depending on the length and diameter of the introducer tube.”

And while use in aviation, turbines, engines and heat exchangers is the norm, some customers use them for unusual applications.

O’Connor said ViewTech endoscopes were used to inspect the inside of antique violins and even The Spirit of St. Louis, the plane that Charles Lindbergh flew non-stop across the Atlantic. Quinnipiac University in Connecticut used ViewTech to inspect a mummy.

“People think it’s boring because we only have one product,” said O’Connor. “The cool thing is that we are in so many industries.

“You never know what the next weird call will be,” he said just before the next desk phone rang.

ViewTech Borescopes started as an RF System Lab in Gaylord in 2008, where 53-year-old O’Connor grew up. The company moved to Traverse City in 2012 and occupied the Gateway Building there for five years before O’Connor bought the building at 1745 Barlow Street in 2017 and changed the company name.

ViewTech is in the process of remodeling and expanding its office from 3,600 to 6,600 square feet. The renovation should be ready at the beginning of next year.

O’Connor said the idea for the endoscope came about while working in the dental equipment industry, working with a Japanese manufacturer on a wireless oral camera.

“That was 2001,” said O’Connor.

O’Connor, who said he loves the company’s research and development space, said the current ViewTech product is the third generation. He said that as cell phones continue to improve, technology is penetrating other applications such as the endoscope.

“We’re already working on the fourth,” said O’Connor. “The technology is getting better and better.”

“You want the shortest, largest diameter tube that you can still inspect.” ViewTech Endoskope General Manager Sean O’Connor