Mud pump

A mud pump is a powerful multi-piston pump (up to 2300 kW), which is used on a drilling rig. It serves hinaufzupumpen the drilling fluid under high pressure up to 500 bar down through the drill string and the annulus again. By a replaceable piston / cylinder liners and mating the change in the speed of the drive, the pump can be adapted to different pressure and flow requirements of a deep hole. Previously mainly double-acting duplex pump came on drilling rigs with two pistons are used, these were replaced over time by single-acting triplex pumps with 3 pistons and are now used only rarely.

Construction

An irrigation pump consists of two main modules: the water supply and the drive unit.

The water supply allows with its valves, pistons and cylinder liners the actual pumping process. These parts are subjected to heavy wear by the abrasive drilling mud. The pumps are designed so that these wear parts can be easily replaced. In order to reduce pulsations in the drilling fluid, the pulsation dampers can be attached to a suction - like on the pressure side of the pump.

The drive unit converts rotational motion of the drive into the oscillatory motion of the pistons. For this purpose a crosshead crank mechanism is used. Most mud pumps are so constructed that the pump is a large gear mounted on the crankshaft. The external motor drives, via a belt or chain drive of an internal step-down gear, which in turn drives the gear on a pinion shaft.

Recent Developments

Newer Spülpumpenentwicklungen have more pistons, Quintuplex or Hexaplexpumpen (5 or 6) or replace the combination of internal gears and belt drive by a single gear direct drive pumps.