Page 22 - Shale Shakers Drilling Fluid Systems
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HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE 5
A Mud Cleaner in the First Commercial Application. This installation, in Pecan
Island Field in Louisiana, occurred within one year after the patent was submit-
ted. The mud cleaner consisted of a manifold arranged for eight, 4-inch hydro-
cyclones mounted above a single-deck, round Sweco shaker. This was the first
well in this field that casing could be reciprocated while cementing.
The First Mud Cleaner installation. In 1971, Power Rig #10 was drilled M. J. Foster
in South Louisiana. The mud cleaner concept had previously been tested in a 1,900-
foot well near Houston, Texas. This unit consisted of a Sweco shale shaker, five feet
in diameter, receiving solids from the underflow of two, 12-inch desanders and
twenty, 4-inch desilters while circulating a potassium chloride drilling fluid. The rig
shown has a degasser mounted on the mud tank in front of the mud cleaner skid
and a centrifuge mounted on top of the tank after the mud cleaner. The mud cleaner
skid was covered by a tin roof with additional lighting to facilitate sampling.
