This application is a U.S. National Phase patent application of PCT/SE2013/050215, filed on Mar. 11, 2013, which claims priority to Swedish Patent Application No. 1250345-4, filed on Apr. 4, 2012, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns apparatus for a drill for down-the-hole drilling and the installation of a lining pipe in rock or soil layers according to the introduction to claim 1.
Description of the Related Art
Drills are used in prior art drill arrangements for the installation of a lining pipe, i.e. in which a lining pipe is to be left permanently in a borehole after, for example, drilling in loose rock, or in which fluids such as water or oil are to be led into the pipe, that demonstrate a central pilot drill bit that is intended to be mounted in a chuck in a down-the-hole drill using a shaft or a neck, from which impacts are transferred to the pilot bit. A control means guides the drill and the lining pipe relative to each other such that the drill can be freely rotated relative to the lining pipe. A coupling arrangement, normally in the form of a bayonet coupling, is located between the drill and the control means, which coupling arrangement when in its free condition allows the drill to be drawn back through the lining pipe together with the down-the-hole drill. The drill is intended to drill a borehole that allows the lining pipe to accompany it into the borehole. A casing shoe, which has been welded at a forward end of the lining pipe, ensures that the lining pipe is driven into the borehole together with the drill and transfers impacts from the drill to the lining pipe. The drill has internal flushing passages for the supply of flushing agent, and it has evacuation passages for the removal of drilling cuttings together with the flushing agent. Drilling takes place through a combination of impacts and rotational movement.
The transfer of impacts to the lining pipe takes place in prior art drill arrangements through the casing shoe through a forward impact surface that is a part of the drill bit acting on a rear impact surface of the casing shoe and initiating the casing shoe in this way into intermittent, axial impact motion, which is in turn transferred to the lining pipe. One problem with this design is that the output power of the hammer that is a part of the impact mechanism must be limited such that the impact energy is not sufficiently great that the welded join between the casing shoe and the lining pipe breaks. The welded join between the said parts that transfer impact energy thus constitutes a weak point. Even if the weld is of high quality, the impact energy must normally be limited when installing a lining pipe. As a consequence of the low power of the impact mechanism, the desired drilling rate is not obtained, and thus also the total capacity of the equipment used to install a lining pipe is limited.
Furthermore, if the force of feeding is too low, also the problem that the drill bits become polished arises, which means that they soon loose their cutting capacity. The drill bit may in the worst case be destroyed due to the overheating that arises. It should be realised that the possibilities for the operator to observe a broken welded join between the casing shoe and the lining pipe or a reduced drilling rate due to the loss of cutting capacity of the drill bit are limited, and that repairs to the equipment in question are both time-consuming and expensive. There is, thus, a desire to make it possible to drive this type of drill arrangement with a considerably higher hammer power than previously, not only in order to obtain an increased drilling rate but also to reduce the risk of polishing of the drill bit arising.
Drills are known from WO 9934087 A1 and US 2004/0104050 A1 that drive a lining pipe into a hole through the transfer of direct impacts from pilot bit to the lining pipe through a casing shoe. A drill is known from DE 4000691 A1 that presses a lining pipe into a borehole through the interaction between a casing shoe and a stationary part of the drill, which parts cannot be rotated at their opposing contact surfaces.
A first purpose of the present invention, therefore, is to achieve an arrangement at a drill for the installation of a lining pipe that allows a significantly improved drilling rate and at the same time reduces the risk of failure due to failure of the welded join between the casing shoe and the lining pipe. A second purpose of the invention is to achieve an arrangement at a drill that makes it possible to carry out the installation of a lining pipe without any noteworthy reduction in the power of the impact mechanism, i.e. to install a lining pipe at essentially full hammer power. It is appropriate that the drill arrangement according to the invention is used with a fluid-powered down-the-hole hammer drill.
It has surprisingly proved to be the case that efficient water flushing in front of the drill bit has a lubricant effect that in nearly all cases achieves such a reduction in the friction between the surrounding wall of the cavity in the soil layers and the lining pipe that the percussive force that prior art drills have applied to the lining pipe through the casing shoe for the driving of the lining pipe into the borehole is not necessary: the force of pressure (not of impacts) that can be transferred through a suitable selected stationary part of the down-the-hole hammer drill is, in nearly all cases, sufficient. Since the casing shoe in the present invention does not function as a percussive component, it is more correct in principle that it be known as, due to its functionality, a collar of the lining pipe, or a casing collar.
The two purposes of the invention are achieved through a drill arrangement for down-the-hole drilling with the installation of a lining pipe that demonstrates the distinctive features and characteristics specified in claim 1. The drill arrangement includes essentially a combination of a specially designed drill and a down-the-hole hammer drill. Further advantages of the invention are made clear by the non-independent claims.
An embodiment of the invention will be described below in more detail with reference to attached drawings, of which:
The drill arrangement shown in
The drill 1 that is described below is essentially already known. In this part it should be understood that the invention can be applied to a number of different types of known drills, not only of the type that is described below for the purposes of an example and that demonstrates a central pilot drill bit with a ring bit that surrounds this, but also of the type of available excentric system that, lacking a ring bit, work with spacers that can be radially extended and that has a separate control means that acts between the drill bit and the lining pipe for the mutual guidance of the drill and the lining pipe.
With reference to
As
As is made clear by
The pilot bit 2 has three carriers 24 formed as L-shaped protrusions with essentially the basic form of a hook with the shape of a parallelepiped, which carriers are evenly distributed around the circumference of the surface 8. The carriers 24 demonstrate a first part 24a that extends along the longitudinal axis of the pilot bit and that is terminated at the forward end 9 of the pilot bit in a transverse second part 24b. This transverse second part 24b forms a hook that functions in the bayonet coupling. Each carrier 24 includes a forward end surface that forms a part of the forward end 9 of the pilot bit, together with two side surfaces 26, 27 and an outer surface. Reference letter A in
As is made clear by
With reference to
With reference to
As
It is furthermore to be noted that second grooves 50 are formed in the region between neighbouring first grooves 46, which second grooves are located, similarly to the first grooves, with separations of 120° and extend axially between the forward and rear ends 38, 39 of the ring bit. Each such second groove 50 is separated from an adjacent first groove 46 by means of a ridge or separating wall 51, the inner surface of which forms a part of the inner surface 40 of the ring bit. Furthermore, a part having the nature of a shoulder having a smaller diameter of the rear plane end surface 39 of the ring bit 3, the impact surface 14b at the ring bit 3 that is intended to interact with the impact surface 14a at the pilot bit 2.
With special reference to
The present drill arrangement is shown in
As has been mentioned in the introduction, the present drill arrangement uses a down-the-hole drill, which has been given the general reference number 100.
As is best made clear by
With continued reference to
The drill arrangement is shown in
The drill arrangement for installing a lining pipe described above functions in the following manner:
When a hole is to be drilled for the purpose of installing a lining pipe in rock or soil, the relevant lining pipe 58 is first united with the casing shoe 4 by welding. In the next step, the ring bit 3 is connected to the casing shoe 4. The drill 100 is prepared in a following step by the driver chuck 112 being fixed into the forward end of the machine housing pipe 111 of the drill and the neck 2a of the pilot bit 2 being brought into contact in a retaining manner, inserted into the chuck that is a component of the drill. In a final step, the ring bit 3 is connected to the pilot bit 2. This takes place through the drill 100 being introduced into the lining pipe 58 and through the carriers 24 of the pilot bit 2 being axially introduced through the grooves 46 until they are located at the level of the pockets 47 at the forward end of the ring bit. The pilot bit is subsequently rotated in the direction of rotation R of the tool such that the drive surfaces 26 at the carriers 24 make contact with the contact surfaces 49 that are part of the pockets 47. The drill in this condition is now ready for the drilling operation. The drill is thus located concentrically inserted into the lining pipe 58.
Drilling takes place through a combination of impacts and rotational movement, whereby the rock is crushed by the crushing means of the drill bit. To be more precise, the impacts are transferred directly to the crushing means of the pilot bit 2, partly to the crushing means of the ring bit 3 through the influence of the pilot bit through the interacting impact surfaces. Since the ring-shaped lower end surface 55 of the casing shoe forms a contact surface 59a that interacts with the stationary part 59b (part that does not make impacts) that is constituted by the driver chuck of the down-the-hole hammer drill, the lining pipe will be driven into the borehole under the accompaniment of the drill through its driver chuck. Transfer of impact motion between the pilot bit and the ring bit takes place without any influence at all of the casing shoe, which can move axially along the ring bit with the required degree of freedom, guided and connected through interaction with the radially inwards-facing protrusions 56 of the casing shoe and the circumferential grooves 44 in the surface of the ring bit 3. The rotation of the ring bit relative to the casing shoe, and thus to the lining pipe, that is required for the ring bit to accompany the pilot bit in order to intermittently displace the crushing means that are a component of the ring bit occurs by means of the carriers 24 that are held in interaction with the pockets 47 of the ring bit.
During the drilling, when the carriers 24 interact with the pockets 47, flushing water and the accompanying drilling cuttings are evacuated through the passages that are limited on one side by the channels 50 in the inner surface of the ring bit 3 and on the other side by the surface 8 of the pilot bit 2. The channels 50 in this position are located axially aligned with a rear passage 21 through the ring girdle on the pilot bit 2. This means that the flows of flushing water through the drill take place through passages in the form of second channels 50, which are separated from the first channels 46, as is required for the application of the carriers 24 of the bayonet coupling in a locked, driving condition. In other words, the individual flow of contaminated water is directed linearly through the channel 50 and the axial rear passage 21 in the ring girdle 13. When the pilot bit 2 is to be freed from the ring bit 3 and withdrawn from the borehole, when the borehole has been completed or when surveillance and monitoring must be carried out, the pilot bit is rotated through an arc extent in the direction that is opposite to the direction R of rotation. The carriers 24 are in this way placed into locations in line with the channels 46 and can be withdrawn backwards through these, and further backwards together with the down-the-hole drill 100 out of the lining pipe 58 that remains in the hole.
A significant advantage of the invention is that forces of impact from the hammer mechanism are transferred essentially exclusively from the pilot bit 2 to the ring bit 3 through the carriers 24 of the bayonet coupling. Thus, the casing shoe 4 is in principle insulated from impacts. Instead, the lining pipe 58 will be driven into the borehole under the accompanying drill 100 through a stationary part that is constituted in the present case by the driver chuck 112 of the drill. Due to the welded join between the casing shoe 4 and the lining pipe 58 not being subject to impacts from the impact mechanism, the drill can be driven at essentially full power, which contributes to an increase in drilling rate and thus also a significantly improved total capacity. Due to the flushing of water in front of the drill bit, a lubricating effect is obtained that reduces the friction between the wall of the cavity and the lining pipe to such an extent that the percussive force that is applied through the casing shoe in prior art arrangements for the driving of the same is not necessary: the force of pressure (not of percussion) that is applied to the lining pipe through the interaction with the driver chuck of the down-the-hole drill is sufficient.
The invention is not limited to what has been described above and shown in the drawings: it can be changed and modified in several different ways within the scope of the innovative concept defined by the attached patent claims.
Number | Date | Country | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
1250345-4 | Apr 2012 | SE | national |
Filing Document | Filing Date | Country | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
PCT/SE2013/050215 | 3/11/2013 | WO | 00 |
Publishing Document | Publishing Date | Country | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
WO2013/151477 | 10/10/2013 | WO | A |
Number | Name | Date | Kind |
---|---|---|---|
20040104050 | Järvelä et al. | Jun 2004 | A1 |
20100264608 | Wolfer | Oct 2010 | A1 |
Number | Date | Country |
---|---|---|
4000691 | Jul 1991 | DE |
1837481 | Sep 2007 | EP |
1996015351 | May 1996 | WO |
9934087 | Jul 1999 | WO |
WO 2010071563 | Jun 2010 | WO |
Entry |
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International Preliminary Report on Patentability received for PCT Patent Application No. PCT/SE2013/050215, dated Oct. 16, 2014, 6 pages. |
International Written Opinion received for PCT Patent Application No. PCT/SE2013/050215, dated Jul. 1, 2013, 4 pages. |
International Search Report received for PCT Patent Application No. PCT/SE2013/050215, dated Jul. 1, 2013, 4 pages. |
Extended European Search Report (includes Supplementary European Search Report and Search Opinion) received for European Patent Application No. 13772373.0, dated Dec. 14, 2015, 7 pages. |
Office Action received for Australian Patent Application No. 2013244044, dated Aug. 10, 2016, 2 pages. |
Number | Date | Country | |
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20150330151 A1 | Nov 2015 | US |