When there is a catastrophic pumping unit failure it is natural to wonder what happened and how this failure could have been prevented. However, the right answer may or may not be simple to find. The following list shows the most common reasons for a failure and how to prevent or minimize its occurrence in the future:
Continue reading Sucker-rod pumping units can be operated over a range of pumping speeds. It is expressed in Strokes per Minute (SPM). Obviously, this assumed that the up and down stroke of a unit forms one complete stroke cycle.
Sucker rod pumping speed can be calculated manually using a stopwatch or automatically by the mean of a pump-off controller (POC). This article will detail the manually pumping speed calculation procedure.
This article gives you some good practices and rules of thumb for optimizing beam pump applications. The following topics have been presented:
A good understanding of counterbalance is vital to the successful operation of surface sucker rod pumping units. Poor counterbalance practices can cause early failure of the gear reducer gearing and will result in excessive energy cost.
The up-stroke:
The figure above represents a simple non-counterbalanced lever system. On the up-stroke, by pulling down on the end of a beam, a man is lifting a bucket full of water having a combined weight of 150 lbs.
Note that the upstroke effort of the man is a substantial 150 lbs.
The problem of heading (flow off and pump) is often encountered in gassy wells. This heading effect which can blow the tubing dry occurs as follows:
When heading process starts, the expanding gas pushes the liquid into the flowlines and increases production for a short time. In the meantime, the liquid leaving the tubing is replaced by more and more free gas. Eventually, the tubing is blown dry and production stops until the tubing fills with liquid again.
