Fracing a well

W

Woland

500+ Posts
I got to observe the fracing of a gas well this morning. Not having any experience in this industry before, I thought it was very cool: 14 trucks, a quarter-million dollars a day, 6100 psi pressure, and 2 million pounds of sand. The technology to monitor the operation was awesome.
 
Sounds like a low pressure job. My wife has had frac jobs where the pressure was upwards of 13000 PSI (cue the sex jokes).
 
The location was in the Barnett Shale, south of Denton. I don't know if that makes a difference as to what pressure is required. Also, somehow, they were using gas from a neighboring well, if that means anything. Everything I know I learned over the din of the operation.
 
Typhoon_Se7en has a potential gas well on some of his land. I am really hoping the drill so I can see it get fraced one day, from what i hear it's quite a sight.
 
They buy their stuff from Cat not us.
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They are a customer, but not for frac pumpers. Agree about the technology aspect. Anybody can put together a pumper; blenders are a little tougher -- but the technology to run it all in sync is what's impressive.
 
The site manager was an elderly gentlemen. He said he came out of retirement just to play with the new technology.
 
Barnett Shale-They were likely using the gas to lighten up a slickwater frac with a large sand loading. It helps clean up the gas returns quicker. There is some really cool technology being used in the Barnett. For example, they can track the direction of the frac by using sensors on the surface and in adjacent wells.
 
In 1969 - I was on a Frac Crew for Halliburton working the summer in Gillette, Wyoming (godforsaken place). I drove the mixer truck. Basically we were on 24 hour call and ended up going out to frac a well every day the whole summer. Awesome job.

Watching 5-6 trucks all hooked up - blowing sand and glass down the tube at massive pressure was cool. Dangerous but cool. I never got to be a part of "cracked frac" (where something goes wrong and all hell breaks loose with pipes flying) but I did hear stories.

Thanks for bringing back some great memories of that summer - I had forgotten about my fracing days.
 
I have 3% in three wells. I don't know if that will amount to much, but (as my brother-in-law says) it will be better than getting hit in head.
 
Ther are FRACturing the rock formation that holds the oil or gas to make it flow better. They do this by pumping high pressure gas (fluids?) down the well to expand the formation and create zillions of tiny cracks. to hold the cracks open they pump sand or micro glass beads down the well to prop the tiny cracks open.
 
MrPhelgm is correct. A lot of wells that have been drilled and were productive, will stop up or seal. The rock or formations will just seal up around the pipe and the oil and gas will not flow. Since the oil companies have a few million invested in drilling these wells - they call in "frac" crews to fracture the wells (open em up again) so that the wells become producers again. It's much like a Roto-Rooter for your sewer system ... on a massive expensive scale.
 
Being an ex-Petroleum Engineer.....don't forget acidizing wells. THAT was fun (smelly but fun). My last frac job was with Western Co for around $500K back in the 80s. I am sure things (ie technology ) have really changed.
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What is so cool is I can claim that looking at Hornfans is job related! Who needs a frac pumper? Look, I just made a sales pitch!
 
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