Objective
To develop an explosive fusion bonding process to line full length of oilfield tubulars or oilfield pipe with corrosion resistant alloys such as stainless steels, nickel or chrome alloys.
To provide the global oil industry a lower cost alternative to solid alloys and offer them greater choice in the type of alloy they can specify. This is because the steel body of the tubular or pipe will provide the necessary strength and thus a highly corrosion resistant alloy unsuitable for use as a solid due to poor strength may now be considered seriously.
Technical innovation lies in the development of a special low gas explosive, the development and application of a high energy absorbent clamp, full understanding of explosively generated shock waves, the development of a vacuum chamber at the central part of the manufacturing process and the special application of explosive welding techniques.
The hot rolling trials at British Steel for 1990 were delayed until 1991 due to the repeated supply of out of spec material from British Steel.
A technical audit of the project by E.C. representative concluded that because the goal of the project, namely, production of an explosively clad full length tubular was being attempted by a different technique to that originally envisaged, ie. hot rolling an explosively clad pipe billet rather than explosively cladding a full length tubular (hot rolling is not new technology although hot rolling a bi-metallic pipe billet is) the E.C. would terminate further support for the project from November 30th 1990.
Work is continuing; during 1991 intensive negotiations were initiated with a German company to merge the project and continue it in their vacuum chambers. Samples of that billets have been made there for onward hot rolling by Mannesman.
Thus although from an E.C. viewpoint the project is officially ABANDONED, in reality it is ONGOING.
Some samples of explosively clad pipe made in earlier trials have been solid to a north sea operator and are now in service.
The project phases may be summarised as follows :
1) Development and Testing of Explosive
Develop and explosive that is non-toxic, has a good shelf life,
is safe and stable with a detonation velocity that can be varied between 2,400 and 3,200 m/s to order, has a low gas/mass ratio.
2) Testing and Development of Clamp Design
An energy absorbing clamp is required to support the pipe or tubular during firing.
This part of the development exercise will include;
- Design, testing and final specification of body
- Strain gauge monitoring of pressure distribution,
shock loading and strain rates
- Empirically leavened computer simulation of process
- Construction of a full size clamp for linig an lim long
tubular of 7" diameter.
3) Design and Development of Vacuum Chamber
A vacuum chamber will absorb the noise of an explosion and the gas pressures generated if the ratio of vacuum level to evacuated volum is correctly set for given explosive quantities and types.
However thereare dangers posed to executing process in a vacuum chamber.
The activities within this section therefore include :
- Conceptual design of vacuum chamber production facility.
- Research into local planning and environmental barriers.
- Research and design of fail-safe enclosure building.
- Testing of various vacuum level/volum ratios.
- Development and design of fail safe vacuum explosive
initiation interlinked systems.
4) Qualification and Testing
A wide range of tubular diameters, and material variants must be tested to oil industry, D. N. V. and Lloyds standard to ensure product acceptance.
Programme(s)
Topic(s)
Call for proposal
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DEM - Demonstration contractsCoordinator
AB1 2SL Aberdeen
United Kingdom