Testing of a cornering water-jet-drilling system for drilling horizontal holes in coal

Conference · Thu Jan 01 04:00:00 EST 1981

OSTI ID:6266204

Love, S L; Timmerman, K M

Sandia National Laboratories is developing a drilling system which uses high pressure water jets to drill horizontal holes in a coal seam which is accessed through a vertical borehole. These horizontal holes can be drilled for the purpose of draining methane before mining begins or for creating linkage paths between vertical boreholes in a linked vertical well underground coal gasification process. In two years of work, the elements of the water jet drill which have been developed and tested are the drilling head, an articulated drill string, and an instrumentation system for directional control and hole mapping. In the most recent field tests, six to eight inch diameter holes of up to 102 feet long were drilled into a coal seam accessed at the face of a surface mine pit. A quarter scale laboratory model of the cornering device has been built and tested to evaluate the design, and hardware is being built for the full scale version. Tests of the complete round-the-corner system will be performed later this year.

• Research Organization: Sandia National Labs., Albuquerque, NM (USA)
• DOE Contract Number: AC04-76DP00789
• OSTI ID: 6266204
• Report Number(s): SAND-81-1720C; CONF-810923-5; ON: DE81027603
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

01 COAL, LIGNITE, AND PEAT
010404 -- Coal
Lignite
& Peat-- Gasification
012000 -- Coal
Lignite
& Peat-- Mining
42 ENGINEERING
420206* -- Engineering-- Mining & Drilling Equipment & Facilities-- (1980-1989)
BOREHOLE LINKING
COAL DEPOSITS
COAL SEAMS
DEGASSING
DESIGN
DIRECTIONAL DRILLING
DRILLING
DRILLING EQUIPMENT
EQUIPMENT
GEOLOGIC DEPOSITS
HYDROGEN COMPOUNDS
JETS
MINERAL RESOURCES
OXYGEN COMPOUNDS
PERFORMANCE TESTING
RESOURCES
TESTING
WATER