SPE/IADC 79914

Directional Drilling with Casing

Tommy Warren, SPE, Bruce Houtchens, SPE, Garret Madell, SPE, Tesco Corp.
Copyright 2003, SPE/IADC Drilling Conference
This paper was prepared for presentation at the SPE/IADC Drilling Conference held in
Amsterdam, The Netherlands, 1921 February 2003.
This paper was selected for presentation by an SPE/IADC Program Committee following
review of information contained in an abstract submitted by the author(s). Contents of the
paper, as presented, have not been reviewed by the Society of Petroleum Engineers or the
International Association of Drilling Contractors and are subject to correction by the author(s).
The material, as presented, does not necessarily reflect any position of the SPE, IADC, their
officers, or members. Electronic reproduction, distribution, or storage of any part of this paper
for commercial purposes without the written consent of the Society of Petroleum Engineers or
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Abstract
Drilling with casing has proven to be an effective method of
reducing drilling costs and solving drilling problems. Most of
the current Casing Drilling* activity is focused on drilling
vertical wells, but interest in directional wells is increasing as
the benefits of Casing Drilling in straight holes are
demonstrated.
A directional Casing Drilling system has been run sufficiently
to prove that directional drilling with casing can be practical
with casing sizes from 5-1/2 to 13-3/8. The system uses a
wireline retrievable directional drilling assembly, positioned in
the lower end of the casing, to replace the conventional
directional tools used when drilling with drill pipe. These
tools have been used to drill to inclinations greater than 90o
and have been retrieved and re-run at inclinations ranging
from vertical to horizontal.
The directional Casing Drilling system can be used for a broad
range of directional applications to capture the proven
advantages of Casing Drilling that have been demonstrated for
vertical wells.
Introduction
Growing commercial activity shows that drilling with casing
is gaining increasing acceptance as a practical method of
reducing drilling costs and solving drilling problems.1,2,3,4
This activity includes both onshore applications where the
entire well is drilled with casing and offshore applications in
the Gulf of Mexico and Gulf of Thailand where only the first
hole section or two are drilled with casing.
Most Casing Drilling activity has been focused on drilling
vertical intervals, but interest in drilling with casing in
*

Casing Drilling is a trademark of Tesco Corp.

directional wells is increasing as the processes for drilling

straight holes become proven, the benefits of Casing Drilling
are demonstrated, and more versatile tools become available.
Vertical wells can sometimes be drilled with casing using a
simple system consisting primarily of a special bit attached to
the casing that can be drilled out to run subsequent casing
strings. But when there is a need to drill with a motor without
rotating the casing or the section cannot confidently be drilled
with a single bit, then a retrievable drilling assembly that can
be recovered and re-run is required. Even some sections that
can be drilled with a drill-out bit may be more cost effectively
drilled with a retrievable system.
A retrievable Casing Drilling system is required for directional
wells because of the need to recover the expensive directional
drilling and guidance tools, the need to have the capability to
replace failed equipment before reaching casing point, and the
need for quick and cost effective access to the formations
below the casing shoe.
The Tesco Casing Drilling system provides the versitile tools
required for successful directional drilling operations. A
wireline retrievable directional drilling assembly, positioned in
the lower end of the casing, replaces the directional tools used
in a conventional BHA. These tools have been retrieved and
re-run at inclinations exceeding 90o. The casing can be
reciprocated and circulation maintained while running or
retrieving the tools to assure that the casing does not
become stuck.
The directional Casing Drilling system has been used with 51/2, 7, 9-5/8, and 13-3/8 casing to drill deviated wells
with relatively low inclinations. The system has also been
used with 7 and 5-1/2 casing to drill several test wells with
inclinations that approached or exceeded horizontal.
Successful directional Casing Drilling operations require more
than simply having directional tools available that can be run
below the casing. BHA response may be quite different when
drilling with casing as compared to drilling with conventional
systems. Torque and drag must be managed through selecting
the casing connections, stabilization, and operational practices
at the well site. Special surface handling equipment is often
required to make the Casing Drilling process efficient.
The following paragraphs explain the processes that are used
to directionally drill with casing, highlight some of the issues

SPE/IADC 79914

that must be addressed when planning these operations, and

discusses some of the testing and field applications where the
system has been used.
Casing Drilling Process
The directional Casing Drilling system is composed of
downhole and surface components that provide the ability to
use normal oil field casing as the drill string so that the well is
simultaneously drilled and cased.6 A wireline retrievable
drilling assembly is suspended in a profile nipple located near
the bottom of the casing. The drilling fluid is circulated down
the casing ID and back up the annulus between the casing and
well bore. The casing is rotated from the surface with a top
drive for all operations except slide drilling with a motor and
bent housing assembly for oriented directional work.
The Casing Drilling BHA normally consists of a pilot bit with
an underreamer located above it to open the hole to the final
wellbore diameter. The pilot bit is sized to pass through the
casing and the underreamer opens the hole to the size that is
normally drilled to run casing. For example, an 8-1/2 pilot
bit and 12-1/4 underreamer may be used while drilling with
9-5/8 36 ppf casing.
Other downhole tools in addition to the bit and underreamer
are used as appropriate. For vertical drilling, stabilization
would normally be included on the assembly and for
directional drilling a steerable motor, MWD, and non-mag
collar would be included in the BHA.
The drilling assembly is attached to the bottom of the casing
with a special tool, shown in Fig. 1 and referred to as the
Drill-Lock-Assembly (DLA). The DLA provides the ability to
connect conventional drilling tools with rotary-shouldered
connections to the casing and facilitates running the tools in
and out of the casing.

Seals

Axial Lock
Axial Locator
Torque Lock
Rotary
Connection

Figure 1: Drill lock Assembly (DLA).

Drilling tools is that tripping them must be faster than tripping

conventional tools. This dictates that wireline rather than drill
pipe be used for running and retrieving tools.
The original tools used for most of the Casing Drilling field
applications reported in the literature were restricted to near
vertical wells because of the design of the DLA and running
and retrieving tools.1,4 As experience was gained with the
original tools and the requirements for directional work
became better understood, a new generation of tools
was developed.

The casing string is attached to the top drive with a Casing

Drive System (CDS) without screwing into the top casing
coupling. The CDS, shown in Fig. 2, includes a slip assembly
to grip the interior of large casing or the exterior of small
casing and an internal spear assembly to provide a fluid seal to
the pipe. The use of the CDS speeds up the casing handling
operation and prevents damage to the threads by eliminating
one make/break cycle.
Connections are made in a similar way to drill pipe
connections - either in the mouse hole or over the rotary table,
depending on the particular equipment that is available. The
CDS usually includes hydraulically activated single joint
elevators to pick up casing out of the V-door to facilitate
connections.
Using the CDS and power slips allows casing connections to
be made as fast as drill pipe connections, minimizes floor
activity while making a connection, and increases rig
floor safety.
Retrievable Downhole Tools
A fundamental philosophy used in designing the Casing

Figure 2: Internal Casing Drive System.

SPE/IADC 79914

These tools preserved the proven capability of the DLA to

axially and torsionally lock and un-lock the drilling BHA to
the casing, seal in the casing to direct the drilling fluid through
the bit, locate the DLA in the profile without relying on
precise wireline measurements, and bypass fluid around the
tools for running and retrieving. New features added to the
tools allow them to be run and retrieved in deviated wells with
inclinations higher than 90o, allows the DLA to be released
before running the wireline, increases the strength of the axial
and torsional locking system, increases the fluid bypass area
and places most of the tool complexity in the running and
retrieving tools rather than in the DLA that is subjected to
drilling forces and vibration.
Figure 3 shows the steps involved in retrieving the tools after
drilling with a directional assembly. Step 1 shows the DLA in
place at the end of drilling, but the BHA below the DLA is not
shown. At this point the casing shoe would normally be about
80 to 120 ft above the underreamer which corresponds to the
deepest full gauge hole. In step 2 a dart (pump down release
tool) is pumped down the casing while the well is being
circulated and prepared for the wireline trip. In step 3 the dart
has landed on the DLA and pressure is applied to release the
DLA from the profile nipple.
As soon as the DLA is released, one or two more joints of
casing are picked up and the casing is washed over the
directional BHA. This assures the DLA is released before
running the wireline, protects the BHA while the wireline
tools are being run, and allows the casing to be landed near
TD if this is casing point. Step 4 shows the wireline retrieving
tool being run to pull the BHA from the well. For high angle
wells the retrieving tool can be pumped down and functions as
a locomotive to pull the wireline into the well. Step 5 shows
the BHA, DLA, and dart being pulled from the well with
the wireline.
The wireline retrieval system can be used with 13-3/8 and
smaller tools, while a drill pipe running/retrieval option is also
available for all of the tools. The DLA has a relatively large,
full open bore (2.75 for 7 casing DLA) to minimize pressure
losses and to facilitate any wireline operations that might be
needed for the drilling BHA suspended below the DLA.
The directional drilling BHA used with the Casing Drilling
system normally consists of a pilot bit, underreamer, steerable
mud motor, MWD, and non-magnetic drill collar(s). This is
similar to the assembly that is commonly used for
conventional directional drilling, except the mud motor is
often smaller than would be used for conventional directional
work in the same size hole. A magnetic MWD tool is
normally used for steering, which requires a section of non
magnetic collars between it and the casing shoe. This extends
the bit and underreamer to 80120 ft below the casing shoe.
The smaller motor required for some sizes of casing limits
motor power, but this is of little consequence for casing sizes
larger than 7. Similarly, the smaller motor is more flexible
than would normally be used and this coupled with the
inability to place full gauge, rigid blade stabilizers above the

Figure 3: Steps required to retrieve directional tools.

motor can make the directional response a little more difficult
to predict and control.
A final difference between the Casing Drilling and
conventional directional assemblies is that the bend in the
motor is limited by the fact that the assembly must pass
through a smaller casing size. The clearance between the
motor and casing is less than would exist around the open hole
and motor for conventional directional work. In general,
though, an adequate bend angle can be run to drill the
maximum curvature that is safe to use when drilling
with casing.
Directional Casing Drilling System Testing
Some of the early tests with the Casing Drilling system were
conducted to prove that the system could be used to drill
directionally, to explore the limits for which Casing Drilling
could be used, to determine criteria for the type of tools that
would be needed to provide a practical directional drilling
system, and to develop operational practices for directionally
drilling with casing. These tests were conducted near Tescos
Calgary office with Casing Drilling Rig 1, which was
designed and built for use in testing Casing
Drilling equipment.
Wells with inclination as high as 86o were drilled with 5-1/2
casing and as high as 90o were drilled with 7 casing in these
first test wells. These tests proved that it was possible to
directionally drill with casing at relatively high build rates, but
the prototype tools used for the work were somewhat limited.
There was no pump-down capability for either running or
retrieving the tools, thus the highest inclination that the tools
could be run and retrieved with wireline was about 45-50o.

SPE/IADC 79914

When the inclination exceeded these values, the casing had to

be partially pulled out of the hole to trip the BHA. The tests
also demonstrated a need to develop underreamers specifically
for directional Casing Drilling.
Once the second generation pump-down, pressure set tools
were developed, as discussed above, another round of
directional testing was conducted with 5-1/2, 7 and 13-3/8
casing. These tests were designed to demonstrate controlled
guidance of the borehole while Casing Drilling, work out bugs
in the tools, develop operational procedures for the tools, and
define the limits of the practical application of the tools.
Table 1 lists the intervals that were drilled while testing
directional Casing Drilling tools and procedures. A total of
13,951 ft were drilled in test wells at inclinations up to 91.5o
with three different sizes of tools. While this table shows the
scope of directional work that can be done with Casing
Drilling techniques, the two tests described below illustrate the
capability of the Directional Casing Drilling system.

Casing
Size

Depth
In

Distance Avg Build Maximum

Drilled
Rate Inclination

In.

Ft.

Ft.

Deg/100 ft

Deg.

5 1/2

633

1362

8-12

86

5 1/2

1010

507

10-14

60

1712

1216

6-8

90

1747

465

4-6

10

5 1/2

610

1995

6-8

70

1325

1552

6-8

54

2398

1411

6-8

93

5 1/2

827

2309

6-10

91

5 1/2

1913

1149

4-6

84

13 3/8

328

1985

2-3

19

Table 1: Summary of test conditions with Directional

Casing Drilling tools.

7 casing tests: A test well was drilled with the second

generation DLA and 7 23 lb/ft buttress L-80 casing to
simulate the build section of a shallow horizontal well. The
objective of the test was to demonstrate that the casing could
be used to drill from vertical to horizontal while maintaining
directional and build rate control. A 5, 7/8 lobe, 3.8 stage
motor with a 1.15 bent housing was used for the work. The
section was drilled with a single PDC bit with 13 mm cutters
and a variety of PDC underreamers. The average build rate
over an inclination range of 1o to 90o was 5o/100 ft.
The well was kicked off and built to 34o inclination with a
ratio of sliding to rotating of 34%. At this inclination, a
tangent section was initiated by drilling in the rotating mode.
This section included one short slide where the motor was
oriented to low side. The build was resumed and the angle
built to 54o, but in the process, two consecutive surveys

indicated a build rate in excess of 8 o/100. This occurred after

drilling two 25 ft slides separated by rotating only 13 ft. This
curvature approached the endurance limit for the casing and it
was decided to plug the well back to the tangent section and
start again rather than risk a fatigue failure of the casing.
The well was plugged back while using the 7 casing as the
drill string and was sidetracked with the directional Casing
Drilling system using a 1.5o bend in the motor. Drilling
resumed with a 1.15o bend and the build continued to 89o
where a tangent section was again drilled with no difficulty.
Table 2 shows more information about the directional
response observed during these tests.

Depth,
Ft.
1654 - 2329
2329 - 2453
2453 - 2840
2566 -3086
3086 - 3457
3457-3831

Avg. Build
Inclination, % Slide
Rate,
deg
deg/100 ft
1.3 34.4
34
4.6
34.4 34.5
3
-34.5 54.4
42
6.0
Plug back and sidetrack
35 - 69
35
5.88
69 - 89
46
4.75
89 89.7
4
--

Max .
Build
Rate
6
-8.12
7.76
6.69
--

Table 2: Directional performance while drilling with 7 casing.

The well probably includes a higher ratio of sliding to rotating

than might be used to accomplish the same directional
program conventionally. There generally was little difficulty
in sliding, but the ROP was substantially reduced during the
slides as is commonly seen in conventional wells.
13-3/8 casing tests: Casing Drilling Rig 1 was moved to
Houston and used to drill a directional well with 13-3/8 54.5
lb/ft J55 casing. The well profile was designed to build at
about 2.25o/100 ft to 20o and hold angle before drilling a
decreasing inclination section. This profile was chosen to
represent the most severe directional program that would
normally be encountered when drilling surface hole with 133/8 casing and would test the ability to kick off and build
angle in very soft sand sediments.
The drilling assembly consisted of a 12-1/4 Series 1-1 milled
tooth bit, 12-1/4 x 16 underreamer, 8 motor with 1.5o bend
angle, 8 MWD, and 8 flex non-magnetic collar. After the
directional drilling had begun, the soft sediments around the
20 conductor washed out. The directional work resumed
after sixteen inch surface casing was drilled in and cemented
at 406 ft.
The upper section of the hole was extremely soft where
drilling rates of several hundred ft/hr could be obtained with
very little WOB. Sliding 80% of the footage resulted in an
average build rate of 1.5o/100 ft down to a depth of about
1,100 ft where the formations firmed up. Below this point the
build rate increased to 2.0o/100 ft with about 60% of the
footage drilled sliding.

SPE/IADC 79914

The motor orientations are extremely easy when drilling with

the casing because there is very little twist between the surface
and motor. For example, Fig. 4 shows the tool face for about
5 minutes during which time the motor stalled, the drill string
was picked up, and the motor re-started. The tool face
changed less than 10o when the string was picked up and went
back to its original position when drilling resumed.

Motor
Stalled
Resumed
Drilling

Figure 4: Toolface change during motor stall and re-start.

Throughout the testing, a positive mud pulse MWD was used
without any difficulty in receiving the signals through the
DLA and large diameter casing. Both the signal strength and
noise ratio while Casing Drilling were the same as is typically
seen when drilling with a conventional drill string. No
degradation of the positive pulse MWD signal was
experienced with the smaller casing sizes either, but negative
pulse tools seemed to be less effective and it was sometimes
problematic to get good signals with them.
Directional Control:
The examples discussed above
demonstrate that directional wells can be drilled with the
Casing Drilling system. The following paragraphs describe
some of the issues that should be considered when selecting a
BHA to be used with the Casing Drilling system for either
deviation control or directional drilling.

In the simple situation of vertical drilling, it would seem

logical that stabilization could be placed on the lower portion
of the casing to provide an effective means of deviation
control. Stabilizing the casing to center it in the hole should
allow the stiffness of the casing to aid the bit in drilling along
a straight path. Unfortunately this does not always work.
Several attempts were made to do this in South Texas with 7
casing.4 Stabilizing the lower end of the casing resulted in
high lateral loads and one-sided wear on the stabilizers and did
not provide adequate deviation control. Better deviation
control was provided by stabilization on the casing when
drilling with 4-1/2 casing without a retrievable BHA
in Wyoming.2
The root cause of the stabilizer wear and poor deviation
control is that the casing is not straight. This may result from
a variety of reasons such as the casing having hook ends or
mis-alignment of the four machining operations required to
cut the boxes and pins at each connection. In some cases the
pipe may be straight when it leaves the mill, but may not
remain straight due to residual stresses left from the
manufacturing and straightening processes.
Measurements of 7 casing shows that the run-out from the
axis of the coupling on one end to centerline of then pipe at
the other end may be several inches. Figure 5 shows the
measurements indicating that the run-out follows a normal
distribution with a maximum value of 2.6 for the coupling
end and 1.8 for the pin end for this particular sample (40
joints) of pipe. The coupling end consistently had larger runout than the pin end. Using this 7 casing as the drill string
may require several hundred pounds lateral force at each
coupling just to deform it sufficiently to fit into a straight,
gauge hole, even though the angular mis-alignment at the
connection may be only about 0.25o.

Cumulative Sample No.

The inclination was built to 19o at 1,684 ft where a tangent

section was initiated. Drilling continued with 100% rotation
to drill a 240 ft tangent section. The inclination decreased at a
rate of 0.14o/100 ft while drilling the tangent. A drop was
then initiated by sliding two joints and then continued by
sliding 50% of the remaining footage. This resulted in a
controlled decrease in inclination from 18.7o to 13o to provide
an average drop rate of 1.65o/100 ft. The build section
included a slight right turn and the drop section included a
slight left turn to demonstrate directional control as well as
inclination control.

40
30
20
Coupling
Pin

10
0

0.5

1.0

1.5

2.0

2.5

3.0

Axis misalignment over joint length, in.

Figure 5: Measured pipe run out for 7 casing.

However, this lateral force may provide a beneficial effect by

mechanically building a filter cake to reduce lost circulation
events.5 But it also may cause wear on the hardfaced
stabilizers and will cause them to enlarge the borehole. Even
if these issues were resolved, it would be difficult to impart

SPE/IADC 79914

the stiffness of the casing to the retrievable drilling assembly

without increasing the complexity of the system used to
attachment the BHA to the casing.

assembly drills a smooth, straight hole, which is then opened

sufficiently to provide clearance around the casing. The
casing follows this path with little difficulty.

An alternate method of providing deviation control at the bit

was developed rather than trying to find a better way to take
advantage of the casing stiffness. The casing is used to
transmit mechanical and hydraulic energy to the BHA, but the
BHA is intentionally decoupled from the stiffness and lateral
motion of the casing. Stabilizing the drilling assembly in the
pilot hole between the pilot bit and underreamer provides the
deviation control.

This is a little more difficult to accomplish for directional

wells when using a conventional steerable motor. Figure 7
shows the typical motor assembly that is used for directional
work while Casing Drilling. Because of the need to drill
without pipe rotation for a portion of the hole, the underreamer
must be placed below the motor, which places it directly
above the bit. A full gauge (pilot hole) stabilizer is
incorporated into the underreamer immediately below the
cutters to assist in drilling a smooth curve.

Under gauge stabilization is still used on the bottom of the

casing to provide centralization for cementing and to make
sure the casing is not inadvertently run into a severely
undergauge section of hole.
The BHA must be stabilized in a way that allows the hole to
be drilled to a diameter larger than the casing with tools that
can be withdrawn through the casing. This precludes using
any fixed-blade stabilization above the underreamer. Placing
all the stabilization in the pilot hole and then opening the hole
to full diameter with an underreamer positioned above the
pilot BHA provides good directional control while
maintaining the retrievability of the BHA.
A relatively limber spacer collar connects the top of the
underreamer to the DLA to partially decouple lateral motion
of the casing from the underreamer. The DLA is generally
positioned about 20 ft above the casing shoe so that any
eccentric rotation of the casing is not rigidly transferred to the
underreamer. However, the overlap between the casing and
spacer collar still provides some limits to the lateral deflection
of the BHA. Use of this type of assembly, shown in Fig. 6,
has proven to provide effective deviation control. It has also
significantly reduced the rotating torque by drilling a smoother
hole than any configuration of casing stabilization that has
been tried.
The fundamental principle employed for providing good
deviation control performance is that a stabilized pilot

Casing
Internal BHA
External BHA
Stabilization

Profile
Nipple

DLA

Crimp-on
Stabilizer

Stabilizer

Underreamer

No full gauge stabilization can be placed on the BHA between

the casing shoe and the underreamer. As discussed above, for
larger sizes of casing this does not pose any problem. Both
the 7 and 13-3/8 Casing Drilling system were steered up,
down, right, and left within the desired range of parameters.
In smaller hole sizes, higher build rates are often desired and
the directional control is a little more difficult with an
unstabilized steerable motor assembly. It is much easier to
build inclination than to drop inclination with the smaller
motor and MWD assembly. For example when drilling with
5-1/2 casing with a 4-3/4 pilot bit, 7-1/2 underreamer, and
steerable motor with 1.5o bent housing, it was easy to achieve
controlled build rates as high as 10o/100 ft. But once the
inclination reached horizontal the motor would not drop angle
even when oriented to low side with 100% slide. Running an
expandable stabilizer above the top of the motor eliminated
this problem, but introduced another complexity to the BHA.
Choosing the motor bend angle to run with the Casing Drilling
system involves an additional consideration to that required
for conventional drilling. The motor, bit and underreamer

Internal BHA

External BHA

DLA
Stab.

NonMag

Motor

Spacer
Collar

Stabilizer
Casing
Crimp-on
Stabilizer

Spacer
Collar

Crimp-on
Stabilizer

pony
collar
Stabilizer
PDC Bit

Figure 6: Deviation control assembly.

MWD

Stab.

Underreamer
PDC Bit

Figure 7: Retrievable directional drilling assembly

SPE/IADC 79914

must pass through the casing that may be only slightly larger
than the motor housing. This limits the bend angle to one that
might be less than would be used to conventionally drill at the
same desired curvature. The smaller bend angle increases the
amount of sliding relative to rotating, but this is not all bad
because it tends to limit the maximum local borehole
curvature needed to achieve the desired average curvature.
An ideal assembly for providing directional control would be
to run a rotary steerable system in the pilot hole below the
underreamer. This would provide a more constant build rate
and eliminate the normal problems associated with sliding, but
might present a significant economic hurdle for less expensive
rig operations.7
Well Selection Criteria
It is possible to drill directionally under some quite extreme
conditions with the Casing Drilling system, but some
candidates wells are much better for this process than others.
It is important to establish criteria for selecting potential
applications that will lead to both technical and
economic successes.
Technical criteria: Directional drilling with casing is in its
infancy and much more progress can be expected in the future
as a broad range of tools become available to use with it. But
at the present time, directional drilling with casing smaller
than 7 is somewhat limited. The small size of the motors that
can be used with 5-1/2 casing leaves the bits underpowered
and provides limited directional control. Directional drilling
with the small motors can be accomplished, but it is most
competitive in places where it provides an enabling
technology. It is certainly a viable option when there are no
alternatives for getting the casing into the well.
Directional drilling with 7 casing becomes much more
practical with the currently available motors and guidance
systems. The motors used with larger casing sizes are
sufficiently powerful and robust so that they do not limit
performance. The directional work is often conducted at
shallower depths and at lower build rates with the larger
casing sizes, which also make the guidance more effective.
In most cases the OD of the casing used for drilling is larger
than the OD of the drillpipe and collars that would be used to
drill the same size hole. This results in an increased stiffness
which increases the magnitude of the reversing stresses that
occur when the pipe is rotated in any particular curvature.
These reversing stresses cause fatigue and limit the build rate
that is practical for any given size and grade of casing.
The fatigue characteristics of drill pipe are reasonably well
known, but much less data is available for casing and casing
connections. Data discussed by Warren indicates that K55
casing is slightly more susceptible to fatigue than is grade D &
E drill pipe for the same magnitude of reversing stress.8 This
data indicates that if the reversing stress magnitude is kept
below about 12,000 psi (based on pipe body calculations),
fatigue should not be a major consideration.

Drilling with bending stresses somewhat higher than 12,000

psi will not result in an immediate catastrophic failure of the
pipe. This fact allows the Casing Drilling system to be used in
situations where the curvature exceeds the maximum
allowable average values for short intervals. But a fatigue
failure is much more likely to occur after a finite number of
rotations at these higher stresses. It is best to design the well
with a curvature substantially below the endurance limit to
tolerate the inevitable higher dog-legs that will occur while
drilling with a steerable motor. When dog-legs greater than
the endurance limit occur, casing rotation without axial
advancement of the casing should be limited.
The coupling design can also significantly affect the
endurance limit for the casing. The suggested 12,000 psi limit
is based on using a connection with a tension efficiency of
100% and one that has relatively good fatigue characteristics.
Common buttress connections generally satisfy these
conditions, as do many premium couplings. Historically there
has been little consideration given to casing coupling fatigue
properties because it was not important for normal casing
applications. Because of this, some connections having very
high torque ratings may have relatively poor fatigue
performance and not be suitable for use in Casing Drilling.
The 12,000 psi endurance limit for K55 casing can be
extrapolated to other casing grades using standard techniques.9
A maximum allowable curvature for different sizes and grades
of casing can then be calculated that will prevent the
endurance limit from being exceeded. Table 3 shows
suggested values that could be used for some typical
casing strings.
Casing
Size
5.5
7
9.625
13.375

Casing
Weight
17
23
36
54.5

Casing
Grade
P110
L 80
J55
J55

Maximum
Curvature
13
8
4.5
3

Table 3: Maximum allowed curvature for various

weights and grades of casing.

Torque and drag considerations also affect the determination

of whether a particular well is a good directional Casing
Drilling candidate. Factors that affect torque and drag when
drilling with casing include all the ones that affect drill pipe
drilling but more.
In a very general sense we can consider that the normal
contact force, the friction factor, and effective rotating
diameter determine the torque required to rotate the casing. In
many situations with larger casing, the aggregate normal force
while drilling with casing in a directional well is greater than
when drilling with drill pipe because the casing weight is
greater. The effective diameter of the casing is also larger
than for drillpipe drilling. Both of these effects can contribute
to higher rotating torque with casing. If the hole is tortuous,

SPE/IADC 79914

then the stiffness of the casing may contribute significantly to

the torque.

time associated with lost circulation, and the ability to save the
well when a problem does occur.

The torque observed in some cases while Casing Drilling in

directional wells has been higher than expected. For example
Fig. 9 shows the torque measured in the 7 casing test well
while tripping out with and without non-rotating centralizers
on the casing. The lower curve shows the torque calculated
from the directional surveys with a typical torque model using
a friction factor of 0.4.10 Including a tortuosity of 0.6 o/100 ft
increased the calculated torque only slightly. At first it was
thought that the elevated torque was caused by the stiffness of
the casing that is not included in a traditional torque and drag
model. Using a finite element model that includes the pipe
stiffness (but no tortuosity) to calculate the torque at TD gave
essentially the same results as the method that ignores
pipe stiffness.

The primary advantage of directional drilling with casing is

that it allows these types of advantages to be captured for
directional wells. The directional Casing Drilling system does
offer greater ease in orienting a steerable motor and faster
tripping time for changing BHA components, but the actual
penetration rate probably suffers a slight penalty when drilling
with smaller casing. For larger casing sizes and less severe
directional profiles, the benefits of Casing Drilling can be
captured with no loss in directional efficiency or
penetration rate.

Rotating Torque, ft-lb

12000
10000
8000

No Centralizers
With Centralizers
CM, no tort.
CM, 0.6 tort.
FE model

6000

Once these benefits are identified, then the technical criteria

associated with directionally drilling with casing may be
evaluated to determine if the directional objectives can be
achieved while drilling with casing.

4000
2000
0
1000

In evaluating directional candidate wells for Casing Drilling, it

is best to first identify wells that have specific problems that
may be solved by Casing Drilling. These may include things
like reducing lost circulation trouble time, driving the casing
to a deeper depth in troublesome formations such as depleted
zones, drilling through unconsolidated formations, reducing
trip time in high cost operations, or using a smaller rig for
infield drilling off a platform.

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

4000

Measured Depth

Figure 9: Measured torque for high build rate well.

The torque could be reduced temporarily by pumping a sweep

of nut plug, but this affect seemed to be caused by a
reduction in the friction factor rather than removing a buildup
of cuttings from the hole. The elevated torque is probably
caused by an interaction of the tortuosity and the stiffness of
the casing, but a build up of cuttings in the hole can not be
ruled out as a cause of the increased torque. This higher
torque was also seen on the 13-3/8 directional testing.
This is not to say that the torque while Casing Drilling in a
directional well is always higher or that it is always a limiting
factor. It simply means that the torque should be calculated
and evaluated for the particular well geometry, fluid type,
casing coupling capacity, and top drive torque rating that is
being considered for each application. So far, experience
while Casing Drilling directional wells also indicates that it is
prudent to anticipate that at some point in the drilling the
torque may be higher than calculated by the normal torque and
drag model using normally accepted friction factors
and tortuosity.
Economic criteria: There are a number of benefits of Casing
Drilling that results in cost savings.5,6 Primary among these
are the reduced time required for tripping, reduced trouble

Directional Field Examples The Directional Casing Drilling

system has been use to drill directional wells in two different
commercial applications. In the first application it was used to
drill the surface holes to 3,332 ft and 3,838 ft with 53.50 lb/ft
9-5/8 casing for two offshore wells.1 The directional work in
these wells was required for collision avoidance for wells
drilled from a jack-up rig counter-levered over an
older platform.
The first well was drilled with a 1.5o bent motor and the
second well was drilled with a 1.83o bent motor. No difficulty
was encountered in kicking off the wells, steering to the
proper inclination and heading and then dropping the
inclination back to vertical. The average curvature obtained
while sliding with the 1.83o bent motor was 4.3o/100 ft.
A single shot gyro tool was used for the initial orientations and
as soon as the magnetic interference from the existing wells
was cleared, the remainder of the well was steered with a
conventional MWD. The torsional stiffness of the pipe made
the directional orientations extremely simple and fast.
The penetration rate while Casing Drilling was similar to a
conventional offset drilled with the same directional profile
drilled immediately before the Casing Drilled wells. As
shown in Fig. 10 the ROP for the Casing Drilled was slightly
better than the conventional offset (187ft/hr vs 159 ft/hr) down
to 2,400 ft. Below this point, wear on the carbide cutting
structure of the underreamer affected the ROP. This would
not have been an issue if PDC cutters had been used on the
underreamer instead of the carbide cutters that were used.
Even so, the on-bottom rotating time for the Casing Drilled

Casing Drilled

500
400

Conventional Offset

300
200
100
0
500

1500

2500

Cumulative Time, hrs

Penetration Rate, ft/hr

SPE/IADC 79914

3500

250
200

well was 25.4 hours compared to 18.9 for the offset, while the
connection, reaming, and surveying time was 25.6 hrs
for the Casing Drilled well compared to 27.3 hrs for the
conventional well.
The directional efficiency on the Casing Drilling well was
similar to the conventional well, requiring 12 slides (316 ft) to
accomplish the directional objective compared to 11 slides
(234 ft) for the conventional offset.
This offshore well was drilled with prototype Casing Drilling
tools and required the drilling assembly to be pulled with
drillpipe because no wireline unit with adequate load capacity
was available. While the process worked effectively, it did
not result in a direct time saving over drilling the well
conventionally. The major learnings from drilling the wells
was that they could be drilled easily with the directional
Casing Drilling tools, but that the BHA recovery system
needed to be faster and that a means needed to be developed
for releasing the tools so that casing could be run to bottom
and landed in the wellhead before recovering the BHA. The
experience from these wells was one of the main drivers for
developing the second generation directional Casing
Drilling tools.
The second example of Directional Casing Drilling is a
directional well drilled with 7 casing in South Texas. This
well was drilled as part of a package of vertical wells where
the Casing Drilling system had proven to provide advantages
for reducing the lost circulation in weak zones commonly
encountered about mid-way through the 7 intermediate
casing section.
The well was drilled to the kick-off point with the Casing
Drilling system. The straight hole BHA was retrieved and the
directional assembly was run on wireline. The well was
kicked off and built to the desired inclination of 7.9o at the
intermediate casing point of 6,705 ft. The directional BHA
was retrieved with the wireline and the casing cemented.
A direct offset with a similar directional plan was drilled
conventionally immediately following this well.
The
conventional well lost circulation at about 2,000 ft. and

Directional Drilling

100

Lost circulation

50

Drill to KOP

Conv.
Well

Measured Depth, ft.

Figure 10: Comparison of ROP while Casing Drilling

and conventionally drilling similar wells.

Trip out & run casing

150

Casing
Drilled

Figure 11: Casing Drilled well benefited from faster

process and eliminating lost circulation.
required two days to recover. The conventional well required
9.3 days from spud until the 7 casing was run compared to
6.1 days for the Casing Drilled well as shown in Fig. 11. The
conventional well drilled a slightly longer section (902 ft) than
the Casing Drilled well (705 ft), but they both progresses at
17.5 ft/hr for the directional work when the directional drilling
and directional tripping time are included.
This example shows the Casing Drilled well captured value
because of the process being somewhat faster (saving one day
due to reducing tripping time). But also using the Casing
Drilling system to drill the upper troublesome lost circulation
zone allowed the well to be drilled with no losses before the
directional drilling assembly was quickly inserted with the
wireline, thus capturing another benefit of Casing Drilling.
Conclusions
Casing Drilling of directional wells provides a practical
alternative to drilling the wells conventionally and then
running the casing as a separate process. It assures that the
casing can be run to TD and it captures many of the savings
that have been proven while Casing Drilling vertical wells.
For larger sizes of casing, no loss of efficiency occurs while
drilling with the steerable tools below the casing. This allows
the operator to take full advantage of the faster tripping and
trouble avoidance benefits provided by Casing Drilling.
Directional drilling with smaller size casing may sacrifice
some drilling efficiency due to the requirement to use smaller
motors and is most advantageously applied in situations where
the Casing Drilling system provides an enabling technology
rather than an improvement in efficiency.
Acknowledgement
We would like to express our appreciation to Tesco
management for allowing this paper to be published.
References
1.

Warren, T, Houtchens, B, and Portas, W., Casing Drilling

with Directional Steering in the US Gulf of Mexico. (Parts
I & II), Offshore, Jan & Feb 2001.

2.

Shepard, S.F., Reiley, R. H. and Warren, T. M., Casing

Drilling successfully applied in Southern Wyoming,
World Oil, June 2002, pp 33-41.

10

SPE/IADC 79914

3.

Shirley, Kathy Casing Drilling: Yielding Field Success,

The Am. Oil & Gas Reporter, Sept. 2002, pp 66 -71.

4.

Fontenot, Kyle, Warren, Tommy and Houtchens, Bruce

Casing Drilling proves successful in South Texas World
Oil, October 2002, pp 27-32.
Fontenot, Kyle, Highnote, Joe, Warren, Tommy and
Houtchens, Bruce Casing Drilling Activity Expands in
South Texas SPE 79862, SPE/IADC Drilling Conference,
Amsterdam, Feb 19-21 2003.

5.

6.

Tessari, R, Madell, G, and Warren, T., Drilling with

casing promises major benefits, Oil and Gas Jour.,
May 17, 1999.

7.

Warren, T. M., Trends Toward Rotary Steerable

Directional Systems, World Oil, (May 1997) pp 43 - 47.

8.

Warren, Tommy M., Casing Drilling Application Design

Considerations, IADC/SPE 59179, presented at 2000
IADC/SPE Drilling Conference held in New Orleans, LA,
Feb. 23-25, 2000.

9.

Physical Metallurgy Principles, Robert E. Reed-Hill and

Reaa Abbaschian, Chapter 21.

10. Johancsik, C. A., Friesen, D. B., and Dawson, Rapier,

Torque and Drag in Directional Wells Prediction and
Measurement, JPT, June 1984, pp 987-992.