Otis Engineering Corporation

Continental Oil Company

John V Fredd

William G Hill

Michael B Calhoun

John W Tynan, Deceased

Benjamin E Kearney

A ball valve with cooperative cranks for rotating the ball valve in which the cranks run in arcuate waffle plates having intersecting lands and grooves and wherein the ball valve is spherical and retainer rings cooperate with the ball valve to hold the cranks in engagement with the waffle plate even when pumping through the valve and moving the ball valve away from an upper seat while retaining the ball valve actuator in the closed position.

Valve

A method and apparatus for annulus flow systems in which a safety valve controls flow adjacent the packer and the safety valve is operated by control of tubing pressure exerting an upward force on the valve operator and an urging device such as a weight string of tubing exerting a downward force on the operator. In one form the control valve is a foot valve below the packer which is automatically closed by removal of the actuator. In other forms the control valve is removable with the tubing string and a separate foot valve may be provided below the packer, if desired. The system may be designed to close the safety valve in direct response to a reduction in pressure in the well annulus, or it may be designed to reduce or increase tubing pressure and close the safety valve in response to any well condition sensed at the surface which would include a reduction in annulus flow pressure. Provision is made for a pressure sensing instrument to be associated with the control valve and the control valve may be opened and closed by changing tubing pressure to obtain well data. In one form when the sensing instrument is removed the tubing is automatically closed. In another form after the sensing instrument is removed, a plug is run to close the lower end of the tubing.

Method and apparatus for controlling a well

An equalizing ball valve member and valve apparatus for use in a tubing string in a well bore of an oil or gas well to isolate a lower portion of the well bore below a packer including a body having a longitudinal bore therethrough connectible in a well tubing string, a lower annular valve seat supported in the body for limited sliding movement, fluid seal means between the lower valve seat and the body, an upper annular valve seat supported in longitudinal spaced relation from the lower valve seat within the body, an equalizing ball valve member supported for rotation between opened and closed positions between the valve seats, pivot members secured with the ball valve member for rotating the valve member, and a longitudinally movable operator member coupled with the pivot members for moving the pivot members longitudinally while permitting the members to traverse an arcuate path as the ball valve member rotates between an open and closed positions. The ball valve member has equalizing flow courses which reduce valve and valve seat wear and improve operating characteristics. The valve apparatus is useful in various types of well installations for production and testing procedures. The ball valve member is useful in various valve apparatus design.

Equalizing ball valve member

A well test apparatus in which a by-pass sleeve valve lands in a previously set packer. A lock mandrel assembly lands in the sleeve valve and carries a transducer fitting. A transducer is releasably carried in the fitting. Well conditions such as pressure may be sensed by the transducer and recorded or transmitted to the surface. By manipulation of casing pressure, the by-pass valve may be opened and closed to flow the well at high production rates with the transducer in place.

Well test apparatus

A sleeve valve which may be made up as a part of a tubing string in which the valve member has two positions. Dogs carried by the valve member alternately cooperate with spaced grooves in the body in said positions. The dogs are alternately engageable by a shifting tool to shift the valve member in opposite directions and after the valve member has been shifted, the dogs are disengaged from the shifting tool. The valve is disclosed as a part of a testing system employing a circulating tool, a cushion valve, a seal unit, and a landing nipple with a transducer fitting.

Apparatus and system for testing and producing a well in which the well is controlled adjacent the producing formation and may be shut-in or permitted to flow at the discretion of the operator. The well may be tested under flowing or shut-in conditions and after testing is completed the tubing may be hung off in the well with the well shut-in adjacent the producing formation.

Apparatus for and method of operating a well

A well testing system and method in which a by-pass valve is positioned in the tubing and a probe run on a line from the surface opens and closes the valve with vertical movement of the probe. The probe when landed in the valve is exposed to formation fluids and may transmit back to the surface, or may record information about the formation. The probe may also collect a sample of fluid to return to the surface with the probe.

Method and system for well testing

A valve which may be made up as a part of a tubing string, preferably by removably landing the valve in a landing nipple. The valve is of the sleeve type and the gap through the valve member is held to very close spacing when the valve member gap passes over the seals in the body and is then permitted to expand when the valve member is in open position. The valve is disclosed as a part of a testing system employing a packer, a foot valve, a seal unit and a landing nipple in which the valve is supported.

There is disclosed a testing system employing a circulating tool, a cushion valve, a seal unit packer with a foot sleeve, and a landing nipple with a transducer fitting. This system permits running a packer with a foot sleeve and transducer fitting and landing it in the well, and subsequently running a tubing with a circulating tool and cushion valve to land in the seal unit. Thereafter a transducer may be run on a wireline.

Actuator

An actuator for shifting a mandrel. The actuator is responsive to external ambient pressure and to internal ambient pressure and a differential in pressure shifts a mandrel carried by the actuator against the resilience of a spring. The actuator is disclosed as a part of a testing system. The system employs a packer, a foot valve, a landing nipple and a transducer fitting, all of which may be first run and landed in the well. The tubing is then run with a circulating tool and dump valve. The actuator of this invention may be run on the free end of the tubing, landed in and sealed with the bore wall through the packer and carry the actuator for opening and closing the foot valve.

A well packer and depending foot valve are landed in a well. A landing nipple depends from the foot valve. A tubing string sealingly engages the packer and includes a circulating valve. A transducer-valve fitting may be run with the packer foot valve assembly or it may be run at a later time and landed in the landing nipple. The foot valve is operated by an actuator which is positioned above the packer and is exposed to the casing tubing annulus as well as tubing pressure. The circulating valve is also exposed to casing-tubing and tubing pressure. The foot valve is controlled by the differential in pressures as is the circulating valve. A transducer may be landed in the transducer fitting and by selectively opening and closing the foot valve data may be taken from the well during both flow and non-flow conditions. After testing is completed the transducer and transducer fitting may be removed and a plug inserted in their place permitting flow thereafter through the foot valve which acts as a subsurface safety valve.

Well test systems and methods

A well valve for use in a tubing string in a well bore of an oil or gas well to isolate a lower portion of the well bore below a packer including a body having a longitudinal bore therethrough connectible in a well tubing string, a lower annular valve seat supported in the body for limited sliding movement, fluid seal means between the lower valve seat and the body, an upper annular valve seat supported in longitudinal spaced relation from the lower valve seat within the body, a ball valve member supported for rotation between opened and closed positions between the valve seats, pivot members secured with the ball valve member for rotating the valve member, and a longitudinally movable operator member coupled with the pivot members for moving the pivot members longitudinally while permitting the members to traverse an arcuate path as the ball valve member rotates between open and closed positions. The valve seals both upwardly and downwardly and is opened and closed without longitudinal travel of either seat or the ball valve member. The valve is useful in various types of well installations for production and testing procedures and is operable by manipulation of operator means coupled into the valve from an upper tubing string.

Rod operated rotary well valve

A subsurface valve for use in a well having a hinged flapper closure element and a moveable fluid pressure actuated operator element and a resilient member connecting the operator element to the closure element.

Flapper valve

A well tool for inclusion in a tubing string of a well adapted to perform multiple functions including controlling fluid flow through the tubing string and/or cutting coiled tubing or wire line used in the tubing string for performing well completion and workover functions. The tool includes a tubular body connectible in a tubing string and having a flow passage therethrough, a spherical seat surface around the flow passage developed on an eccentrically positioned center relative to the axis of the flow passage, an operator member which may function as a cutter, a valve, or a combination cutter and valve having a spherical surface engageable with the seat surface and mounted on an axis of rotation eccentrically positioned relative to the axis of the flow passage and coincident with the center of the spherical seat surface, an actuator movable longitudinally in the housing and engageable with a surface of the operator member spaced from the axis of rotation of the operator member to rotate the operator member from a first opened position to a second closed position, and return apparatus for rotating the operator member back from the second closed to the first opened position. An annular hydraulically operable piston is provided in the housing to move the actuator. The operator member is a spherical segment formed on a radius which is larger than the radius of the bore through the housing so that by pivoting the operator member eccentrically within the housing maximum torque is generated in the operator member by application of force at a substantial distance from the axis of rotation of the member by the actuator.

Well tools

A thread chaser tool with cutting edge defined by two symetrical points. The tip radii of the two points are spaced apart slightly less than the pitch of a thread to be cut. The thread form is generated by the inside flanks of each point and a crestforming radius there between. Both points cooperate in forming the long flanks of either male or female tapered threads, and both points form straight threads having two roots.

Growing community of inventors

Dallas, TX, United States of America

John V Fredd