Oilfield Team
Oil & Gas Books Store, Petroleum Engineering Books
  • Main
  • News
  • Photo
  • Video
  • Oilfield Jobs
  • Learning Section
  • Oil & Gas Calculator

Casing Handling Tools

2017.04.29
14 104

A wide variety of the elevator and spider assemblies are available to run casing. Some elevators are what is called square shouldered (see Figure -1), they have no slip elements. Instead, they have an internal diameter that will fit around the casing body but is too small for a coupling to pass through; they have hinge openings. The spider may be similar to the elevator and hinged or large enough for the coupling to pass through with some type of slip assembly built in, or there may be just a simple set of manual slips.    >> Drilling Engineer Books <<

Elevators and spiders increase in sophistication from there. We assume that anyone who runs casing knows to select an elevator and spider combination of sufficient strength to suspend the casing safely. There is one important point to make in this regard though. The elevator and spiders (see Figure-2 and Figure–3) normally used to run heavy casing strings are rated at 500 tons (1 million lbf) or even 1000 tons (2 million lbf) and have an internal slip assembly that is either manually activated with an external lever or is air or hydraulically actuated.

Figure -1 

 

Figure -2

 

Figure -3

These are very good tools for running heavy strings of casing. The problem is that even a heavy string of casing is not “heavy” when it starts in the hole. The efficiency and ease with which the manual lever operates the slips is such that it is possible for someone on the rig floor to easily open the slips even with several hundred feet or so of casing suspended in the spider. A similar problem can occur when the pipe is in the elevator and an obstruction is hit, causing the load on the elevator to be momentarily released so that the slips jump open. The result in either case is a portion of a casing string dropping into the hole and going to the bottom. For this reason, it often is preferred to start a long string of casing in the hole with lower-rated tools, then switch over to the 500 ton tools when the casing is at the bottom of the surface casing or some other point where the running process can be paused to switch the elevator and spider. The possibility of such an event may sound remote, but a number of these instances inhabit many companies’ annals of bad events. In one case, a casing crew member slipped and fell against the release lever on a spider and dropped 400 ft of 13⅜ in. casing to the bottom of a 5000 ft well. In another case, the crew was not filling the 7⅝ in. casing properly, and as the driller lowered the casing, it was buoyed enough that it did not descend at the same rate as the elevator; the elevator slips opened. No one realized the elevator slips were open until the driller stopped the elevator above the spider and the casing kept on going right through the spider before anyone had time to react. Approximately 1100 ft of 7⅝ in. casing fell 12,000 ft before it stopped. One other point about casing tools is that a spare elevator-spider combination should be on the rig, in case there is a problem with the primary tools. There will not be time to order a replacement if one fails in the process of running casing.

 

Related Posts

5 Tips For Oil And Gas Pipeline Maintenance
2023.03.16
100
5 Tips For Oil And Gas Pipeline Maintenance
Oil and gas products are very volatile. Therefore, it is essential to ensure they are transported sa…
Completion and Workover Fluids
2023.03.06
131
Completion and Workover Fluids
Completion and workover fluids are any fluids used in the completion of a well or in a workover oper…
Stay Ahead of the Curve: The Latest Trends in Oil and Gas Marketing
2023.02.28
267
Stay Ahead of the Curve: The Latest Trends in Oil and Gas Marketing
As an oil and gas sales professional, staying on top of the latest trends and best practices is esse…
Improvement of MWD Operational Efficiency
2023.02.08
274
Improvement of MWD Operational Efficiency
The most important component of this topic is the sensor. Even though sensors have been used to meas…
Market quotes are powered by TradingView.com
© Oilfield Team, 2023
About Us  | Contact Us  | Privacy Policy  
Made in studio Zuber