WELL INTEGRITY

LOGS
DOWNHOLE CASING INSPECTION
OVERVIEW
Casing inspection measurements are used to examine the casing or
tubing in a well. Unless the inspection is of the tubing, the assessment
of pipe condition is not a through tubing operation, and requires pulling
of the tubing and casing and killing the well. Scale and other buildup on
the inside of the casing may affect the tool response, and therefore a
bit and scraper run is usually required to clean up the hole prior to
running the survey.
 Applications
• The applications of the log include the location of pits, leaks, and holes in the
casing. With some equipment, a pit on the outside can be discriminated from one
on the inside wall of the pipe. A caution should be noted about hole detection.
Holes smaller than 1/8 in. (.4 cm) diameter are difficult to detect with any of the
instruments.
• larger defects such as pits may be easily detectable, but cannot easily be discrim­
inated from smaller holes through the casing. Larger holes are easily detectable.
• Perforations are detectable since they are expected and are oriented in a
predictable pattern.
• If small holes which are producing an undesirable fluid need to be detected,
temperature or other fluid movement logs may be better suited to their detection.
Application:
• These tools are helpful in assessing the overall condition of pipe, whether
it is to evalu­ate the suitability of changing a producing well to an injector,
assessing the condition of intermediate strings during drilling operations,
or determining the financial value of pipe before plugging and abandoning
a well. Corrosion management is an important applica­tion. Certain surveys
are necessary for proper cathodic protection planning. Often surveys are
run on a time lapse basis to monitor the progress of corrosion with time.
Proper com­binations of tools discussed herein even afford the
opportunity to detect serious damage to the outer of two concentric
strings of pipe.
Types of Inspection Equipment
Generally, there are a number of approaches to casing inspection, all
using vastly differing technologies. They are:
• Mechanical Calipers :examine the inner pipe surface.
• Electro Magnetic Tools: examine and discriminate the inner from
outer pipe surface and may shed light on concentric casing strings.
• Acoustic Devices: assess the pipe ID, surface roughness, and wall
thickness.
• Borehole Video Cameras: provide an actual view of damage or lost
equipment downhole.
• Casing Potential Profiles: foresee electrochemical corrosion and are
the basis for cathodic protection.
 MECHANICAL CALIPERS
Tool Configuration
The mechanical calipers are among the simplest and
most accurate measurements of the inside condition
of pipe. The tool is centralized with an array of fingers
or arms which reach out to the inside casing wall. The
arms are tungsten carbide tipped for wear and, when
released downhole, spring loaded to press against the
pipe wall. Typically, such a tool can have from 40 to 80
fingers, depend­ing on the tool design. The coverage is
not 100% since a gap between the fingers will exist.
The tool is insensitive to borehole fluids. Such tools
are available on electric wireline for real time surface
readout and also available with downhole recording
devices for slick line or pump down applications.
 MECHANICAL CALIPERS
Mechanical Caliper Log Presentation
The Figure here shows a typical log presentation for a 40
finger caliper. The upper part of the figure shows a piece of
casing with a slot at A, a swelled casing section at B, and
perfora­tions at C. The right-hand tracks of the log show the
traces across this casing interval for each of the individual
40 fingers, with radius increasing toward the right. The split
at A shows up on a single finger, the swelled casing at B
shows up on all fingers, and the per­forations at C show up
on four fingers. On the left-hand track, the minimum and
maxi­mum as seen among the 40 fingers is recorded. Such
min/max presentations help high­light the gross number of
defects on a piece of pipe. Prior to the development of
tools capable of recording each finger and sending that
data to the surface, the min/max pre­sentation was all that
was available (some equipment could do a min/max
measurement over discreet segments of the perimeter).
Indeed, sometimes only the max was shown.
 BOREHOLE VIDEOS
Equipment and Presentation:
• In a sense, borehole videos are the ultimate tools to assess conditions downhole. The prob­
lems can be viewed directly without significant interpretation.
• There are two basic types of operational tools available. One takes continuous movies viewed
in real time at the surface. The other takes only snapshots, as fre­quently as 9 seconds or
faster between photos.
• Without a doubt, the continuously run tool is more useful. However, it must be run on a
special line, either a coaxial cable or a fiber optic cable.
• The snapshot tool can be run on a convention wireline.
• Coaxial cable units set up inside of a coil tubing unit are also available for horizontal borehole
inspection logging.
• Another drawback is that the fluid in the well must be clear. Most videos run to date have
been done in wells where the borehole was filled with filtered water or blown down with
nitrogen to provide a clear fluid for logging.
BOREHOLE VIDEOS
Applications:
• Fishing jobs are a natural to see the fish and select the proper equipment to catch it.
• Oil and possibly gas entries can be identified.
• Serious damage and scale can be detected.
• Perforations can be inspected.
• For a frac job, the perforations taking the proppant can be identified.
• Needless to say, this equipment only looks inside the casing and outside damage will
not be evident unless it has progressed through the casing.
• Furthermore, if quantification of metal loss or depth of pene­tration of pits is desired,
these tools are of little use.
POINTS TO REMEMBER
• Types of casing inspection surveys include mechanical calipers, electromagnetic, acoustic,
video, and potential surveys.
• Mechanical calipers examine only the inside of the pipe.
• Mechanical calipers may show only the maximum, the max/min, or the response of each
finger to damage.
• Electromagnetic tools evaluate the total wall of the pipe and can discriminate inside from
outside damage.
• Acoustic tools can also evaluate the total wall and discriminate inside from outside dam­age.
• Except for the phase shift device, all tools need a prior bit and scraper run to clean the pipe
inside.
• Casing inspection tools are larger diameter and not generally through tubing tools unless
designed to examine the tubing.
• The mechanical and electromagnetic tools are insensitive to borehole fluids.
• Casing potential profiles requires a non-conducting fluid, although equipment is available for
conductive fluids.