Recently, the newly developed XJ27.5 million-meter vehicle-mounted workover rig developed by Petrochemical machinery successfully completed many tests and was put into use in the 5-5H well of the Shunbei oil and gas field, successfully filling the gap in the field of ultra-deep workover operation equipment, marking the entry of China's workover engineering technology and equipment level into the era of 10,000 meters deep.

In recent years, deep-sea, deep-water, and unconventional oil and gas exploration and development have gradually become the mainstream, and higher requirements have been put forward for oil and gas equipment.Ultra-deep oil and gas wells with a depth of more than 9,000 meters have high bottom pressure and high temperature, making mining difficult.Without excellent workover equipment, oil and gas wells cannot resume production in time, and the overall economic benefits of oil and gas exploration and development cannot be guaranteed.Petrochemical machinery is tailored to needs, accumulates into tools, and continuously improves and strengthens in the fields of workover equipment, laying a solid foundation for high-quality exploration and development.

Electric hybrid drive automated workover machine at the construction site

Innovation.Optimize and strengthen workover equipment technology

Oil and gas wells may fail at any time during the production process, causing production to be reduced or even discontinued.At this time, workover machines are needed to be used to lift and lower drilling tools, clean up well shafts, repair wellhead devices, etc., to ensure the smooth progress of oil and gas extraction.

Foreign operating equipment is represented by the C-series workover rig developed by National Oil Well Huagao (NOV). It adopts a self-propelled or towed chassis structure with a maximum hook load of 57~181 tons. The whole machine has a lightweight structure, user-friendly operation and easy maintenance, and can achieve rapid transportation and installation, but at the same time there are problems such as long delivery times, high prices, and inability to improve operating capabilities to meet the needs of deep well operations.

Facing the problem of ”stuck neck", domestic enterprises represented by Petrochemical machinery, Nanyang Second Machinery, etc. have completed the transformation of workover equipment research and development from 0 to 1 and from 1 to N after years of technology accumulation and innovation. The technical level has been continuously improved and the product range has been continuously improved. Now it has realized the overall parallel operation with multinational companies, and has reached the international leading level in terms of grid-connected energy storage electric drive workover, ultra-deep well workover, and wellhead pipe column automation processing equipment.

“Scientific and technological innovation must have a technical base and underlying logic, and it cannot be done alone or with a beard.For petrochemical machinery, it is to focus on the development of ultra-high-pressure structure technology, ultra-high-hard material technology, ultra-high-energy control technology, and ultra-high-precision manufacturing technology, accelerate the development of new-quality productivity, and make characteristic advantages."Wang Junqiao, chairman of Petrochemical Machinery and secretary of the Party Committee, said.

After more than 40 years of deep cultivation, petrochemical machinery has undergone technology introduction, digestion, absorption and independent research and development, and has run out of “acceleration” on the workover equipment track.Especially since the “14th Five-Year Plan”, with the blessing of the “Four Super” technology, the company has conscientiously implemented the national digitization strategy and greening strategy, and formed a cross-professional R&D and innovation team with the goal of maintaining the dominant structure of the workover. It has overcome the problems of integrated workover transportation, large crane offset, and difficult integration of the main vehicle, and has developed equipment that can be disassembled and assembled quickly, efficiently and economically, so that the workover can develop to a larger hook load and higher power, from traditional diesel drive to oil-electric hybrid and all-electric drive, from conventional multi-person cooperative operation to unmanned wellhead. Automatic pipe column processing, from multi-function module configuration to integrated and efficient integrated matching, continuously expands the new functions of automated workover equipment and polishes the background color of “intelligent and low-carbon”.

“Finding strategic resource replacement areas in deeper and older strata is an inevitable choice for our country's oil and gas industry to ensure energy security. The ultra-deep and ultra-deep layers have become the main positions for major oil and gas discoveries in our country.To better serve 'deep-earth engineering’, the research and development and manufacturing of workover equipment must keep up."Li Zhe, head of research and development of petrochemical machinery workover equipment, said.

Adhering to this belief, petrochemical machinery has accelerated the pace of research and development. A number of domestic and world-first workover machines, such as XJ900 all-electric drive workover, XJ900 grid-connected energy storage workover, XJ1350DB and XJ1600DB all-electric drive workover, and XJ27.5 million-meter vehicle-mounted workover, have been launched one after another to help workover operations improve quality and upgrade, and oil and gas exploration and development move into deeper formations.

Ready-to-go SXJ900E all-electric workover

Pursuit.Forging tools for ultra-deep oil and gas development

In recent years, the central energy companies represented by Sinopec and PetroChina have made many major breakthroughs in the exploration and development of onshore ultra-deep oil and gas in our country, driving our country's ultra-deep oil and gas exploration and development to the forefront of the world.The 10,000-meter vehicle-mounted workover is one of the representative equipment achievements.

Sinopec Shunbei Oil and Gas Field is one of the few ultra-deep oil and gas reservoirs in the world, with an average buried depth of more than 8,000 meters and the deepest well of more than 9,300 meters.With the deepening of development, many oil and gas wells with a depth of more than 8,000 meters are facing workover problems.In the case of insufficient maximum hook load capacity of traditional workover rigs, Northwest Oilfield was forced to adopt the method of modular drilling rig workover. Although it can meet the needs of workover, the relocation cycle is long, the operation cost is high, and the safety risk is high.

Aiming at the technical gaps in the equipment for workover operations of ultra-deep oil and gas wells, Petrochemical machinery has formed a R&D team with 15 people as the core. Through adequate technical preparation and on-site practice, it has continuously enhanced the function of workover equipment, improved operational efficiency and safety.

There are a thousand threads above and a needle below.The overall development plan of the ultra-deep well workover is the key to the success of equipment research and development, and the top-level design must be done.

Since July 2022, petrochemical machinery R&D personnel have been stationed at the workover site of the Shunbei oil and gas field, focusing on on-site research, determining the key input conditions and main technical parameters of the equipment, and based on this, 12 kinds of ultra-deep well workover overall plans have been formulated, and cross-professional personnel have been organized within the company for multiple reviews to select 5 better solutions, and then organize oilfield site experts and well site operators to jointly review, and finally select the most suitable plan recognized by everyone.

Although the final plan is theoretically optimal, it is really difficult to implement.It is necessary not only to ensure that the load of the workover is greatly increased, but also to realize the rapid disassembly and transition of the workover. How can we “have both fish and bear's paw"?The petrochemical machinery R&D team used actions to give the answer.

After more than 11 consecutive months of scientific research and research, in July 2023, the world's first 10,000-meter vehicle-mounted workover machine was born: the maximum carrying capacity of the eight-axle heavy-duty chassis reached 104 tons, which was 14.29% higher than the conventional workover chassis, which solved the problem of integration and transportation; the first set of fast rope with the largest pull force on-board winch in China realized a 22% increase in the capacity of the high-power winch, and the weight increased by only 3.4%; the input torque of the high-torque power parallel vehicle device is 10626 nm, which is higher than the conventional workover chassis. The device has increased by nearly 10%; the 41-meter large-load mast-type derrick has the same shape, weight and displacement of the operating crane as conventional equipment, and can be integrated and transported with the workover; the modules of the 8-meter heavy-duty high-clearance base are limited to two, and the disassembly and transition are convenient, and the disassembly and assembly time can be controlled within 3 hours.

In order to fully verify the design performance of the new workover rig, the R&D team has also independently developed supporting test tooling to complete the system verification before leaving the factory to ensure the reliability of the factory equipment on-site.

In September 2023, the 10,000-meter vehicle-mounted workover started industrial testing in the 5-5H well of the Shunbei oil and gas field, and then it was officially put into operation.The complete set of equipment and 4 modules were shipped to the well site, and the on-site installation and commissioning were completed in only 6 hours, and the 8,200-meter deep side drilling and workover operation was completed within 10 days, and the use effect was good.

Keeping up with actual needs, petrochemical machinery has accelerated the application of R&D results and tailored characteristic workover equipment. At present, it can produce a full range of vehicle-mounted operating equipment with a maximum hook load of 60 to 275 tons and a workover depth of 500 to 10,000 meters. The production and manufacture of automated workover machines, 10,000-meter ultra-deep well workover machines, green energy workover machines, desert workover machines, marine workover machines, non-tension rope and self-tightening rope workover machines, double fast rope workover machines and other characteristic equipment have been widely used in oilfield sites at home and abroad.