Motor drives of modern drilling and servicing rigs for oil and gas wells

Abstract

This paper provides a synthetic view on the most recent achievements in the field of drilling and servicing rig drives for oil and gas wells. This field is featuring powers of hundreds and thousands of kilowatts and speeds of 150–250 rpm for drilling and 30–200 rpm at servicing rigs. In the first part the paper presents achievements in the field of rotary tables—the central piece of equipment of the drilling rigs. In the second part of the paper recent achievements in the field of hydraulic motor driveheads (HMD) are presented. Details are given regarding a recent product of S.C. CONFIND: the cement plug drilling installation with HMD of 80 tons and thermic motor of 160 HP. In the last part of the paper the newest international achievements in the field of power swivels are described: Top Drive (TD) and Direct Drive (DD), using slow speed hydraulic and electric motors.