Patent Application
20150352660
In the downhole exploration and production industry, the movement and production of fluids is central to virtually all relevant operations. In many cases, the fluids that are moved would entrain solids. While in some cases, the entrainment of solids is desirable, such as in gravel and frac packing operations, such entrainment is often undesirable in other operations. One example, of course, is formation sand entrained with the production fluid. This is clearly undesirable as it is both a contaminant in the produced stream and also contributes to expedited wear of downhole components due to a sand blasting effect. Filtering assemblies are consequently used ubiquitously in the industry to remove these entrained solids. Sand screens have been used for decades and generally work well for their intended purposes. More recently, different operating parameters has supported interest in other filtering media such as beaded matrix assemblies.
Beaded matrix assemblies comprise a number of rounded beads that are typically braised together to form a porous solid that is configured during the manufacturing process to fit into a selected housing. One drawback is the impact that the braze has on the porosity of the beaded matrix since the braze itself requires a minimum surface area contact to be strong and is difficult to control as it flows. Braze itself also renders beaded matrixes not NACE compliant, which is increasingly important in downhole installations. Another drawback is that the heat of brazing can be deleterious to the longevity of the resulting products. Since downhole assemblies are long term installations, improvements are always welcomed by the art.
A method for making a beaded matrix includes positioning two or more beads near one another; accelerating the two or more beads toward one another; and impacting the two or more beads with one another so that electrons are shared between molecules thereby fusing the two or more beads together.
A downhole system includes a tubular string positioned in a borehole; and one or more beaded matrix assemblies in fluid communication with the string, the one or more assemblies having two or more beads sharing electrons between their respective molecules forming the matrix.
A NACE compliant downhole system includes a tubular string positioned in a borehole; one or more beaded matrix assemblies in fluid communication with the string, the one or more assemblies having two or more beads sharing electrons between their respective molecules forming the matrix; and an absence of NACE noncompliant materials in the beaded matrix assemblies.
Referring to
The matrix illustrated herein is produced by collecting together a number of beads 14, 16, etc. each comprising a metal alloy, and joining the beads to one another at contact points by magnetic pulse welding or electrohydraulic forming. The processes employed are commercially available from BMAX ZI Thibaud 30 Bd de Thibaud, Toulouse France and utilize a magnetic field in a magnetic pulse welding operation or a hydraulic shock wave in an electrohydraulic forming operation in order to accelerate adjacent components, here the beads, (and hence their molecules) into one another such that the resulting collision causes the molecules to share electrons in their outer valences, see
In some embodiments the beaded matrix is formed in thin layers, see
In one embodiment the matrix is formed and positioned within a housing, such as that shown in
One advantage of the configuration and method disclosed herein is that the resulting beaded matrixes (using for example nickel chromium alloys or nickel alloys) are NACE compliant which has never been possible in the art because of the braze that has heretofore always been required in order to produce any kind of beaded matrix. Another benefit of the present invention is that the pressure ratings of beaded matrixes produced as taught herein are vastly superior to those of beaded matrixes of the prior art. The pressure ratings achievable with the beaded matrixes of the invention are on the order of six times the psi ratings braze based matrixes normally attain which are limited to on the order of 5,000 psi to 10,000 psi depending of the geometry and size of the media.
Referring to
