OTC 2017: Weatherford collaborates to upgrade deepwater drilling reamer
May 1, 2017
At the first day of the 2017 Offshore Technology Conference, Weatherford International plc commercial released a premium version of the RipTide RFID drilling reamer that incorporates advanced cutter technology.
Offshore staff
HOUSTON – At the first day of the 2017 Offshore Technology Conference, Weatherford International plc commercial released a premium version of the RipTideRFID (radio-frequency identification) drilling reamer that incorporates advanced cutter technology.
The RipTide RFID drilling reamer has been deployed in deepwater fields throughout the world,Weatherford says. After encountering especially abrasive formations in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico, the company approached US Synthetic, a provider of polycrystalline diamond cutters, to explore new solutions for reaming operations in these fields.
As a result of this collaboration, the pair said they each developed proprietary technologies. Weatherford developed the ReamSync borehole enlargement performance system, which includes a predictive cutter and formation interaction software used in the design of cutter blocks.
Concurrently, US Synthetic developed Deep Diamond cutters with improved thermal stability. Applied together, these technologies yielded an enhanced RipTide reamer that has demonstrated improved performance in highly abrasive formations in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico.
