Drilling
mud serve as lubricant that keep the drilling bit operate smooth. The consequence of drill bit overworked by
temperature heading up will lead to hard work of engine and transmission that
lead to breakdown and halt the whole operation.
It is a very costly operation halt that leads cost of extra ten thousand
of dollars and more. Plus, the drilling fluid is also a very costly lubricant
and to keep the drilling cost under control, solids control machinery is need
for filter the debris that contain in the drilling mud for many times of cycle
of use the drilling mud. The five
machinery that will completely perform filter the solids from the drilling mud
are shale shaker, vacuum degasser, desander, desilter and
decanter centrifuge.
The filter step goes in below:
Shale
shaker
The
drilling mud feed enter the feeding box of shale
shaker. The mud
contains various size of the solids return to the ground surface and shale
shaker is filtering the biggest solid by use high G force of shaking. The box of shale shaker contain panels of
mesh screen that is different number of mesh depend on solids contents analyze
by drilling mud engineer
Vacuum
degasser
. The muds
that return to ground surface not only contain solids but also gas from the
earth core. This gas that change density
of drilling mud leads result change the viscosity of drilling mud. Vacuum degasser
removes the gas in the drilling mud to keep the mud in balance and continue the
future solids filter process.
Desander
The drilling fluids now that
contain medium size solids enter the liquid feeding pump and enter the
desander, which contain large hydrocyclone(s). The solids diameter above 40-60um will be
filtered and bottom of desander is pair with shale shaker contain finer mesh
compare with first shale shaker to complete the filtering. T
Desilter
This machinery’s function of
work is just as same like desander in last step before. It contains multiple
smaller hydrocyclones that can remove solids that measure diameter above
15-40um. It is also pair with shale
shaker like desander and complete this step of filtering.
Decanter Centrifuge
The drilling fluid feed through
centrifugal pump that feed into decanter centrifuge that rotate in High
speed of G force. The rotating
bowl will separate solids from the mud and exit in one for solids and other one
is for filtered mud. The drilling mud
now will feed back to the rig for next cycle of usage.
