DRILLSTRING

DESIGN
REF: DRILLING ENGG. BY NEAL ADAMS

WELL PLANNING
CONSIDERATION

Drill-Collar Selection
The drill collars are the first section of the
drillstring to be designed. The collars' length and
size affect the type of drillpipe that must be used.
Drill-collar selection is usually based on :
1.) buckling considerations in the lower sections
of the drillstring when weight is set on the bit or
2) using a sufficient amount of drill collars to
avoid running the drillpipe in compression.
The design approaches that satisfy these design
criteria are the buoyancy factor method and
the pressure-area method, respectively.

DRILL STRING DESIGN

CRITERIA
The controlling criteria for drillstring
design are
Collapse and tension are used to select
pipe weights, grades, and couplings
slip crushing affects the tension design
and pipeselection.
dogleg severity is performed to study
the fatigue damage resulting from
rotating in the dogleg angle change

Collapse Load
The highest external pressure tending to collapse the string
will occur at the bottom when the string is run empty into
the hole. (This only occurs when running a Drillstem Test DST tool).
The highest anticipated external pressure on the pipe is
given by
Pc = 0.052 x MW x TVD
where:
Pc = collapse pressure (psi)
MW = mud weight (ppg)
TVD = true vertical depth (ft) at which Pc acts
This assumes that there is no fluid inside the pipe to resist
the external pressure (i.e. no back up).

Tension Design
The tension load can be evaluated after
the weights, grades, and section lengths
have been established from the collapse
designs. Buoyancy is included in the
tension evaluation due to the manner in
which biaxial stresses
alter the collapse properties of the pipe.
Since the string is designed with a
maximum load concept, it is important
that buoyancy be included in the design.

 The tension design line is established

as the maximum load resulting from
applying three different design
considerations, including 1.overpull
2.design factors,
3.slip crushing.
Each consideration is applied
separately to the load line

 a safety factor for slip crushing is

generally added to the loadingline
calculated above. This allows for the
interaction of hoopstress (Sh) caused
bythe slips and the tensile stress (St)
caused by the weight of the string. This
effect reduces the allowable tension load
by a factor (Sh/St) which can be
calculated as
follows:

where:
D = O.D. of pipe (in)
L = length of slips (in)
K = lateral load factor
Slips are normally either 12 in. or 16 in. long, and for normally lubricated
slips K = 4.00.If used pipe is being considered the actual D must be
measured and Sh/St calculated from the above equation. Having obtained
this factor it is applied to the tension loading line.

COLLAPSE DESIGN

BURST DESIGN

TENSION DESIGN

SLIP CRUSHING

Dogleg Severity Analysis

The most common type of drillpipe
failure is fatigue wear. It generally
occurs in doglegs where the pipe
goes through cyclic bending stresses.
These stresses occur because the
outer wall of the pipe in a dogleg is
stretched and creates a greater
tension load (see Fig. 15-20)