Should a person be a consultant before being a directional driller

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Permalink Reply by Brad Davidson on January 29, 2012 at 10:03am

I have been in the drilling industry for 20+yrs...have sat in both the pushers chair and the consultants chair. I have never been in the DD chair. I (personally) see no need to. Sure over the years,you pick up what is going on thru drilling or pushing tools. Directional Drilling is a career choice that many take but its not for all. If you are consultanying then all you need to know are the parameters of the well. Its the DD job to stay within them :) 

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Permalink Reply by Van Clay Dietrich on March 18, 2012 at 4:27am

Yes!!!! I'm a consultant that has work my way up from lead tongs to pushing. Then directional drilled I have seen so many mistakes made by consultants without dd experience 

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Permalink Reply by Lucien Cline on March 21, 2012 at 11:56am

Not necessary...the directional team is responsible for steering and consultant should give them that right.  Through driller and directional team theres always communication as there should be from dd to consultant.  Company man can express concern but ultimately if conflict arrises simple communication needs to bring everyone to the same page..

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Permalink Reply by JW Hendry II on August 28, 2012 at 8:02pm

As a directional i have seen company men tell me how to drilll a directional a well. They have never been a directional driller and dont know jack crap about how it works. There is no now in directional. You are always projecting ahead. So yes they need to know how directional drilling works and what u can and cant do. Then they want to throw you under the bus when u do exactly what they say. All they see is a dogleg and its always the dogleg that causes the hole trouble.
Good luck Mr. Company men

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Permalink Reply by Peter Aird on October 23, 2012 at 12:12am

DD first then consult later.
However for me competencies are all over the place and in consistent as this indutry lack due and diligent standards.
Here my background.
In the 80's I undertook 18months rough necking, roustie, derrickman, then a 15week in house training course and exam you had to pass with 75%.
2 1/2 years AD, during which one did a correspondance course of 20sections in all drilling technical, engineering subject. Exam again you had to pass with > 75%
3 years driller, mor advanced correspondance course 11 sections, 1 1/2 days exam that you had to pass with >75% or you were out.
Then night company and then day company person.

In the late 90's I realised more technical undertsanding for more compex wells being drilled was needed. You need hands on experience and a decent undertstanding of engineering application to truly evolve a best practise in more compes wells (Horizontal, long reach, depleted, deepwater, HPHT etc). So I self financed a MSc in drilling engineering to understand the engineering bit better.
Recently I have spent 5 years office based in engineering positions all enabling me to be a better company person.

Today a well control certificate, a degree in geology, a big ego or lots ot testosterone. If you can communicate on a telephone can and i have seen are company persons. So you will find a wide range of persones and backgrounds.

I have been doing this a while and am still making mistakes (littler ones perhaps) but still learning all the time.

Unfortunately this industry is a sham where competencies and standard need to be raised to a far higher level if are ever to have safer well and rig operations .

There are however some company persons who do know however a lot about directional drilling, plus it's not just about keeping to the line there are lots of other things going on in the hole. So a good company rep should listen to all that is going on and then assure as a team we do the right things right first time. Here sometimes it pays to listen to the service hands as they vey often have good points and valid reasons to offer.

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Permalink Reply by Scott on November 15, 2012 at 11:31pm

I was never a dd but smart enough to sort through dd bullcrap. I have worked with excellent dd's and poor wanna be mwd/dd's.. I would recommend to anyone from Rough neck to engineer if your directional light in your head isn't on, get some graph paper and start plotting it out for yourself. (laterals) my personal opinion is a great dd and a great fishing tool hand will always have work.

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