Analysis of drilling failure in soft and hard sandwiching of coal seam

• The thermal related effects on the wear performance of polycrystalline diamond compacts were studied.
• The crystal structure of the PCDs soaked at different temperatures was investigated.
• The morphologies of the worn surface of PCDs with different soaking temperatures were examined.

The severe abrasion of drill bits will be confronted during drilling in soft and hard sandwiching of coal seam. Not only does this failure result in the increasing consumption of bits, but also it delays the construction period, significantly extending the duration of the delay, even causing borehole instability, resulting in a catastrophic buried well accident. In order to reveal the failure causes, the authors of this paper researched the wear properties of the tooth of bit. As the thermal damage is one of the main threats to drilling failure in soft and hard sandwiching, thermal related effects on the wear performance of polycrystalline diamond compacts (PCD) were studied by an Amsler friction and wear testing machine. Meanwhile, silica sands were added to the interface of wear couples throw a funnel instrument to meet the demand that wear conditions correspond more closely to those in actual coal seam drilling. The friction coefficient and wear rates was measured. The X-ray diffraction analysis was used to investigate the chemical composition and crystal structure of the PCDs soaked at different temperatures. The morphologies of the surface of PCDs were examined by metalloscope and scanning electron microscopy. The results show that the wear rate and wear coefficient all rose with the increase of wear load. So the drilling load over proper operation limits especially when the equipment stuck happened is the primary threat to bit failure. On the other hand, the wear coefficient is not sensitive to the soaking temperature when it is under 700 °C. But it decreases obviously when the temperature was over 800 °C, which seems to be corresponding to the graphitization of diamond and the oxidation of Co. This phenomenon indicates that the high temperature over 700 °C is the main cause of the drilling failure.