"Garrett Fulton" wrote in message
...

"SteveB" wrote in message
news:J00ne.1449$4p.809@fed1read03...
PS: I worked for Norman Jet systems, Global, and Gulf Coast Divers as a
diver, and for Reading and Bates as a crane operator.

Steve



Well, while we're on this subject, I'd like to be able to understand an
operation performed on a drilling rig. In '75, I was based onshore in
Guyana maintaing a Bell 212 that serviced the Glomar Sirte. The ship was
offshore about 90 miles and had drilled down to 14,000 ft., if I remember
this right. I was on the ship during some type of cementing operation
that
was about to take place where, as far as I could understand it, they were
preparing to pump liquid cement down the hole under high pressure. It
would
be forced out through the bottom of the hole, migrate up between the earth
and the drill pipe, harden and stabilize the pipe in the earth. I didn't
know beans about drilling wells, it wasn't my field, but that was the best
I
could understand it. We had an old Irish drilling engineer named Jake
Murphy, who was a close friend, and was doing the computation for this
operation. The Shell Oil big boss was named Harry TenApple and was
roundly
disliked by everyone. He really was a thoroughbred asshole as even I had
had a run in with him. Right before the cementing operation, Harry told
Jake he was taking over supervision of the deal. Jake went up on the
bridge, got a notepad, wrote up a statement absolving himself of any
responsibility for anything that was to occur subsequent to Harry taking
over. Took it to Harry, and made him sign it. Harry blustered and fumed,
but signed it. About an hour later, I heard that Harry had messed up the
amount of hardener that was supposed to go in the cement mixture and
plugged
up the 14,000 ft. hole at the 10,000 ft. level. They later moved the
ship
over a short distance and had to start a new hole. That was the way it
was
all explained to me. Harry got canned off the job and Jake flew back with
us and got roaring drunk and celebrated in the hotel until the wee hours.
He was the sweetheart of the rodeo for letting Harry hang himself, I
guess.
Didn't have to buy any drinks. Anyhow, have I got this cementing
operation
correct? Is that the way it works? You have to be dead on the money with
the amount of hardener?

Garrett Fulton



Yep. That's about right as I remember. I didn't have anything to do with
calculating the hardener, so don't know about that. The drilling engineer
used to come over and look at the calliper log to determine how much cement
to run though. He'd just glance down the log and select a volume. Must have
had divine assistance cause I sure couldn't have determined it from that.
One point though, Its actually casing that they stabilize with cement. The
drill pipe is out of the hole standing in the derrick. They case the hole
with a larger diameter casing and cement it in. They then use a smaller bit
to drill from the bottom of the casing to total depth. On some of the deep
hole there would be three layers of casing between the formation & the drill
pipe.