Apparatus for and method of recovering clean drilling fluid from fluid contaminated with entrained debris
OwnerJohn Astlefordinventor
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Apparatus for recovering clean drilling fluid from fluid contaminated with entrained debris comprises an input conduit for the contaminated drilling fluid, the conduit being branched whereby a portion of the contaminated fluid is delivered to a preliminary separation stage and the remainder flows to a main separation stage, each said stage comprising a screen for separating debris from the fluid. The preliminary separation stage comprises a vibrating screen and conveyor means for conveying separated debris into the remainder flow to the main separator stage, thereby increasing the proportion of entrained debris in the remaining fluid.
Claims9
Apparatus for recovering clean drilling fluid from fluid contaminated with entrained debris, comprising an input conduit for the contaminated drilling fluid, the conduit being branched whereby a portion of the contaminated fluid is delivered to a preliminary separation stage and the remainder flows to a main separation stage, each said stage comprising a screen for separating debris from the fluid, the preliminary separation stage comprising a vibrating screen and conveyor means for conveying separated debris into the remainder flow to the main separator stage, thereby increasing the proportion of entrained debris in the remaining fluid.
A method of recovering clean drilling fluid from fluid contaminated with entrained debris, comprising passing a portion of a fluid flow containing entrained debris through a preliminary separation stage in which a portion of the fluid is separated, and passing the remainder of the fluid flow through a main separation stage to separate further fluid from the debris, wherein the debris separated from fluid in the preliminary separation stage is reintroduced into the remainder of the fluid flow prior to entry into the main separation stage.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.