BJB Company

Challenging Tomorrow with Technological Inovations Today

LINEBOAR SUCCESSFUL FIRST RUN

LINEBOAR Tool Completes the First Successful Run in a Live Liquid Carbon Dioxide Line.

 

On October 26, BJB demonstrated the first successful tool run through a live Kinder Morgan liquid CO₂ pipeline.  This run was completed in preparation for a later inline inspection.  Liquid CO₂ is a particularly challenging environment for most tools.  Within the pipeline, carbon dioxide is held at pressures of over 1700psi.  At these pressures CO₂ becomes a supercritical fluid, and can easily penetrate and swell or dissolve many materials.  In addition, CO₂ provides very little lubrication between the cups and the walls of the pipe, so most cup materials wear very quickly.

 

A mandrel fitted with two LINEBOAR urethane cups was used in this run.

The tool was placed in the launcher on the night of October 25, and then launched in the morning.  After the completion of the 30 mile trip from Big Spring to Snyder, Texas, the tool was left in the trap overnight.   In the morning, the trap was allowed to depressurize.  When the tool was removed, the cups were placed in the sun, and inspected for any damage or swelling.  Even after running in such tough conditions, no swelling was observed, and the LINEBOAR cups had very little wear, and looked almost new.  A number of small urethane bubbles were observed on the leading edge of the cup.  These appear to be caused by CO₂ permeating into voids on the surface of the cup, and it is thought that the damage is only superficial in nature.

 

Following the success of the first run, a second run was performed.  In the second run, a gauging plate was placed between the two cups, and the transmitter was bolted to the rear of the pig rather than being placed inside the mandrel as it had been in the first run.  Unlike the first run, the tool was launched immediately after being placed in the launcher. Upon exiting the trap the gauging tool rode up on a patch of CO₂ ice, and the transmitter broke off and was lost in the line.  After passing the obstruction, the cups were undamaged, and the run was completed without incident.  Again, when the tool was removed, very little wear was observed.

 

A final run was made several days later to retrieve the lost transmitter.  This time a disk/cup combination was attached to the front of the tool in order to keep the tool from riding up over the transmitter or any CO₂ ice that might be in the line.  The transmitter was successfully retrieved, and the cups once again exited the line with little wear.

 

Liquid CO₂ was chosen as one of the toughest environments we could find for testing the new LINEBOAR cups.  There is little doubt that the LINEBOAR tool could have run many more miles without trouble.  These tests successfully demonstrated that the challenges of cleaning and inspecting liquid CO₂ pipelines can be overcome.  We at BJB are looking forward to meeting those challenges.

 

                                                                                   January 1st, 2008

Above: LINEBOAR Tool after completing its 30 mile run in a Kinder Morgan liquid carbon dioxide line.